Illini Couple: Unexpected Gifts
Samantha Knoll and Alex Kreig in 2016, at their wedding (left) and on graduation day (right). (Images by D Maloney Photography and courtesy of Samantha Knoll and Alex Kreig)
For anyone who’s ever wondered how it feels to take the field at Gies Memorial Stadium before an admiring crowd, here’s a hint. Book the Colonnades Club, and the field is yours.
That’s how, on June 11, 2016, Samantha Knoll, ’11 ENG, MS ’13 ENG, PHD ’16 ENG, and Alex Kreig, ’11 ENG, MS ’13 ENG, PHD ’16 ENG, came to be on the turf in their wedding clothes, tossing around the pigskin with a team of wedding guests and groomsmen. “My cousin made a field goal, but also split his pants,” Alex recalls. “He has to live that down at every family party for the rest of time.”
For Sam and Alex, the day was epic—the triumphant culmination of a decade of study, achievement and, of course, romance. Both had defended their Ph.D. dissertations that spring—hers in biomechanics, his in bioengineering—and were well on their way into the professional world.
As Illinois juniors, they launched Avriculture, a company that uses drones to survey crops. They received recognition from the U. of I.’s Cozad New Venture Challenge competition for entrepreneurship two years in a row, which led to jobs with Monsanto (now Bayer) in St. Louis. Their work together “was always an unexpected gift, which really kind of set us up on our future successes,” Sam observes. “We attribute so much of our personal and professional stories to Illinois.”
After persevering across a decade with Bayer, Sam recently joined the U. of I.’s Grainger College of Engineering as part of a research team working on shunt placement in neurosurgery. Alex has transitioned from bioengineering into data science and management and currently serves as vice president of data science for CVS subsidiary Oak Street Health, leading an analytics team that “basically synthesizes all the healthcare data we get.”
They now both work from home in the Chicago suburbs—a full house, as it turns out, with baby Jackson and sisters Scarlett, 4, and Frances, 2. “I’m a third-generation Illini and Alex is a fourth,” Sam says. “We were raised as Illini, and we’re already indoctrinating our little ones. Franny is two-and-a-half, and if you say ‘I-L-L,’ she’ll say, ‘I-N-I.’”
“The U. of I. has given me a lot—my career, how I think, who I am as a person,” Alex concludes. “But I always go back to how it gave me my best and favorite gift, which is that I met my best friend who then became my wife.”
If you found true love at Illinois, we’d love to know! Email us at IllinoisAlumni@uillinois.edu.
Illinois Alumni, Summer 2026
