Toledo Rockets head coach Tim Beckman has looked to be the favorite for the Illinois Fighting Illini job over the past few days, and it sounds like the deal could be announced as soon as Friday. The Associated Press reports Beckman has already told his players he'll be heading way, way out west.
(Also worth noting another Rockets coach has Twitterly critiqued Beckman's decision to leave.)
The MAC aficionados at Hustle Belt are accustomed to this sort of thing, and have turned to assessing the job Beckman did at Toledo:
But if he does leave, then let that be another tally on the MAC's wall of coaches who've stepped up from AQ conference coordinator to mid-major head coach and then to major-major head coach. If you want to get silly about it the last time someone replaced Ron Zook as head coach they won two national titles.
Beckman had an A-plus game plan against Ohio State, which they lost by five points. He did very admirably all season, from a near-loss at Syracuse to a rout of Temple - despite losing several starters on both sides of the ball. Back-to-back eight-win seasons, despite no MAC West division titles, was a dandy of a rebuild job on the fly considering where Toledo was (PAY NO ATTENTION TO THE POINT SHAVING).
For more, visit Illinois blog Hail to the Orange and MAC blog Hustle Belt, and here's our 2011 Coaching Carousel Tracker.
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