No. 1 JUCO LB Ismael Kante Already Feeling at Home With Illinois Football

Kante – from Iowa Central CC by way of Minnesota and West Africa – is ready to make hay in his new home

The Illini flags are run across the field at Camping World Stadium in Orlando, Florida, during Illinois' 21-17 win over South Carolina in the Citrus Bowl on Dec. 31, 2024. | University of Illinois athletics

Fort Dodge, Iowa – a town nearly three hours removed from the relative booming metropolis of Iowa City and the University of Iowa – is where Ismael Kante briefly called home.

Kante has had a few of them, emigrating from West Africa to the U.S. – specifically, Brooklyn Park, Minnesota – with his family as a young child. Out of high school, he attended Northern State in North Dakota, where he spent two years. Kante then transferred to Iowa Central Community College in Fort Dodge before last season.

And now he has another new home: Champaign.

Kante committed to Illinois not long after his first interaction with Illinois coach Bret Bielema, which was an immediate sign his college football career had only scratched the surface of what it could become.

#illini transfer Ismael Kante hit off with Bret Bielema quickly

“When he visited me, my head was spinning. Big ten football was a dream of mine.”

In 2024, he played community college ball in Iowa

“I’ve never had a coach visit Iowa to recruit me.”

Bielema is a work horse. He… pic.twitter.com/NMoAxY9c9A

— Carson Gourdie (@GourdieReport) February 4, 2025

"As a JUCO kid, I'd been recruited, but I had never seen a head coach come down to Fort Dodge, Iowa, to talk to me," Kante told FOX Illinois on Tuesday. "Coach [Bielema] being the first to come down to Fort Dodge, Iowa, to come talk to a JUCO kid? That meant a lot to me. When he came and sat down in the coaches' office and he was talking, my head was just spinning. I'm like, 'This is actually happening right now.'"

Kante had earned the attention. After turning in a 71-tackle, four-sack season at Iowa Central CC in 2024, he was rated a three-star recruit and the No. 1 JUCO linebacker in the country, according to 247Sports.

Now in Champaign, Kante recognizes that his window of time there is a fairly small one (two seasons of eligibility) and wants to make the most of the experience playing in the Big Ten and helping boost Illinois' fortunes.

"I want to be here for my next two years and settle here," Kante told WCIA 3, "and I really want to build something special here."

Ismael Kante, the No. 1 JUCO linebacker in the country, says his focus this spring is on building relationships.

"Want to be here for my next two years and settle here and I really want to build something special here."@IsmaelKante5
📹 @courtneylaynebr pic.twitter.com/ikMpjIeU9u

— Glenn Kinley (@glenn_kinley) February 4, 2025

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