Illini should be happy with new coach

Friday's announcement that Tim Beckman is the new football coach at Illinois probably didn't play well in Peoria … or Champaign or Urbana, for that matter.

When the Illini fired Ron Zook after seven years of mixed results and a recent late-season meltdown, Illinois fans had visions of Houston's Kevin Sumlin or Boise's Chris Petersen or other sugar plum-type candidates dancing to the rescue at Memorial Stadium.

Tim Beckman?

Ohio State hires Urban Meyer. Illinois hires Urban Meyer Lite?

No, it likely didn't play well in Peoria or in Chicago's loop, either.

But it should.

Beckman has mentored under Meyer, Jim Tressel, and Mike Gundy and has recruited at the highest levels for programs like Ohio State and Oklahoma State.

Objectively, he did wonders at Toledo, which had posted three straight losing seasons before his arrival. The cupboard wasn't bare, but it was thin, and winning eight games each of the past two years is a testament both to his ability to motivate and improve players he inherits and to mining gold on the recruiting trail.

This season's Rockets are 8-4 and should be 9-3 if not for a whopper of an officiating blunder at Syracuse and could be 10-2 for the want of a fourth-down completion in the waning seconds at Ohio State. Out of the "shoulda-coulda" realm and back to reality, UT has been installed as an early favorite against Air Force in the upcoming Military Bowl.

Toledo athletic director Mike O'Brien announced Friday that 32-year-old offensive coordinator Matt Campbell is interim head coach for the bowl game. O'Brien indicated the Rockets would conduct a national search, but if Campbell ends up with the gig on a fulltime basis, well, remember where you first heard it. (And if he doesn't, feel free to forget where you first heard it.)

There is probably consternation among some UT fans, and hurt among many Rocket players, that Beckman would bolt town at such an early opportunity, but I never figured he was doing anything other than just visiting. He was and is a man of ambition with dreams of coaching at the highest levels. I doubt he views Illinois as a final stop either, and that's fine.

A confident coach with that kind of drive breeds success. He left UT football better than he found it and if he does the same at Illinois fans who now may be grousing about his selection will rue the day he leaves.

In Beckman, Illinois is getting a coach who will hit the ground running, put together a young, aggressive staff that relates well to players and recruits and will himself be a recruiting maniac. Many head coaches burn out on the recruiting trail and rely heavily on their assistants, but it may be the part of the job Beckman likes best.

Illini fans also should know they are getting a coach who gives way more than lip service to academic performance -- advances made by his Toledo players were nothing less than startling -- and one who mandates that his players are involved in community activities, especially those involving schools, hospitals, and charities.

In other words, Beckman is everything, give or take a big name, a school could want in a football coach.

Providing, that is, he wins.

Illinois isn't the easiest sell. The facilities, compared to others in the Big Ten, are just OK. Champaign is off the beaten path, although no more so than Iowa City or West Lafayette or State College or East Lansing. Chicago is a lush recruiting ground and while UT hasn't made much of a dent there Beckman is surely aware the Illini always seem to get their share of athletes from the big city.

And he'll know what to do with them when he gets them.

Still, there is risk on both ends of this marriage.

From Beckman's perspective, a lot of good coaches with good credentials have been able to achieve only sporadic success at Illinois, which has never been considered a Big Ten power and resides in the same division with Ohio State, Wisconsin, and Penn State. It's not Indiana, but it's also not an easy job.

From Illinois' perspective, Beckman is not a finished product as a head coach. He is a tad stubborn and is still maturing, and he will occasionally say and do things that make eyes roll.

But he has learned from championship coaches at winning programs and produced one of his own given a first opportunity at UT.

If his second head coaching stop is as successful, it should play just fine in Peoria.

Contact Blade sports columnist Dave Hackenberg at: dhack@theblade.com or 419-724-6398.