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A publication of The Daily Illini | Friday, November 16, 2012

ILLINI SENIORS’

SWAN SONG

Twenty Illini athletes will play

their fi nal game in Champaign

Friday, November 16, 2012 The Daily Illini | www.DailyIllini.com2

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We’re Serious About Illini Sports!

Predictions, Recaps, Player & Coach Interviews

BRIAN RAY THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Purdue quarterback Robert Marve (9) hands the ball off to running back Akeem Hunt (11) a game Saturday in Iowa City, Iowa. Purdue won 27-24 for its fi rst Big Ten victory of the season. Marve has racked up over 1,000 yards and eight touchdowns this season while sharing the quarterback position with teammate Caleb TerBush.

EYE ON THE ENEMY:Purdue quarterbackRobert Marve

BY LARA KHALAFSTAFF WRITER

In high school, Robert Marve broke three Florida records with 4,380 pass-ing yards, 48 touchdowns and 280 completions. His passing yards sur-passed the numbers put up by 2007 Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow. As a top recruit and 2006 4A state champion, Marve committed to Ala-bama but later changed his decision to Miami, where he began his college football career.

Lara can be reached at khalaf1@dailyillini.com.

Rough road from ACC to Big Ten When Marve announced his deci-

sion to leave Miami in 2008, the ad-ministration stipulated that he could not transfer to any school in Florida, regardless of conference.

Miami lifted the SEC restriction af-ter Marves’ appeal, but the university believed individuals representing his family contacted Florida, Tennessee, and Louisiana State, so those schools remained off-limits. Marve decided on Purdue in 2009, and controversy followed him to the Big Ten. In 2011, the quarterback admitted to receiv-ing improper benefi ts from Nevin Shapiro while playing for Miami, but an agreement with the NCAA al-lowed him to keep his eligibility.

Battered ACL Marve tore his ACL in 2009. As

a transfer, he was required to sit out anyway, so he didn’t miss any playing time. The next time, he wasn’t so lucky. A year later against Toledo, Marve retore his ACL, end-ing his season. Earlier this year, the quarterback replaced Caleb TerBush in the second quarter against Notre Dame and tore his ACL again. He is currently playing through the injury.

Momentum from Iowa win Despite his weak knee, Marve led

his squad to a stunning overtime win against Iowa last week, marking Pur-due’s fi rst victory in Iowa City, Iowa, in 20 years. In the game, the quarterback passed for 266 yards and tallied two touchdowns. His 17-yard run helped set up kicker Paul Griggs’ longest fi eld goal of the season. The sixth-year senior this season has racked up over 1,000 yards and eight touchdowns, while sharing the quarterback role with Caleb TerBush.

The Daily Illini | www.DailyIllini.com Friday, November 16, 20123

Illinois hopes to break 4-season senior day losing streakBY CHAD THORNBURGSTAFF WRITER

Hugh Thornton is familiar with senior day.

His freshman season, he played alongside Jon Asomoah for his last game in orange and blue before he joined the Kansas City Chiefs.

As a junior last year, he saw Jack Cornell off to the Baltimore Ravens.

But come Saturday, Thornton and his 19 fellow Illinois seniors will be the ones run-ning out onto the field for the last time as players.

“Now it’s my turn,” Thornton said. “It’s a little bittersweet.”

The Illini will look to reverse a senior day trend against Purdue, as Illinois has lost on senior day in each of the last four seasons. The last time Illinois seniors left Memorial Stadium as victors in their final game was the 2007 Rose Bowl season, when Illinois defeated then-No. 21 Northwestern 41-22 to advance to 9-3 on the season.

“My first and last senior day,” defensive tackle Glen Foster said. “It’s sad that it’s my last home game here. I’m going to leave everything I have out on Memorial Stadi-um because I’ll never be able to play here again.”

Offensive line coach Luke Butkus shared his senior day memories with his players Tuesday morning, although the conditions surrounding his final college home game were entirely different. Butkus and the 2001 Illini were competing for a Big Ten Cham-

pionship against Northwestern on Thanks-giving Day, a game Illinois won 34-28.

“It’s something that I’ll remember for the rest of my life, and I’m hoping that, regard-less of our situation right now, (offensive linemen) Graham Pocic, Tyler Sands and Hugh Thornton remember that day,” Butkus said. “This is their last day on Zuppke Field at Memorial Stadium. These guys need to make it special.”

