Illinois
Shannon helps Illinois move on to bigger stage after Big Ten championship
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Terrence Shannon Jr. took over the Big Ten Tournament, putting Illinois in position for much bigger goals.
After scoring 34 points in the championship game to lead 13th-ranked Illinois past Wisconsin on Sunday, Shannon received the Most Outstanding Player award for the tournament.
With 102 points in three games at Target Center, Shannon finished one short of the record for a single Big Ten Tournament. Keegan Murray had 103 points in four games for Iowa in 2022.
But the fifth-year guard whose performance on the court was so loud, from swishing pull-up 3-pointers off the break to finishing sky-high drives to the rim to sinking his free throws when he was fouled, has been consistently quiet off of it.
Shannon has not been made available for interviews since he was charged with rape or an alternative count of sexual battery in Kansas in December, stemming from an alleged incident in September. Shannon was suspended from team activities by the school. He returned after six games when a federal judge intervened, ruling that his civil rights were violated by a lack of due process.
The spotlight will increase considerably next week when the Illini, who have the No. 3 seed in the East Region, arrive in Omaha, Nebraska, to prepare for a first-round game against Morehead State in the NCAA Tournament.
“I’m the basketball coach, and a lot of this stuff was put in play by our university, the courts, and I’m not going to consume myself with it,” coach Brad Underwood said after the Big Ten championship game. “It’s a very serious matter. He’s got representation. … It will be handled accordingly and with great sensitivity and respect to everybody.”
Illinois, which is the winningest team in the Big Ten over the last five seasons, won the conference tournament for the second time in four years. With one more win, the Illini will have their most victories since the 2004-05 team went 37-2 and lost in the NCAA championship game. That’s also the last time the program reached the Sweet 16.
“This team doesn’t know anything about any of that. I’m here to try to win a national championship,” Underwood said, referencing regular conversations he has with athletic director Josh Whitman and chancellor Robert Jones about that lofty goal that Illinois has never accomplished. “If those goals ever change, then I probably don’t need to be your ball coach anymore.”
Underwood has raved often about the chemistry of this team. Marcus Domask, who was an all-Big Ten pick with Shannon, is a graduate transfer from Southern Illinois. Shannon is in his second season with the Illini after coming from Texas Tech. Quincy Guerrier, another fifth-year player, transferred from Oregon for this season. Then there’s the lanky leader Coleman Hawkins, who has spent his entire career with Illinois.
“I’m super proud of all the adversity we’ve gone through, whether it was from Marcus in the summer with his hamstring, me all year with my knee, Quincy’s wrist all year, off-the-court things,” Hawkins said. “We’ve all stuck together, and we’ve done a really good job of just being together.”
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Illinois
Motorsports race in Illinois named one of the best in the country by USA TODAY poll
Daytona Motor Mouths: Jockeying for position
Photo finishes in Kansas and the Kentucky Derby, a NASCAR runner-up more heartbreaking than Buescher and early Darlington thoughts.
USA TODAY readers have spoken, and they have declared Illinois has one of the top 10 motorsports races in the United States.
A recent USA Today Readers’ Choice poll determined the top races by asking a panel of experts for nominations. Readers then voted on the nominees. Chicago’s Grant Park 165 was named the ninth best race in the country.
“First run in 2023, the Grant Park 165 pits NASCAR drivers against one another over 75 laps as they speed down Columbus Drive, Michigan Avenue, and DuSable Lake Shore Drive,” USA TODAY wrote in the winning entry. “The 2.2-mile route travels along Lake Michigan and around Grant Park, providing scenic views for spectators.”
USA TODAY 10best: NASCAR track in Illinois voted one of the best in the country
As a region, the Midwest performed well in the poll. In addition to the Grant Park 165, Indiana boasts two of the country’s best motorsports events and Iowa is home to another. Surprising such famous races as the Indianapolis 500 and the Daytona 500 were only able to capture eighth and 10th places, respectively.
USA TODAY announced the winners May 8.
Top motorsports races according to USA TODAY Readers’ Choice
- Sick Week, Orlando, Fla.
- NOS Energy Drink Knoxville Nationals, Knoxville, Iowa
- King of the Hammers, Johnson Valley, Calif.
- SCCA National Championship Run-Off, Plymouth, Wisc.
- NHRA U.S. Nationals, Indianapolis, Ind.
- Holley LS Fest West, Las Vegas, Nev.
- Chili Bowl Nationals Powered by NOS Energy Drink, Tulsa, Okla.
- Indianapolis 500, Indianapolis, Ind.
- Grant Park 165, Chicago, Ill.
- The Daytona 500, Daytona Beach, Fla.
Illinois
Illinois Valley Democrats to meet May 23 in La Salle
The Illinois Valley Democrats (La Salle, Bureau, Putnam counties) are scheduled to meet 6:30 p.m. Thursday, May 23, at the La Salle VFW, 2325 Donahue St.
The meeting is to strategize to get all Democratic candidates elected. All Democrats are invited and encouraged to attend. Food can be purchased through the La Salle VFW.
