Mike Cagley, Co-Host Sports Spectacular

July 14, 2025

The Illini football continues their hot recruiting streak, beating out the mighty Oklahoma Sooners for 4-star and 5^th rated recruit in Missouri, Jacob Eberhart, a 2026 6’3” safety/wide receiver from St. Louis. Fans across the country are wondering what is going on in Champaign and how are the Illini taking the recruiting world by storm.

The NBA Summer League in Las Vegas has provided former Illini players with a stage to show off their talents. On Saturday, Terrence Shannon Jr. had 24 points, 7 rebounds and 3 assists in 28 minutes. TSJ is making a case for more minutes this season with the Timberwolves.

Hail Mary #1 – New Era for Bielema

Bret Bielema has moved through a few phases during his career as a collegiate head football coach. I’ve taken the liberty of naming them from the perspective of a college football fan who has followed Bielema’s career closer than others because of his B1G ties.

We seem to be at the dawn of a new era for the Illini head coach. Let’s look at the pathway leading to this new era:

• The “Young Gun” Era – Bielema was a young head coach who succeeded the legendary Barry Alvarez in Madison. Many wondered if Bielema was up to the job. His .739 winning percentage ranked him the best since 1926, even surpassing that of Alvarez himself. It’s safe to say that Bielema proved to everyone he was up to the job. He wins double digits in 4 of his 7 years in Wisconsin and then takes his show to Arkansas.
• The “Oh No, You Don’t” Era – Bielema brings B1G power football to the SEC. It didn’t work as well as planned. The Razorback program that had sustained excellence from the late 50s through the late 80s before falling into a cycle of mediocrity that only Houston Nutt and Bobby Petrino briefly interrupted proved to not be a great fit for Bielema or his offensive scheme.
• The “Work for the Jedi Master” Era – Bielema pivoted to the NFL. He was hired by possibly the greatest football coach of all time in Bill Belichick. Bret worked for 2 of his 3 years in the Sunday league with the legendary head coach. Hard to believe anything but good could come out of working for Belichick in the NFL environment.
• The “Why Did He Want this Job” Era – Bielema is hired by Josh Whitman and tabbed to return the moribund Illini football program to greatness. Who are we kidding? Even at its peak, the Illini haven’t ever been consistently great. Yet, Whitman sees something in Bielema and hands the keys to the program to him. For his part, Bielema sees potential in the Illini that has been missed by almost everyone else. Things change starting on day one.
• The ”Oh Crap, Bielema’s Building Something in Champaign” Era – Bielema is set on the edge of a new era for Illini football. If they make it back to a bowl game for a second year in a row, the Illinois Fighting Illini will be on the road to long-term success. Something that doesn’t happen often in Champaign. In the last 100 years, only John Mackovic and Bob Zupke have a higher winning percentage than Bielema and Bielema took over the program at a much lower point than Mackovic did following Mike White.

As an Illini fan, it’s fantastic to see Bielema killing it and hitting expectations that were only envisioned by two people - Josh Whitman and Bret Bielema himself.

With the Illini football program, the challenge lies in following up a bowl season (and a ten-win season). The schedule isn’t easy, but it should be fun to see how this team with an experienced QB and a boatload of returning starters will perform in 2025. the Illini football season will be very entertaining and a season to remember.

Heat Check #1 – Superman – A Movie Review

Superman came out on Thursday night last week. I watched it in XD and on IMAX screens on Thursday night and Friday evening.  This movie was a rousing success for a myriad of reasons. Let’s look at a few:

Casting

• David Corenswet as Superman. Corenswet nailed both the Clark Kent and Superman sides of his character. Fantastic man who was perfect for the job. I have little issues with the men who have been cast as Superman in the past and a lot of concerns with the scripts they have been handed. Corenswet had a pretty good script to work from.
• Rachel Brosnahan as Lois Lane. Brosnahan came across as a very Kidder-esque Lois (without the occasional weirdness that Kidder used at times). She had such a great rapport with Corenswet to make me rethink my thoughts on abandoning this character and her relationship with Clark/Superman from the Superman mythos.
• Nicholas Hoult as Lex Luthor. Hoult was a truly despicable antagonist. That’s hard to pull off, but he did it well. His Luthor was directly derived from a more modern depiction of Luthor from the comic books. Gone is the mad scientist mad at Superman for accidentally making him bald. Gone is the Hackman parody Luthor. All we have is the menace of a narcissistic billionaire.