The 20 Illinois seniors — which include four redshirt junior walk-ons who aren’t using their final year of eligibility — will be honored on the field with their families before the game.

Each senior gave a speech during Camp Rantoul in the summer that will be played on the big screen as they walk out onto the field.

“I believe it’s a special day,” head coach Tim Beckman said. “And I want it to be a special day, not just for our seniors, but for their families.”

In the midst of a seven-game losing streak and without a Big Ten victory since Oct. 8, 2011, the Illinois seniors aren’t the only ones desperate for a win. While the Illini haven’t reached preseason expectations for a team that had a top-10 defense and won a bowl game in 2011, they still hope to send the seniors off with something to celebrate.

“Our mentality is we just have to go out and have fun and execute,” Thornton said. “Do those two things, and I’m confident we can come out with a win.”

If Illinois (2-8, 0-6 Big Ten) is going to

get another victory this season, this week might be its best shot. Purdue (4-6, 1-5) has also struggled this season, though the Boil-ermakers are coming off a win over Iowa and have played close games with some of the nation’s top teams in Notre Dame and Ohio State.

“It will be another challenge for us,” Beckman said. “I think each week that you step out there on the football field in the Big Ten, every game is a major challenge.”

Chad can be reached at thornbu1@dailyillini.com and @cthornburg10.

DARYL QUITALIG THE DAILY ILLINI

Illinois’ Hugh Thornton (72) tackles a Michigan player at Michigan Stadium on Oct. 13. Thornton is one of 20 Illini seniors who will take the field at Memorial Stadium for the last time Saturday.

Friday, November 16, 2012 The Daily Illini | www.DailyIllini.com4

T erry Hawthorne lines up as he always does across from the opponent’s best receiv-er, right leg back, left leg

forward. He peeks to the Illini side-line and waits for the play, a run that is stopped by freshman linebacker Mason Monheim.

Hawthorne is taken across the field by his receiver but hustles toward Monheim, extends his hand to help his teammate off the ground and offers a chest bump that Monheim fails to real-ize is coming, leaving all 6 feet, 190 pounds of Hawthorne to awkwardly jump on the freshman.

When his fellow cornerback Justin Green breaks up a pass, again Haw-thorne is one of the first players to congratulate his teammate.

Every time his teammates make a play on defense, Hawthorne goes out of his way to offer congratulations, high fives and better-executed chest bumps.

His coaches have praised the way he’s become a vocal leader for the Illi-nois football team.

It’s a little unusual at first glance. He seems quiet and reserved. Haw-thorne often fields questions from reporters with his head held high, hands behind his back, answering with “no sir” and “yes sir” values he was taught despite growing up in a rough East St. Louis, Ill., neighborhood.

He’s not a yeller or a screamer. In fact, Hawthorne can be quiet, but he’s always brutally honest. He’s pulled freshman defensive back V’Angelo Bentley to the side before and told him exactly what he’s doing wrong, but he’ll also tell him how to fix it.

And he wasn’t about to let anyone quit, even when Illinois was officially eliminated from postseason play after losing to Ohio State on Nov 3.

“He’s a guy that has a presence,” Bentley said. “Whatever he does, he does it with pride. So you kind of pick up on things like that just as a big-brother figure.”

***After a stop on third down by the

Illini, Hawthorne claps his hands and jogs back to await a punt.

He was installed as Illinois’ return man after the former returner, Tom-my Davis, proved ineffective and prone to fumble the ball. Hawthorne crosses his heart and points up to the sky before the kick. But most of the time the ball’s just fair-caught, or he gets out the way completely.

When he has returned the ball, espe-cially on kickoffs, he’s provided the spark Illinois has needed to get some points on the board. He returned six kicks for 158 yards against Ohio State.

His speed and size make him a play-

maker. Before the season, Hawthorne was supposed to start to get more reps on offense as well. He finally got a chance last week against Minneso-ta and can likely expect to see more action against Purdue on Saturday. He began the year with an ankle injury that hindered his performance, so Illi-nois didn’t want him to worry about playing multiple positions.

On Oct. 6 at Wisconsin, Hawthorne was involved in one of the most fright-ening moments of the year for Illi-nois. Going for a tackle, he lowered his shoulder, and his head collided with Badgers fullback Derek Watt.

