No Love For Smith In Champaign As Former Bears Coach Is Fired

CHAMPAIGN, IL — Lovie Smith wasn’t handed the reigns of a winning football team when he took over at Illinois in 2016. But his bosses figured that if anyone could bring optimism to a struggling program that has only produced four successful campaigns since 2000, it was Smith, whose resume’ included NFL experience and leading the Chicago Bears to their most recent Super Bowl appearance.

But when Smith couldn’t produce a single season that included more than six victories and failed to turn hopefulness into landing enough in-state recruits to make the Illini anything more than also-rans in the Big Ten, he was fired. Smith’s dismissal on Sunday came on the heels of Illinois’ sixth straight loss to Northwestern and despite coming off a season in which the Illini reached a postseason bowl game for the first time in 2014, school officials decided a 17-39 record (10-33 in the Big Ten) over five seasons simply wasn't enough.

In a statement issued Sunday after he held a team meeting to alert Illinois players that Smith’s tenure was over, athletic director Josh Whitman praised Smith for this “unshakable leadership” and his “experienced hand” in trying to provide stability. But, in the end, Whitman said that Smith hadn’t done enough in the win-loss column to warrant another year in Champaign.

“Based on extensive evaluation of the program’s current state and future outlook, I have concluded the program is not progressing at the rate we should expect at this advanced stage in Coach Smith’s tenure,” Whitman said in a statement released by the school Sunday. “To achieve our competitive objectives, I believe new leadership of the football program is required.”

The dismissal came less than a year after Smith’s lucrative contract was extended until 2023, but came at a time which the university could afford to fire him affordably. Last year, Smith’s buyout was $12 million, a figure which dropped considerably to what amounted to being $2.3 million following a year in which he continued to make a salary of $4 million. But after receiving the extension and a vote of confidence from Whitman, Smith produced only two victories in a pandemic-shortened season that has been challenging on and off the field.

Smith's base salary dropped from $5 million which had a made him the highest paid public employee in the state of Illinois in 2018. However, despite his rate of pay, Smith’s performance never lived up to the potential university officials believed existed when he was hired after two years coaching the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

Illinois’ 6-7 mark and fourth-place finish in the Big Ten last season was most wins the Illini had produced since Tim Beckman finished 6-7 in 2014 before he was fired for forcing injured players to compete. Smith went 3-9 in his first season before improving to four wins in Year 3 and six wins in 2019. Despite signs of progress that Smith believed he was seeing and pointed to as recently as Saturday in what proved to be his final game at the helm, Whitman wasn't convinced in Smith's ability to continue.

The final straw came in a a 28-10 loss to Northwestern, which will play for the Big Ten championship this weekend against Ohio State. Following Saturday’s loss, Smith talked about positive signs that he saw in the program, which he hoped to capitalize in the regular season finale against Penn State. Despite being plagued by injuries both Saturday and throughout a season in which the Illini were hit hard by COVID-19, Smith pointed to better days ahead.

“We have a chance to finish a lot better,” Smith told reporters following Saturday’s game. “It would be a huge step for us to finish it off the right way.”

But Whitman decided Sunday Smith wouldn’t get that chance. Rather than allowing the former Bears coach – who was fired in 2012 following a 10-6 finish six years after guiding the Bears to a Super Bowl appearance – Whitman announced he would begin a national search for a coach he hopes can produce a winner – something that Illinois has repeatedly failed to do since Ron Zook, who led the Illini to three bowl game appearances in his seven seasons in Champaign.

Now, after what ended up being a pivotal year for Smith in terms of a continued lack of progress, Whitman determined he had to make a change.

"We imagined this would be an important year," Whitman told reporters Sunday. "We were really positioned to come to a fork in the road. Do we want to reup to the tune of millions of dollars in the future or do we think we need to get out? My obligation to coaches is I’m going to be all in until I can’t be."

Whitman will look to replace a coach he said Sunday that he highly respects and that a year ago, he said he believed in as the right choice to lead a program that he said in 2019 was still on the rise. While there are plenty of coaches who will be in line for the first Big Ten opening of the year, Whitman will search for someone that will be charged with the same expectations Smith was five years ago – to turn the Illini into a consistent winner, something that hasn’t been accomplished – no matter who has run the program – long before Whitman turned to a coach who had reached the biggest stage in the NFL – only to not be able to do the same at the college level.

But according to Whitman, Sunday's action was necessary to attempt to get the Illini on the track he hoped they would have traveled on under Smith.

"I do believe it’s a day that’s necessary if we are to realize the full championship potential of the football program," Whitman said Sunday.