The new leader of the Illinois defense evaluated the damage and didn’t wait long to be held accountable for the 52 points Missouri scored (actually 38 against the defense).

Brit Miller is being held to high standards this season as the successor to All-America middle linebacker J Leman, and he’s holding himself to those standards as well. That’s why he apologized to the Illinois offense in the locker room Saturday night after the defense didn’t hold up its end of the bargain.

“I thought it needed to be said because the offense did a good job,” he said Monday afternoon. “They picked it up when they needed and they scored a lot of points. You hate to be that part of the team that let them down.

“There was a lot of confusion on our side and that was maybe a lack of leadership on our side. I put that on myself.”

Miller dropped a lot of weight and worked overtime during the offseason to prepare for his move inside. The job means that he’s playing almost twice as many snaps per game as he did as a junior.

He tied for the team lead with 12 tackles against Missouri, but Miller said that didn’t begin to tell the story of how he played. After watching tape, he said he counted at least five tackles that he missed, part of a team-wide plague of missed tackles on Saturday.

“That’s definitely one of the worst games I’ve ever been a part of, my performance as well,” he said. “Giving up that many yards hurts.”