Hawthorne couldn’t get up. He had to be taken off the field in

an ambulance but gave the fans a thumbs-up before leaving and would make the trip home with the team. Concussion symptoms would keep him out of the Michigan game.

It’s been that kind of year for the Hawthorne.

He doesn’t have any interceptions, or big or flashy plays like he’s had in the past. During his freshman year, in what he’s called his favorite play during his time at Illinois, he ran the length of the field to tackle a Michigan receiver at the 1-yard line.

But most importantly to him, Illi-nois has lost seven straight. Through all that, he’s still one of the loudest voices, encouraging players to stay positive and to fight until the end of the season.

“To come back and be one of those guys who says, ‘I’m going to come back my senior year,’ and to have the outcomes that we’ve had, that’s hard and difficult for him,” cornerbacks coach Steve Clinkscale said. “I feel for him ... but I’m all about solutions, and Terry is as well.”

***Hawthorne didn’t have to come

back for his final season at Illinois; he would’ve been drafted. But he still has scouts coming to football games to watch him this season.

But leaving was never really an option for him.

“No, sir,” Hawthorne said.Education is too important. He will

finish classes in December and spend the spring semester interning before he graduates in May, a moment he and his family have been waiting for.

“Honestly, it’ll probably be a little bit emotional,” Hawthorne said. “Not too many guys that have come from East St. Louis and athletes that have graduated and went on to the next lev-el with their lives.”

Hawthorne lives with his single mother, older brother and older sis-ter. He admits that it was hard grow-ing up but doesn’t use it as an excuse.

When things get hard for him, in high school and this season, he had his uncle Isaac as a role model. Every day in high school, Hawthorne remem-bers his uncle in his ear, trying to keep him focused on his goal.

It worked because that’s the way Hawthorne is now. He says he doesn’t party, and outside of football, he doesn’t really do much. He’s focused on achieving his goals, and he’s now the person in the ears of his younger teammates.

When Illini players miss a class, they have to run, but Bentley joked that they also have to answer to Hawthorne.

Bentley has developed a friendship with Hawthorne during the past year. It started when the freshman came to Illinois for his official visit in Janu-ary, and although Ralph Cooper was Bentley’s guide, Hawthorne took the liberty of meeting him and helping him out. He’s told Bentley what plac-es to stay away from to keep himself out of trouble.

Hawthorne has done many of the same things for the younger players that his uncle did for him.

Bentley referrs to Hawthorne as a big brother. The two spend time on the sidelines talking in between series as Hawthorne rides his exercise bike.

“He’s setting a path for us,” Bentley said. “On and off the field.”

***On Saturday, Hawthorne will run

out onto the Memorial Stadium field-for the final time in his college career. He’ll hear the band, which he’s said gets him hyped to play in front of the home crowd.

He admits that his four years have flown by, but he hasn’t allowed him-self to focus on the past. He’s got two more games to play.

Back in January, when Clinkscale first met Hawthorne, the cornerback set two goals. The first was to win the Big Ten Championship. It was more important to him than any of the acco-lades he’d received or his NFL draft stock.

As he walks out on the field for the pregame ceremony with his fami-ly, he’ll see a video back from Camp Rantoul, when he gave a speech to the team. In his speech, he spoke about coming out and playing like a cham-pion and being a champion, not just on the field but off it.

Hawthorne can no longer achieve that goal of a Big Ten Championship, but his second goal — to become a leader for Illinois — is more in his control.

Jamal can be reached at collie10@dailyillini.com and @JamalCollier.

‘HE’S SETTING A PATH FOR US’BY JAMAL COLLIER

STAFF WRITER

The Daily Illini | www.DailyIllini.com Friday, November 16, 2012#Friday, November 16, 2012 The Daily Illini | www.DailyIllini.com5

‘HE’S SETTING A PATH FOR US’

CHONG JIANG THE DAILY ILLINI

Friday, November 16, 2012 The Daily Illini | www.DailyIllini.com6

PLAYERS TO WATCHDespite having only two

rushing touchdowns and 459 yards to date, the sophomore

tailback averages 4.1 yards per carry. He had his best

game (124 yards on 5.9 yards per carry) against Indiana’s

porous rush defense, which is worst in the Big

Ten. Purdue’s rush defense ranks second-to-last in the conference, allowing 181.5 yards per game. Young will

factor heavily into the Illini’s game plan to exploit the

Boilermakers’ rush defense.

