Results tagged “ronzook”

Any Chicago sports fan knows the lengthy time that Wrigley Field spent as home to the Chicago Bears' football team (1921 until 1970 when they moved to Soldier Field). But now Wrigley could once again host a football game if several people, including University of Illinois coach Ron Zook, have their way. The story's been bouncing around for a while now, but Zook raised the issue again at today's Big 10 Media Day, asking for a game against Northwestern next year at Wrigley. During the media day, Zook appeared on ESPN 1000 where he said:

According to a computer-assisted data analysis conducted by the Sun-Times, of the 69,000 people employed at Illinois public universities, Ron Zook, the football coach at the University of Illinois, is the highest paid at just under $1 million last year. Zook’s top assistant, Michael Locksley, earned a higher salary than most state university top officials.

Only the biggest of dreamers gave Illinois a chance of beating the semi-professional USC Trojans in yesterday's 94th annual Rose Bowl. Unfortunately, USC beat the Illini like the proverbial red-headed stepchild 49-17. The academic conclusion to the game also led to some wonderful entendre-laden headlines in the dailies: "Case of California Creamin'", "Too Much Booty Puts Illini on the Defensive", and "Trojans Pull Out All the Stops" are some of our favorites. The loss also provided Jay "the Joke" Mariotti with another opportunity to pen his now-patented "sports in this state really suck" columns, complete with desperate stabs at modern cultural relevance and creating lame-ass nicknames, this time referencing "Knocked Up" and calling Illini head coach Ron Zook "Zooker."

Chicagoist knew there'd be plenty of surprises during Sunday's college football Bowl Championship Series selections, given the losses by the two top-ranked team on Saturday and then general tumult among the top ranked teams all season long. Among the biggest surprises was the Rose Bowl's selection of the Fighting Illini to play against the USC Trojans on New Year's Day. The Illini did knock off Wisconsin when they were ranked fifth, and they handed Ohio...

The college football season kicks off this weekend, and Chicagoist can't wait! This is Big Ten country, so we thought we'd take a look at the conference and make our predictions. While the Big Ten is shaping up to be a major football powerhouse this season, the two Illinois schools don't figure to draw much attention. Illinois went 3-8 (1-7 conf.) last year, costing Ron Turner his job. Ron Zook, who lost his job...

Just days after firing offensive coordinator Terry Shea, the Bears have offered the position to former Illinois head coach Ron Turner. Turner served as the Bears offensive coordinator, from 1993 to 1996 under Dave Wannstedt, before leaving to take the Illini job. His tenure running Chicago's offense included some of the Bears 'best offensive years. The hope is that he'll be able to once again awaken the offense. Turner, however, is still in talks with...

There's a lot going on the the Chicagoist SportsCenter these days, so we're going to give ya'll a little recap of some things we haven't yet touched on: