Illinois Fighting Illini

Ohio State's games with Illinois have a tendency not to go as planned

Published Nov. 12, 2015 5:42 p.m. ET

Marcus Hartman

Is your favorite part of college football its propensity for providing pretty weird stuff?

Then the Ohio State-Illinois rivalry -- set to be renewed for the 102nd time Saturday -- might be just your thing.

The Buckeyes lead the all-time series with the Fighting Illini 67-30-4 (including one win OSU vacated in 2010), and they have won seven in a row.

Those numbers don't come close to telling the whole story, though, and we can begin with the last time Illinois beat the Buckeyes.

That was in 2007, when a top-ranked Ohio State squad was upset on 28-21 on Senior Day, ruining a perfect season for a Buckeyes squad looking to put the embarrassing ending to their 2006 season (at the hands of Urban Meyer's Florida Gators) behind it.

Quarterback Juice Williams threw four touchdown passes for the unranked Fighting Illini, who intercepted Todd Boeckman three times and dominated the line of scrimmage, running for 260 yards and running out the clock in the end against a defense that included stalwarts such as James Laurinaitis, Malcom Jenkins, Vernon Gholston and Cameron Heyward.

Owing to the oddness of the series, that setback did not prevent Ohio State from making the BCS National Championship Game despite losing on the next-to-last weekend of the Buckeyes' season.

Since then, Ohio State has had surprisingly close encounters with the Fighting Illini in 2008, 2010 and 2013 (at least until a couple of late runs by Carlos Hyde), but the OSU-Illinois series has been unique almost from the beginning.

It took until their fifth try for the Buckeyes to beat Illinois in 1916, and that 7-6 game itself was a memorable one as All-American halfback Chic Harley scored the Buckeyes' only touchdown and added the conversion kick that ultimately proved to be the game-winner. That snapped an 11-game unbeaten streak in Big Ten play for Illinois and set the stage for Ohio State's first Big Ten championship.

A year later, Harley and the Buckeyes shut out Illinois 13-0 in the season finale to claim another conference title. But the Illini would have their revenge in 1919 when they traveled to Columbus and used a late drop-kick field goal to pull out a 9-7 win.

Not only did that make Illinois the Big Ten champion instead of Ohio State, it proved to be the only blemish in a season that also included the Buckeyes' first win over Michigan. It was also the last college game of Harley's Hall of Fame career, but his lasting impact includes credit for raising the profile of the OSU football program to the point construction of Ohio Stadium was deemed necessary.

In the years since, the Ohio State-Illinois series has also seen the final game of Red Grange's collegiate career (a 14-9 Illinois win in 1925), the longest field goal in Ohio State history (Tom Skladany, 59 yards in 1975), the biggest passing day in Big Ten history (621 yards by Dave Wilson for Illinois in 1980), and the Ohio State single-game rushing record broken not once but twice (first by Keith Byars and then by Eddie George).

It's probably no coincidence that all of the above-mentioned closer-than-expected games were played in Champaign -- as was the 2002 classic in which Ohio State had to outlast the sub.-500 Illini in the first overtime game the Buckeyes ever played.

Illinois' Memorial Stadium, where the game will be played Saturday, has been known to play a certain part in the oddity of the rivalry, too.

Often wind-swept because of its unique design (open on both ends, not a bowl or semi-bowl like many stadiums nowadays), the place tends to play havoc with passing games, as it did in 2006 when Ohio State played arguably its worst game of the regular season, beating a two-win Illinois team only 17-10.

Five years later, the tables were turned as Ohio State played the role of underdog and handed the 16th-ranked Illini their first loss of the season.

The Buckeyes prevailed 17-7 despite completing only one pass all afternoon.

How often have you heard of something like that lately?

And yet it's just another footnote in the Battle for the Illibuck, which happens to be Ohio State's only trophy game in a conference full of games played for axes, spittoons, jugs and buckets -- not to mention bronze pigs.

But, hey, that's just another example of how this series isn't quite average.