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Kraft fights hunger while Illinois and UCLA promote boredom

By Jen Jezierski - DePaul University '12 - 161 views

Illinois celebrates their win in the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl in San Francisco. (Photo by Ezra Shaw, Getty Images)

Kraft may fight hunger, but it didn’t fight boredom with this bowl game. The most entertaining part of the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl was the opening coin toss since they used an Oreo.

Illinois had lost six in a row to end the season, but they finished 2011 on a high note. Terry Hawthorne intercepted Kevin Prince’s pass to Shaquelle Evans in the third quarter, giving the Illini a lead they would never relinquish. The Illini beat the UCLA Bruins 20-14 in a ridiculously lackluster bowl game.

Both teams had fired their head coaches, as the Illini went 2-6 in the Big Ten (6-6 overall) and the Bruins went 5-4 in the Pac-12 (6-7 overall), so expectations for these two mediocre teams weren’t very high. And they delivered on their mediocrity.

Illini quarterback Nathan Scheelhaase rushed for more yards (110) than the entire Bruins team COMBINED (18). Derrick Coleman and Johnathan Franklin had decent rushing games. Coleman carried the ball eight times for 40 yards while Franklin rushed nine times for 29 yards. But unfortunately for the Bruins, the rest of their team was awful and picked up -51 yards on 13 carries.

Prince did throw for two touchdown passes, but the second touchdown was in the last minute of the game after the Illini had mounted a 20-7 lead. He went 14-for-29 for 202 yards with those two scores and one interception. He also rushed for -31 yards on 10 carries. In comparison, Scheelhaase went 18-for-30 for 139 yards with a touchdown and an interception. He also rushed for 110 yards on 22 carries.

Next season, both teams will have new head coaches. Here’s hoping they don’t play another awful bowl game.

(1) Reader Comment

  1. avatar

    catfan1

    January 1, 2012 at 2:13 pm

    Great headline–very creative! I guess that about sums it all up!

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I am a graduate student at DePaul University in Chicago. I am working on my MA in Sports Journalism, and I attended Loyola University Chicago as an undergraduate (BA '08, Political Science). My dream job is to be a baseball writer, and I plan to pursue that dream in Phoenix after I graduate in June 2012. Sportswriting in general is my passion, and I am a huge Chicago sports fan. I live and die with the Chicago White Sox, although the Chicago Bears were my first love. I may currently be a Blue Demon, but my college sports heart belongs to my alma mater, the Loyola Chicago Ramblers. Somewhere along the way, I jumped on the Florida Gators bandwagon and haven't jumped off. I was a cheerleader for seven years in middle school and high school, and that was instrumental in forming my personality and developing my love of sports. I have always loved sports. It has always been a part of me. Writing has always been my passion, even if I thought otherwise. To be able to combine the two into an internship and eventually a job is a dream come true.