Any conversation about the best Illini quarterbacks of the last thirty years starts with Jeff George Sr. From there, highly effective signal callers such as Kurt Kittner and Jason Verduzco enter the conversation.
The discussion would be incomplete without mentioning the memorable 2007 Rose Bowl season led by Juice Williams and the tail end of the Zook era with Nathan Steelhaase.
Recency bias could also lure Wes Lunt into the conversation.
However, when discussing Illini quarterbacks of the modern era, Johnny Johnson is often forgotten, but his years in Champaign were some of the more memorable in recent Illini history, mostly because Johnson’s teammates on the other side of the ball, Kevin Hardy and Simeon Rice, went on to NFL stardom.