The meltdown has begun

Well it's taken 3+ seasons but the blinders are starting to come off some the fans in Illiniland. Today's homecoming loss to Minnesota has been a sobering experience for many who have been drunk on the Kool-aid for the last few years. Here's some quotes from an appropriately named thread at one of the Illini message boards:

The book on Zook
1-2 unexplainable losses EVERY season. He is now doing less with more talent when he plays IA, MN and other big 10 bottom half of the pack

Yes, unexplainable losses. But it'll be more than 1-2.

The book on zook is he never has his teams prepared for games they should win....

Bingo!

There is a reason why isnt the coach at Florida anymore....you have seen it time and again.

Yes there is.

We'll NEVER compete for a national title with Zook as coach. Never. We'll have plenty of talent, and will win 8-9 games a year. But Ron Zook is not the man you want to go through a season avoiding an upset.

No, you'll be able to compete for one right after you fire him. Of course the media will be falling all over themselves to him the credit when you do.

GMAC Bowl here we come. I think we all realized that losing Leman and Mendenhall and some OLs and our Safeties this would be a rebuilding year of sorts.

GMAC Bowl if you're lucky. By the way, what do Mendenhall, Leman and the others have in common. Hint, they weren't recruited by the recruiting master Ron Zook.

Zook=Tommy Bowden

You guys were slow to catch on but now you're getting it.

Remember some of those games his Florida teams lost? Seriously......this is exactly what UF fans warned us about.

Hahaha. We told ya so. But all of us got banned from your boards for speaking the truth.

I know that there are a bunch of elite coaches just waiting to coach Illini football. Let's just fire Zook and hire one....any suggestions?...(this is where the tumbleweed blows across the screen). Zook has been OUTSTANDING for the Illini, period.

Who was Steve Spurrier before he was Steve Freaking Spurrier? He was the coach at Duke. Who was Urban Freaking Meyer? He was the coach at Utah. How about you look at some of the coaches that have truly turned programs around in a positive direction maximizing the players they have and not complaining about the cupboard being bare? Zook is 39-40 as a head coach. At Illinois he's 16-26. Yeah, he's been outstanding. Prediction, when Zook finally gets canned as your coach he'll still be well below .500 with the Illini.

My suggestion would be to keep Zook at head coach and get a single new defensive coordiantor and a new special teams coach. Our special teams was abysmal again resulting in poor field position throughout most of the game.

Prior to being a head coach Zook was alternately a defensive coordinator and a special teams coach. Why is it that these seem to be weaknesses on this team?

Obviously there isn't enough talent.

How can the cupboard be bare four seasons into the master recruiter's era?

Maybe he needs to recruit better.

I thought that was the main thing he was supposed to be good at. Guess not.