Illinois Athletic Director Josh Whitman hosted his annual media roundtable on June 21 at Demirjian Park. The roundtable discussion began around 1 p.m. after a lunch meet and greet for local media members beforehand.

Whitman spoke for around 70 minutes and took questions from reporters in the conference room for another hour. The contents of his speech largely recapped the 2022-23 season for all of Illinois Athletics, as well as a discussion of future plans regarding the Big Ten expansion, the ins and outs of the Name, Image and Likeness bills in collegiate sports, the changes in leadership across the Big Ten and NCAA and future projects for facilities.

Whitman began by thanking reporters for their hard work and dedication to covering Illinois athletes. Whitman specifically pointed out the efforts that were made by reporters to cover Illinois at the NFL Draft.

“I thought the NFL Draft was a great example, the way that you spread out across Kansas City, Canada and Florida was really impressive and very much appreciated,” Whitman said. “Thanks to all of you for the great work that you’re doing and I know I speak on behalf of all of our fans and everybody associated with our programs, you provide tremendous insight.”

Whitman then got into congratulatory statements and showing appreciation for the Illinois golf program, which has been historically successful during Whitman’s tenure.

“I want to celebrate two weekends ago,” Whitman said. “What a weekend that was for Illinois golf, just a remarkable experience for everybody.”

Whitman followed up by talking about how multiple teams made huge strides.

“This was a year that we have been building toward [throughout] my tenure,” Whitman said. “We were one of the 14 schools in the country to put our football, men’s and women’s basketball teams into the postseason.”

However, Whitman did not refrain from acknowledging the realities of what each team experienced in their postseason runs. Neither of the three programs won their postseason games.

“Obviously we would like to see more success once we get there,” Whitman said. “That’s the next step for us, trying to position our programs to experience not only the postseason opportunity to experience postseason depth and performance.”

Following his remarks on the postseason experiences for each respective team, Whitman applauded the efforts of the golf, gymnastics and track teams.

“We captured two team Big Ten Championships in both men’s and women’s golf,” Whitman said. “We had three individuals bring home national championships, two in men’s gymnastics and one in women’s track and field.”

Whitman also applauded the classroom success that student-athletes experienced over the course of 2022-23, mentioning a 95% graduation rate and combined GPA of 3.45 across both the fall and spring semesters.

“It was our 25th and 26th consecutive semesters with our student-athletes posting GPAs above 3.0,” Whitman said. “About 70 percent of our student-athletes are in the GPA of 3.0 or better, just a remarkable achievement.”

Illinois also had an athlete win the Wayne Duke Postgraduate Award from the Big Ten for the second time in program history. In fact, it was the second year in a row that it happened.

“This year we made it a repeat performance,” Whitman said. “Diana Brown on the volleyball team was the second consecutive Illini to earn the award, as Blake Hayes was the first to win it in school history a year ago.”

Whitman kept emphasizing the success that programs had this season while thanking the fans for their support, specifically mentioning the trip to Las Vegas for a men’s basketball game.

“One of my all-time memories was to see the turnout that we had in Las Vegas,” Whitman said. “To be able to walk up and down the strip within the day and see the orange and blue out and about, while hearing people talk and then to see the scene in the arena.”

Aside from the on-field product, Whitman recalled the financials and success the school has had selling season tickets for the football team.

“We have now sold nearly 8,000 new season tickets and we think we will surpass 9,000 before the season opener,” Whitman said. “This year we had a 92 percent renewal rate which is the highest that any of us can remember, [which] speaks volumes about the excitement that people have.”

Whitman took questions following his personal remarks varying from attendance to NIL thoughts. Whitman spoke about the incentives to get students to attend more games for underrepresented sports.

“We have tried to create various incentive programs over the years where they come to events, get points and can qualify for different kinds of rewards,” Whitman said. “We want to create a space that makes them want to be there because of what happens on the court, what happens during the dead balls and timeouts and because of who else is there.”

Whitman also discussed the future and other points across collegiate athletics, and overall, his remarks shined a light on a successful 2022-23 season across the athletic department.

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