Greetings from "Can't Wait For Saturday," your morning morsel of college football, courtesy of longtime Illini beat writer, AP Top 25 voter and Heisman state rep Bob Asmussen. He'll give you his views each day on the game he loves.

It's not quite as cool as "Navin Johnson's" "the new phone book is here" but it is in the ballpark.

In this case, it's "the new Athlon magazine is here." And like with Navin, I'm in it.

The longtime annual produced by Athlon Sports hit the stands this week. On Page 92, you can read an Illinois football preview written by me. I have been a contributor to the magazine as long as I can remember. More than two decades is my guess.

Important to note: while I wrote the part about Illinois, I had no role in where Illinois was ranked both nationally or in the Big Ten.

The magazine put the Illini at No. 17 overall which was sixth among the Big Ten schools, right after No 15 Michigan and No. 16 Indiana.

That is lower than I have Bret Bielema's team going into the season. In my earlier effort, I had Illinois at No. 9. That could potentially tick up or down a notch before it needs to be turned in. But Illinois will be a part of my preseason Top 10. Too many talented returnees for me to keep the team out.

Athlon doesn't include Illinois in its 12-team projected College Football Playoff field. Instead, it picks Illinois for a Music City Bowl berth opposite Tennessee. No offense to the awesome folks in Nashville, but that would be a disappointment for Illinois.

On the Athlon All-American teams, Illinois outside linebacker Gabe Jacas nabbed a third-team spot.

In the Heisman preview, Illinois quarterback Luke Altmyer is listed among the "Don't Forget About" category.

For each team preview, Athlon gets a quote from a rival coach, who speaks anonymously. In the Illinois section, the coach said: "I think if they would have made the playoff instead of SMU, they could have made some noise. They're a hard, physical team that is more talented than people realize and the program has never looked more competent."

That should probably going into mailers the team sends out to recruits.

Bob Asmussen is a college football reporter and columnist for The News-Gazette. He can be reached at 217-393-8248 or .