Illinois head football coach Bret Bielema gave a brief update on the activities the team will go through during the winter and spring, as well as the staff's recruiting plans.

Bielema addressed the media during a Zoom call in which he introduces new offensive coordinator Barry Lunney Jr.

The Big Ten released revised 2022 schedule on Wednesday. The Illini game originally scheduled for October 15 at Penn State was dropped, and Illinois will now play at Indiana on September 3.

Five of the first seven games are at home, with the opener against Wyoming still set for August 27. Illinois is now the only team in the Big Ten that closes out the regular season with two games on the road.

Bielema said he likes the the bye weeks are evenly spaced. They have three week window of games, a bye, a four week window, then the second bye week. Bielema said the team should be more advanced this year, but they will still take advantage of bye weeks.

The first organized team activities will be winter workouts, which begin next Tuesday when the spring semester kicks off.

Early enrollees are arriving on campus now and going through a process over the next four days to get them ready for classes and participation in workouts. All of the early enrollees haven't arrived on campus yet, so Bielema didn't go into specifics.

Winter workouts start begin next week and run for eight weeks. Workouts will be held 5 days each week, along with some position meetings. The NCAA allows 8 hours of contact with players each week up until spring football. Strength coach Tank Wright will put them through the workouts.

Spring break at Illinois is set for March 12-20. The Illini will begin spring practices immediately after spring break and go for five weeks. New offensive coordinator Barry Lunney Jr. will be installing and entirely new offense during spring ball.

Bielema said he proposed a Thursday night or Saturday spring game during the last week of April.

The coaching staff will be on the road recruiting during the last two weeks of January. They'll also go back out on the trail following spring ball. They'll be back for week 3 of winter workouts to spend time with the players during workouts.

Bielema said they are "pretty much done" with their 2022 class besides a few modifications. They'll focus on the 2023 and 2024 classes. The Illini have a junior day set for this weekend, with some of their top in-state targets expected on campus.

Barry Lunney Jr. will take over Tony Petersen's recruiting assignments within the state of Illinois. He'll also recruit the southwest region including Texas and Oklahoma. He'll recruit quarterbacks nationally, as well as other high priority offensive players.