ANTAVIANEDISON

The Florida native is tied for the team lead with seven

touchdowns. The wide receiver paces the passing unit with

575 receiving yards, and his versatility in the passing game poses a big threat to a defensive unit that is tied with Wisconsin in passing

touchdowns allowed with 17.

DARYL QUITALIG THE DAILY ILLINI

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Illini should pull out all the stops to win one last game for the seniors

S aturday is senior day for the 20 players that head coach Tim Beckman gives a shout-out to

every week.After Saturday, the Michael

Buchanans and the Terry Haw-thornes of the world will no lon-ger don Illinois uniforms in Champaign and grace Illini fans with their presence at Memorial Stadium.

In the four years these seniors have played at Illinois, they’ve compiled a 19-29 record but were also part of teams that won consec-utive bowl games for the fi rst time in Illinois history.

To say it’s been a roller-coast-er four years would be an under-statement. Throw in the fact that Illinois was riding a Rose Bowl appearance when these players arrived here and returned most of the talent from that ’07 team fur-ther exemplifi es the mess.

They’ve also experienced what it’s like to lose a game on a two-point conversion to a lineman bum-bling across the goal line with the ball in tow, play three overtimes at

the Big House and be the fi rst team to start 6-0 to then lose its next six.

While we may not play football in the Big Ten, Saturday also rep-resents the last home game for us seniors that have covered the Illini this season.

After working hard in our col-lege careers, covering football and basketball is what you strive for. When we found out we were going to be part of the DI’s football con-tingent, we had high hopes of cov-ering a team with an entertain-ing new coach, vying for its third straight bowl game.

We thought at least 6-6 was a foregone conclusion. We were going to cover a bowl game.

Now we invent coping mecha-nisms for covering a nine-game losing streak that seems almost inevitable.

Given the fact that Illinois has another less-than-stellar defense in its sights, regardless of the lack of personnel that they have on the fi eld, unleashing the most unorth-odox plays in the playbook would be the best way to send out both the senior football players, and us senior writers, for those who care.

Think about it, fans will have an entertaining game to watch, the players will have fun playing in a game with a crazily schemed game plan and us writers will have

something different to scribble about than create another way to cover how poorly the Illini have performed for the eighth consecu-tive week.

During Beckman’s fi rst spring game, we saw Miles Osei play-ing quarterback, running back and wide receiver. He’s mentioned using Terry Hawthorne on offense, and we’ve seen Josh Ferguson throw a halfback option pass that went for a touchdown against Penn State.

Throw out the traditional play-book and let it all hang Saturday. Let’s see a play where Nathan Scheelhaase is at quarterback, Osei is at wide receiver on one side of the fi eld with Hawthorne opposite him, and Ferguson is at tailback.

Scheelhaase will pitch to Fergu-son, who will have Osei coming in reverse fashion to hit Hawthorne running a fl y down the fi eld for a touchdown.

Dreams come true sometimes, right?

Through 10 games, out of 124 teams, the offense is 118th in points per game and total points scored. The unit is tied for 115th in total offense and yards per game.

Lost among these poor statistics has been sophomore running back Donovonn Young ’s 4.1 yards per carry average.

The two most successful trick plays — Ferguson’s halfback option pass and Young’s fl ea-fl icker against Minnesota — worked when they were called, so why not do things like that multiple times in one game?

Sure it’s unorthodox, but how could Purdue possibly game plan for it?

Let Young run loose, then when the Boilermakers key in on him, hit ‘em with a double-reverse pass.

The success rate may not be very high, but it can’t be any worse than the usual three-and-out. It’ll keep people interested and send all the seniors out with a bang. Who knows, maybe Illinois will win a conference game for the fi rst time since last October, or this was the stupidest proposition ever thought?

Dan is a senior in Media. You can reach him at welin1@dailyillini.com. Follow him on Twit-ter @WELINandDEALIN.

DAN WELINFootball columnist

MICHAEL BOJDA THE DAILY ILLINI

Head coach Tim Beckman looks off into the stands during the game against Minnesota at Memorial Stadium on November 10.