Illini vs. Illini

As I was flying to Denver for a long overdue break from the everyday trappings of my life, I started to compare being an Illini football fan versus an Illini basketball fan, and the similarities are mind-boggling. I started by comparing Rejus Benn to Mike Davis, and then just ran with it. Here is what I came up with.





Arrelious Benn vs. Mike Davis - When watching Rejus, all you want is to get him the ball in space and let him run people over or run around them. Watching Mike Davis all you want is to get him the ball in space inside the 3 point line, and let him pull up and hit a jumper, or go hard to the basket. Both have prototypical size for the next level(Davis does need 25 more pounds). Both are becoming the face of each program. Each player is from the east coast. The only difference is that Rejus was a major recruit, while most people didn't recruit Mike Davis because they thought he was going to prep school for a year. Both are the most exciting player for each team, and fans absolutely love them. While Rejus can make the spectacular catch down field, he is more of a possession receiver, just like how Davis can jump out of the gym and have spectacular dunks in transition, he is still mainly a good spot up shooter inside of 18 feet.



Juice Williams vs. Chester Frazier - Both came into college raw and played as freshman and were completely in over their heads. Juice was forced to try and turn around a program that was playing miserably, Chester was expected to take Dee Brown's place and continue the success that Illinois had had for many years. Both are tough as hell and grew up in bad neighborhoods. Both have had fans calling for them to be benched for unproven players, and both have overcome that to have great years, while they both still make some mistakes. Both Juice and Chester are the proven leaders of their teams. Both replaced total d-bags in Tim Brasic and Brian Randle.



Martez Wilson vs. Bill Cole - Both were highly rated and highly recruited out of high school, and so far both have under-achieved. Martez was supposed to be the prototypical weakside linebacker for our cover 2 scheme because he had amazing speed to go with his size. Bill Cole had been running the motion offense for 4 years and was supposed to have the easiest transition to the program for any of the incoming freshman. Coming in as freshman we were told as fans that both are very close to starting. As sophomores, it seems as though either both have regressed, or somebody was blowing a ton of smoke up our asses.



Vontae Davis vs. Demitiri McCamey - Both of these players are the most talented players of their respective sports, and the knock on both of them from their head coaches is that they don't work hard enough. Vontae shows flashes of being a 1st round pick, but also is a little cocky and sometimes gets out of position because of it. Demitri has shown in games that he can take over games and possibly be an early draft pick like Deron Williams was if only he would work hard, but he doesn't all of the time. Both players were benched by their coaches in order to send a message that they need to change their attitudes and work hard all of the time.



Britt Miller vs. Trent Meacham - Both players are local products and both are loved by people in the Champaign area. Each player worked very hard in the last 3 years to become a viable option at their respective position in the Big Ten. Britt Miller put up great numbers as far as tackles and sacks went, but he did that against teams that were not as good as Illinois. Trent Meacham will score at least 15 and hit 3-4 3's against weaker opponents. The knock on both is that they don't step up in big games, and don't make the big plays when the team needs them too, unlike Vontae Davis and Demitri McCamey.



Donsay Hardemann vs. Dominique Keller - Both were awesome in JUCO, and Illini fans eagerly awaited their debuts. Both are outspoken on their teams and bring a lot of enthusiasm and energy to their teams. For Donsay, fans had to wait a little while for that big hit and big play, but we all knew it would come. Dominique was the second leading scorer in JUCO last year, so we were all waiting to see if he was going to be able to do that at this level, and he had back to back great games scoring. Each still makes mistakes that has their coaches upset, but people are already looking for them to be leaders for next years teams. Not only, on the field, but also vocal motivational leaders in practice.



Jeff Cumberland vs. Mike Tisdale - Both players are freaks of nature as far as size, and you will be hard pressed to find their equivalent anywhere else in the NCAA. With Cumberland, he is so much bigger than any corner that he faces that you expect him to just dominate, and he showed flashes in games this year of what he could be, but he is so inconsistent that it is frustrating as hell, and he still drops a lot of balls. Tisdale towers over pretty much everyone he plays, to the point where you think it is almost unfair, but he is also inconsistent, and gets pushed around too much, he also drops too many balls. In some games the mismatch is ridiculous and these players exploit it and put up huge numbers, in other games they disappear.



Eddie McGee vs Jeff Jordan - The backup is always the favorite of every fan base. Both players see some playing time and at times show unbelievable athleticism, but if they had to start at QB or at PG the team would absolutely fall apart because they are not nearly as all-around talented as the people who play ahead of them. Everyone has seen Eddie McGee run, but everyone has also seen him fumble every other time he runs. Jeff Jordan brings the same defensive intensity that Chester Frazier does, but he is an even bigger liability on offense, he makes poor decisions with the ball, and is very easily forced to pick up his dribble in horrible spots on the floor. Everyone will still love both of them, and the Illini fan base will debate whether or not these two should start every time the actual starter has a bad game.



Jarred Fayson vs Alex Legion - Both are transfers from power programs (Fayson from Florida and Legion from Kentucky), and both are supposed to be electrifying scores. Fayson was considered to be one of the best receivers in high school, and Legion one of the best shooting guards. Both were ranked on Rivals top 100, and everyone is waiting for them to play. Each could have been used in the year that they had to sit out because of transferring, but each should contribute immediately.



Now I'm sure you could probably do this for any team in the country, but if you really think about it, there are a lot of really strange coincidences when it comes to the players of each of these teams. I tried for 3 days to come up with something for Calvin Brock, but I couldn't think of anything for him, so I guess it doesn't work for everyone.