The Mediocrity that is Illinois Basketball

First off, I have not been a fan of Illinois basketball since 2004.  That is when i started attending Indiana University, and learned to hate Bruce Weber.  When you look at the last decade of hoops at Illinois, their is obviously the one glorious season of 2004-2005 where the Illini gave North Carolina all they could handle in the NCAA tournament, but since then its been pretty ugly all things considered.  They have not advanced to the Sweet 16 one time since then and have not even made the tournament 2 out of the previous 3 seasons.  While they are poised to return to the NCAAs this year, it still is not the banner year that Illini fans were hoping for with a team led by a core group of seniors. Usually when teams get to the NCAA championship game, it serves as a jumping off point  in the recruiting  game.  Illinois has struck out time and time again in the state of Illinois as far as recruiting goes unable to parlay  on the court success to recruiting success. The blame has to fall on coach Bruce Weber as to why this team has been unable to move forward in the recent years. While as much as I hate to admit it, I do think Weber is a great in-game coach, but at the same time he hasn't developed any players into NBA players since 04-05.  And while he got the most out of that team, they also weren't players recruited by him.  All of those players, 5 of which played in the NBA, were Bill Self's recruits.  The only player that Weber  has recruited to date who will be a sure thing NBA prospect is Demetri McCamey, and he apparently hates Weber. To conclude, if Illinois does not make a sustained run to at least the sweet  16 in the next 2  years, it might be time for Bruce to find a new place to coach because Illinois basketball should be held in higher esteem  and with the talent that resides in the state, talent should not be the problem.