Notable Supporting Characters

• Edi Gathegi as Mr. Terrific. Terrific is a relatively new take on an older character that wasn’t used often in my youth. Many won’t be familiar with Mr. Terrific, but Gathegi did a great job on depicting the billionaire genius. It’s not just a repackaged Tony Stark, either.
• Nathan Fillion as Guy Gardner. – Gardner is a jerk who is also a Green Lantern. Nathan Fillion plays him masterfully and he’s a lot of fun when onscreen. And what a haircut!
• Michael Ian Black as Cleavis Thornwaite. Michael Ian Black does an excellent job being a hyper-emotive television talk show host. He really nails the role and helps move the public opinion plotline forward in an easily accessible manner.

The Plot

Luthor hates how a superpowered alien (Superman) makes him feel inadequate as a man and Superman (along with other metahumans) illustrate the weak nature of mankind overall. So, he tries to kill Superman. Short, sweet and to the point. He uses social media and semi-accurate news reporting to shape public opinion against Superman along the way.

I loved how director James Gunn made the choice to skip the whole origin of Superman. Everyone knows who Superman is and there is no point to spending 15 to 30 minutes of the film giving the audience an origin story when the only thing they are going to do is compare it to the original Superman movie and the Man of Steel origin. The audience doesn't need the origin and the movie didn't need a longer run time.

The movie started in the middle of events and didn’t really stop to take a breath until Superman had to save an alien baby from drowning in a pocket dimension. That fight/rescue was really the only part of the movie that I could do without.

Story Challenges

There were two issues, and these do come up in many superhero movies as well as many other movies:

• The super intelligent villain. These guys (or gals) are hard to write – at least when it comes to consistent use of super intelligence. Super geniuses literally take care of every little detail down to the nth degree. But in the end of a movie, evil geniuses tend to do a poor job of hiding their fingerprints. Luther is simply too smart to do what he did at the end of a movie. I realize Luther is a narcissist and that can lead to his own downfall. And his obsession with Superman is Lex’s “kryptonite”, but I really would’ve loved an ending where his plan fails- but someone else takes the fall. That would've been a part of his plan. To make things worse, we (including Superman) would know Lex was getting away without a consequence - but there would be no one to prove his guilt. In fairness, maybe Gunn wanted a self-contained movie and not one that felt like a part two was required.
• The passage of time is uneven. The rift that headed for Metropolis moved at lightning speed when it was “onscreen” and apparently took a cigarette break whenever it was “offscreen”. Easy fix is to have the rift move slower when it is shown. If it moved at that breakneck speed the whole time, even Superman couldn’t get there to help due to the need to deal with other Lex-supplied obstacles. A movie can’t cut away for five minutes and then show the rift two feet from where it was five minutes ago when the phenomenon comes back onscreen. Especially, when once it reappears on screen, the rift then continues to move like an NHRA dragster. That doesn't work for me.

Overall

This movie was a lot of fun. The only thing I really didn’t like at all was the cut of the Superman costume – especially around the neck. It just looked clunky and uncomfortable. Very similar to the neck areas of the new Starfleet uniforms that Captain Pike and his crew wear in Star Trek Discovery and Strange New Worlds.

Gunn managed to capture the nature of Superman by saving a squirrel in the middle of a battle. That scene demonstrated the kind-hearted and optimistic nature of Superman. That’s something this world could use more of. A character with truly godlike strength and powers who chooses to use them to help those with less and to protect those who can’t pay him back. That is Superman to me.

Go see the movie. It was fun.