Mikale Wilbon Is Not Considering Illinois, Chance Stewart Chooses Western Michigan

One of the things Illinois fans would like to see from Tim Beckman in his 2014 recruiting class is the ability to lock down the top talent in the Chicago area. So far the 2014 class includes two players from the Chicago area and a kid from Ohio, but although all three look like promising players, none of them would be considered "top talent."

One such player the Illini had their eyes on was four-star running back Mikale Wilbon. The De La Salle back is ranked 14th among running backs by Rivals and 151st overall, but unfortunately Illinois' interest in Wilbon is not mutual.

Wilbon told Rivals that he's down to five schools, and none of them are Illinois.

Instead he's narrowed his list to Vanderbilt, Arizona State, Iowa, Cincinnati and Missouri.

Now, this is not good news, as Wilbon would have been a nice addition, but it isn't the end of the world, either. And if you're natural reaction to news like this is to start yelling that the sky is falling, I totally understand, but you may want to wait a second because there's still more bad news to report.

Four-star quarterback Chance Stewart listed his top two schools earlier this week, and they were Illinois and Western Michigan. Well, on Thursday afternoon Stewart announced that he was going to Western Michigan.

That's right, the Illini lost out on a four-star quarterback to Western Michigan.

At least he wasn't a Chicago kid?

There's still a long way to go in this recruiting class, and I like the three kids Beckman has landed so far, but these gut-shots don't breed a lot of confidence in what's to come.

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