Champaign Showers —

Critics act like bringing global talent to central Illinois is some bizarre science experiment. But if you walk around campus, or sit in a coffee shop in downtown Champaign, or look at the names of the people who have walked these halls before, you realize that this is exactly what Illinois has always done. The university has spent a century acting as a beacon for international talent, bringing the best and brightest to the prairie to build the future. Why shouldn’t our basketball program do the exact same thing?

Champaign-Urbana has always been a place for people from all over the world to prepare for great things at the next level, no matter their country of origin. This team is no different, and that’s what makes them a perfect representation of our home.

This is our culture. Illini by a billion.