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Sports Editor Matt Daniels with a look at what’s going on around the area:
Adam Perez won The News-Gazette’s high school Athlete of the Week honor.
Laila Carr LeRoy VB 8/10/2025.
Three reasons we love sports today
➜ 1. Congrats to Adam Perez from the Danville soccer team and Laila Carr from the LeRoy volleyball team. The two area standouts are the latest News-Gazette high school Athletes of the Week, powered by Copper Creek Contractors, after winning this week’s vote. Read more about the pair in Tuesday’s paper.
➜ 2. Three St. Joseph-Ogden graduates and one former SJ-O principal who will be honored at the Spartans’ football game Friday night against Monticello as new inductees into the SJ-O Hall of Fame.
➜ 3. Bobbi Duval Busboom (Class of 2000), Morgan Finn Gooding (Class of 2006), Bianca Truitt Green (Class of 1986) and former SJ-O principal Mike McKenzie are this year’s SJ-O Hall of Fame inductees.
The Illinois offensive line kept Luke Altmyer upright for most of this past Saturday’s 34-32 home win against Southern California with the Illini only allowing one sack.
Numbers game: 217
passing yards Luke Altmyer needs on Saturday at Purdue to become just the seventh Illini quarterback to reach 6,000 career passing yards. Altmyer currently is in eighth place in the Illinois record books with 5,783 yards and has legitimate chance to move past Wes Lunt (5,900 passing yards from 2014-16) into seventh place on Saturday. After Lunt, Tony Eason (7,031 passing yards in 1981 and 1982) is next in sixth place.
Parkland volleyball’s Sammi Christman (22) and Shay McMillen (12) go up at the net to defend a kill attempt by Danville Area Community College’s Nikita Taylor during a match at Parkland in Champaign on Wednesday, Sept. 17, 2025.
Crowd control
Three events I’m paying attention to
➜ 1. Parkland Mid-Season Invite. The Cobras’ volleyball team carries a 29-3 record and No. 6 ranking into two matches on Friday against Kankakee (13-10) at noon and against Madison (Wis.) (17-2) at 2 p.m. in Champaign. Parkland has two more on Saturday against Delta (Mich.) (5-7) at 9 a.m. and Morton (17-3) at 11 a.m.
➜ 2. Illinois at Maryland women’s soccer. The Illini (9-2-1, 2-2 Big Ten) have had a week to prep for the Terrapins (6-6, 2-3) before this 11 a.m. match on Sunday.
➜ 3. North Dakota State at Illinois State football. The sixth-ranked Redbirds (3-1) have won three straight before hosting the top-ranked Bison (4-0) at 6 p.m. Saturday at Hancock Stadium in Normal.
Annistyn Tovey plays softball and basketball and also competes in cheerleading for Georgetown-Ridge Farm.
Ask an athlete
Three questions with Georgetown-Ridge Farm sophomore Annistyn Tovey, who competes in basketball, softball and cheerleading:
➜ 1. Three athletes I’d like to have dinner with are … Bri Ellis, Karlyn Pickens and Mia Scott.
➜ 2. The TV show I most like to binge-watch is … “Ginny and Georgia.”
➜ 3. My biggest pet peeve is … people chewing with their mouth open.
