WIU at Illinois should be on this list

Last year, Illinois went 2-10 with a only 3-pt win over Ball State and 13-pt win over Western Kentucky. At the end of the season, Sagarin had the Illini ranked #126 in all of DI, below teams like Akron, UNLV, and UMass. In fact, by ranking alone, they would have been 8th in the MVFC, ahead of only SIU, MSU, and INSU. Most sites I've looked at aren't projecting U of I to improve much, if any, this year vs last year.

Last year, WIU went 8-4 with regular season losses to USD, NDSU, and SDSU (all playoff teams) and then by 2 points at Weber State in the playoffs. At the end of the season, Sagarin had the Leathernecks ranked #82 in all of DI. How things will change from last year to this year remains to be seen, since it's harder to find predictions for FCS teams this far out. WIU has also beaten FBS teams in each of the last two years (although not P5 teams).

If the game was played at the end of last season, Massey's matchup predictor has WIU a likely 27-24 winner, with about a 59% win probability.

I'm not saying we will win, or that we'll even be favored, but I think the matchup is close enough to at least deserve a mention.