Illinois
Pritzker pledges to expand access to mental health care in Illinois
Service providers, state agency officials joined governor for Springfield panel
By DILPREET RAJU
Capitol News Illinois
draju@capitolnewsillinois.com
SPRINGFIELD – In the middle of Mental Health Awareness Month, Gov. JB Pritzker and Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton hosted a panel in Springfield this week at which he pledged to expand the state’s behavioral health services.
With several dozen services providers from around the state in attendance, Pritzker and panelists floated ideas to improve access to mental health care for Illinoisans, like mandating a social worker be in every school and drafting a “Mental Health Bill of Rights” – a document that will affirm the state’s mental health system as one for people of all backgrounds.
Pritzker said it’s necessary to buck trends of the past, when discussions surrounding mental health were quickly swept under the rug, in private or public life – and received little government attention.
“If you could roll the time backward 10 years, very few people talked publicly about mental health challenges that they personally were having,” Pritzker said during the panel, which was attended by a Capitol News Illinois reporter. “We have to just think about the individual who has no alternative – they don’t have choices – and we have to give them opportunities to get help.”
The governor spoke about his personal experiences and recounted the struggles his mother – who he credits as spurring his political career – had with alcohol as he was growing up in the 1970s. Sue Pritzker died in 1982, leaving the future governor an orphan at 17 years old.
“She drank to self-medicate,” he said. “She was somebody who was an activist, a caregiver and she was a widow with three young children when my father died.”
Pritzker emphasized that his mother had the money to access care, given the family’s enormous wealth, but he said shame and guilt prevented her from seeking professional aid.
“Even with the resources, partly because of stigma, it’s hard to go seek help,” Pritzker said. “In some ways, my experience with that instilled in me a desire to try to address the challenges that are now referred to as behavioral health.”
He and Stratton suggested mental and physical health care should be considered with equal weight. Stratton, who chairs the recently formed Healing-Centered Illinois Task Force, also said mental health care needs to be accessible to everyone, regardless of race or income.
“It’s not okay if just some communities are healing and others aren’t,” she said. “If some communities are saying, ‘Now, it’s accessible,’ but others are left behind.”
As stigma continues to decrease for those seeking mental health care, existing practitioners can’t keep up with the rising need. More than half of respondents – 56 percent – to the American Psychological Association’s 2023 “Pulse” survey, said they had no openings for new patients.
Illinois officials have responded by easing barriers to enter the profession in recent years. The National Association of Social Workers Illinois Chapter earlier this year praised a 2021 law that did away with a previously mandated test for licensure that the organization said was biased.
Since the law took effect, the number of licensed social workers in Illinois has more than doubled in two years. As of early December, there were more than 10,000 LSWs in Illinois, though that figure does not include licensed clinical social workers or school social workers.
NASW-IL noted that 12 percent of those LSWs came from out of state. Pritzker, in 2022, signed legislation that made it easier for behavioral health workers licensed in other states to become licensed in Illinois and enabled in-state providers with lapsed licenses to easily get reinstated.
Read more: Pritzker signs bill to expand mental health workforce | Amid record overdoses and drug counselor shortage, workforce expansion program aims to fill gap
On Wednesday, Pritzker credited “greater investments” in mental health – such as being able to use American Rescue Plan Act dollars to expand services and creating the state’s Children’s Behavioral Transformation Initiative – to Illinois’ improving financial picture, though he added, “there’s a whole lot more to do.”
“You can’t do any of this stuff unless your fiscal health is such that you can make major investments,” he said. “And we have so much more to do in that regard.”
Read more: With recession fears subsiding, new state economic forecast expects ‘firm but steady growth’ | Pritzker launches children’s behavioral health initiative
Pritzker wondered aloud why the state isn’t putting more social workers in schools. Hopeful Futures Campaign, a childhood mental health advocacy group, reported Illinois only had one school social worker for nearly every 750 students in 2022 – a caseload nearly three times the Illinois State Board of Education’s recommended ratio.
“We’ve got to make strides with a social worker in every school,” Pritzker said. “I know we say we can’t afford it, but I don’t know why we aren’t making that a high priority.”
Child welfare expert Dana Weiner, chief of the state’s Children’s Behavioral Health Transformation Initiative, said the state is crafting a new social work pilot program.
“We’re working on developing a pilot for in-home behavioral health aides for young people who have autism spectrum disorders and behavioral health needs,” she said.
No timetable was given on when such a pilot might be introduced.
Weiner announced the state is drafting a “Mental Health Bill of Rights” – also without a timeline – that will eventually “serve as a declaration of our aspirations for an improved mental health service system,” she said.
“Someday, when we get there, (it will) grant all Illinoisans the assurance that they can seek help without stigma in their community, in their language in their culture, and that they have access to timely and effective services and that they know where to go for help,” she said.
A day after the event, House Bill 5457, which would require agencies that license behavioral health workers to “allow reasonable accommodations for applicants for whom English is not their primary language and a test in their primary language test is not available,” passed the Senate and awaits Pritzker’s approval.
Hannah Meisel contributed.
Capitol News Illinois is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service covering state government. It is distributed to hundreds of print and broadcast outlets statewide. It is funded primarily by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation, along with major contributions from the Illinois Broadcasters Foundation and Southern Illinois Editorial Association.
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