BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — Another game, another chance gone awry, another tally on the longest conference losing streak in school history.

Another dosage of questionable playcalling. Another chance to pan a river of failure for nuggets of success.

Same Illini. Same result. Same response.

“Proud of the way this team fought,” Beckman says, game after game.

“It’s gonna come,” Beckman says, as “it” continues to pass Illinois by.

You can try resuscitation all you like, but a heart too weak won’t beat. And as far as bowl season goes, Illinois is as good as dead.

It’s tough for Illini fans as they watch Big Ten loss after Big Ten loss — almost as tough as it is being an Illini defensive back — but if you’re looking for somewhere to get off the train, consider Bloomington, Ind., your stop.

The losses were getting worse and worse: A comeback effort falling just short against Washington, a rout by a good Nebraska team, a lesser rout by a better Wisconsin team, a greater rout by a not-as-good Michigan State team, a heartbreaker to an equal opponent in Penn State. Then you have Indiana: The rare Big Ten school with less fan support than Illinois, an identical record of 3-5, a similar all-pop-no-stop offensive team. Illinois was more desperate, and Indiana was better.

For the second straight season, Illinois failed to halt a four-game losing skid against the Hoosiers, and in both cases it was backbreaking.

So you have to settle.

You shift goals, you shift expectations, you shift your understanding of what this season is about and what it means.

You would wish the seniors well, and the seniors played well. Scheelhaase got to throw the ball 57 times — which sounds like a lot of fun — and finished the game with 450 yards and two touchdowns. Both touchdowns found the hands of Steve Hull, another senior and converted safety, who left the defense at the right time and hauled in nine catches for 224 yards and the pair of scores.

On the defense, not everything was terrible. Senior Jonathan Brown nabbed an interception, and two tackles-for-loss, including one sack.

In fact, the defense had three sacks, forced two turnovers and held Indiana to under 50 percent on third down. The Illini also had four plays in which they were burned for scores of 64, 41, 50 and 75 yards. And of the seven third downs successfully defensed by Illinois, three were merely precursors to Indiana fourth-down conversions. If you factor that in, Indiana’s conversion ratio jumps to seven of 11.

The game’s most pivotal moments came on a couple head-scratching playcalls from the staff — one to not go for it on fourth-and-3 from the 33-yard line on the opening drive, the other a decision to try a fake punt on fourth-and-10 in the fourth quarter.

On the first drive, you punt the ball if you’re in a real field-position battle, where pinning a team on the 10 instead of the 30 means starting your next drive on the 50 instead of your own 20. You don’t punt when your defense is primed to give up what could have been a 1,000-mile touchdown had the field been long enough.

The coaches were making choices based off how good it’d be nice for their team to be, and not the reality they were facing. Instead, the Illini net 13 yards on the punt and immediately let Indiana assume the role of aggressor.

Then there was Justin Duvernois’ awesome fourth down pass. I wonder how Scheelhaase felt watching from the sidelines as that unfurled. Beckman made the point that had it worked, it’d be a great decision. True, but still not really a sound reason for doing something. Every day I choose not to try a backflip despite such logic.

Another game, another loss. Another brick in the wall of disappointment that has been Illinois’ performance in the Big Ten the last two-and-a-half years. It’s time for Illinois to find a different wall to climb, because the loss at Indiana means a bowl game is simply out of reach.

Eliot is a senior in Media. He can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @EliotTweet.