Sweet Home, Chicago now includes GLIAC football with the addition of Roosevelt University in 2024.
Roosevelt joins the conference as a provisional member of NCAA Division II, having previously been a member of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics. Proudly declared Chicago’s only Division II team, learn more about the Windy City’s addition to this level of football and the GLIAC.
— Roosevelt University Football (@RULAKERFB) July 13, 2023
Roosevelt’s football team initially competed under the banner of Robert Morris University of Illinois.
Their distinction as an NCAA program isn’t the only new element for Roosevelt University football. Until 2020, the Lakers played for nine seasons as the Illinois Eagles of Robert Morris University.
Jared Williamson was named the program’s first head coach in 2010, a year before the Eagles’ inaugural season. He remains the only head coach in the program’s history, guiding RMU Illinois’ football team amid the school’s merger with Roosevelt University in 2020.
The Lakers have posted a .500 or better record in eight seasons of NAIA play, including 3 of 4 since rebranding under the Roosevelt banner.
The first graduating class in program history achieved winning streaks of more than 3 games in each season
Starting a program from scratch can be a difficult process that forces a team to accept some obstacles. That wasn’t the case for Roosevelt when it launched as RMU Illinois.
The first four-year class to enter as freshmen in 2011 left the program having produced winning streaks of three or more games each season, including an eight-game winning streak in 2012 and a 6-0 start in 2014.
It’s been 9 years since the program’s first class graduated – time has flown by!
Regards for the whole life!
I couldn’t have been luckier to be surrounded by such an amazing group of young people.
Thanks for posting this memory A’Ryan. image.twitter.com/NVe2blMaLg
— Jared Williamson (@RUCoachJW) April 30, 2024
Quarterback Carson Budke threw for four-plus touchdowns in 2023
Carson Budke took over as the Lakers’ full-time quarterback in the third game of the 2023 season and exploded on his way to MFSA All-Midwest First Team honors. Budke threw for 1,785 yards, most of which came in eight games, and threw 19 touchdowns as a junior.
Thirteen of Budke’s touchdown passes came in dominant performances against Madonna, when he tied a program record with five scoring throws; and at the end of the season, when he threw four touchdowns in consecutive weeks against Olivet Nazarene and Judson.
Budke’s strong finish to his first season as Lakers quarterback sets the stage for Roosevelt’s GLIAC debut.
Roosevelt’s coaching staff has ties to a Division II dynasty and a Rose Bowl championship
Jared Williamson’s young coaching staff is not lacking in significant experience. Along with assistant coach and co-offensive coordinator CJ Davis, who has been a prominent factor in the Lakers’ leadership until the end of his NAIA tenure, Roosevelt’s 2024 team includes Kaleb Borghardt and Blake Potash.
Borghardt served as a special teams intern for the 2019 Rose Bowl-winning Ohio State Buckeyes, the last group in Columbus overseen by three-time FBS national championship winner Urban Meyer.
Potash, Roosevelt’s new special teams coordinator and defensive line coach, returns to the Division II ranks after one season at Valdosta State. Potash coached the linebackers for four-time NCAA Division II national champion Valdosta State in 2022.
Two-sport legend Bo Jackson unveiled the renovated Roosevelt facility
Who better to reveal the ambitions of a multi-sport sports programme than one of the greatest multi-sport stars of all time?
In 2013, when RMU Illinois unveiled upgraded facilities that include the Roosevelt Lakers’ current football stadium in Arlington Heights, Morris Field, Bo Jackson was the guest of honor.
Jackson’s exploits in Major League Baseball with the Kansas City Royals and his otherworldly college football career at Auburn earned him a status bordering on folk heroism. The 1985 Heisman Trophy winner is a prominent figure in the Chicago sports scene after his time with baseball’s White Sox, and to this day runs a youth training center in Lockport.
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