What’s New

The Bears have packed quite a bit of turbulence into the first week of training camp.

The offense has had terrible days and solid days. There’s been zero clarity on key position battles. Some important players have yet to practice. They’ve already had a coronavirus scare.

After one wild week of camp, here’s a snapshot of how it’s going:

Justin Fields has looked…

Right on schedule. The Bears are taking it painfully and unnecessarily slowly with a quarterback who just got done dominating college football at the highest level. If Andy Dalton wasn’t here and the Bears faced the urgency of getting Fields ready for the season opener, he’d probably handle that pace just fine. He has shown glimpses already of everything the team hoped it was getting when it drafted him. Think about this: When was the last time the Bears had a young quarterback with either phenomenal running or pinpoint precision on deep balls? Right now, they have one with both.

But he’s not ready yet because…

Dalton is here. If the Bears had a meaningful game right now, Dalton would be the correct choice over Fields because he has a mastery of every nuance of the offense, total competency reading a defense and 8,000-plus snaps of NFL experience. Fields will exceed him eventually, but not yet.

What is the best development for the Bears so far?

Wide receiver Marquise Goodwin looks more than ready for his return to the NFL after opting out last season. It is undisputed that he’s the fastest player on the team and he has been consistently problematic for the Bears’ secondary in practice. For $1.2 million, this looks like a really smart signing.

What’s the worst?

Oh, nothing big, just that they don’t have a left tackle. Is that bad? Second-round pick Teven Jenkins has yet to practice because of a back injury he suffered in rookie minicamp. Matt Nagy says it’s not a big deal, but coaches say that a lot. Elijah Wilkinson is on the reserve/COVID-19 list. They practiced with fifth-round rookie Larry Borom at left tackle and Lachavious Simmons, a seventh-round pick last year who has yet to make his NFL debut, on the right side Tuesday. You ready to stick Dalton or Fields behind those guys?

Which under-the-radar player has caught your eye?

Sixth-year safety Deon Bush. He played just 6% of the defensive snaps last season and is still a long shot to beat out Tashaun Gipson for a starting job, but he has made some eye-catching plays while filling in for Eddie Jackson on the first team.

What’s the shakiest part of the Bears’ plan for this season?

Banking on outside linebacker Robert Quinn is a dicey proposition. He has had some great years. He also gave the Bears just two sacks last season. Nagy said he has looked amazing so far, but he’s already dealing with a back injury. It’s hard to tell if he’s off to a good start.

Which newcomer has been the most impressive?

Dalton. The word that keeps coming to mind is competent, which is far from thrilling but quite a step forward from where Bears quarterbacks have been for the last few decades.

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The Mexican government is suing United States gun manufacturers and distributors in U.S. federal court, arguing that their negligent and illegal commercial practices have unleashed tremendous bloodshed in Mexico.

The unusual lawsuit, filed in federal court in Boston, targets some of the biggest names in the gun industry. Among those being sued are Smith & Wesson Brands, Barret Firearms Manufacturing, Beretta U.S.A. Corp., Colt’s Manufacturing Company and Glock Inc.

Another defendant is Interstate Arms, a Boston-area wholesaler that sells guns from all but one of the named manufacturers to dealers around the United States

The lawsuit says the companies know their practices contribute to the trafficking of guns to Mexico and facilitate it. It’s seeking compensation for the havoc the guns have wrought in Mexico.

The Mexican government “brings this action to put an end to the massive damage that the defendants cause by actively facilitating the unlawful trafficking of their guns to drug cartels and other criminals in Mexico,” the lawsuit says, noting that the vast majority of guns recovered at crime scenes in Mexico were trafficked from the United States.

“We are going to win the trial, and we are going to drastically reduce illicit arms trafficking to Mexico,” Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard told reporters.

The sale of firearms is severely restricted in Mexico and controlled by the Defense Department. But thousands of guns are smuggled in to Mexico by drug cartels.

The Mexican government says recent rulings in U.S. courts contributed to its decision to file the lawsuit. It cited a decision in California allowing a lawsuit against Smith & Wesson to move forward, a recent lawsuit filed against Century Arms related to a 2019 shooting in Gilroy, California, and a $33 million settlement reached by Remington with some of the families whose children were killed in the Newtown, Connecticut, mass school shooting.

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It’s never too soon to look ahead. The White Sox released their 2022 schedule on Wednesday, a slate the opens the season with the Minnesota Twins visiting Guaranteed Rate Field on March 31, four crosstown games against the Cubs and additional interleague games against teams from the National League West.

The annual crosstown series against the Cubs consists of four games, on May 3-4 at Wrigley Field and May 28-29 at Guaranteed Rate Field.

The interleague schedule includes the Dodgers (June 7-9 at Guaranteed Rate Field), Giants (July 1-3 at Oracle Park), Rockies (July 26-27 at Coors Field; September 13-14 at Guaranteed Rate Field), Diamondbacks (weekend of Aug. 26-28 at Guaranteed Rate Field) and San Diego (Sept. 30-Oct. 2 at Petco Park).

The Padres series marks the first time the Sox will end the regular season in a NL ballpark.

At first glance, the May portion of the schedule looks particularly challenging, with seven games against the Yankees, six against the Red Sox and three against the Indians, as well as the Cubs series.

Here is the regular season schedule. Times are TBA. Schedule is subject to change.

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It’s sad but true that we’re never so much appreciated as when we’re newly dead. Especially if the death is sudden and unexpected.

Three months ago, as preservationists were sounding alarms over Governor J.B. Pritzker’s decision to empty out Helmut Jahn’s iconic Thompson Center and offer it up to the highest bidder for possible demolition (neither Chicago’s status as an architectural center nor Jahn’s international reputation giving him pause), Jahn, 81, was killed in a traffic accident.

As that news spread through the city’s architectural community, there was quick agreement on the need for some sort of public tribute. An exhibit team gelled in two days, and Helmut Jahn: Life + Architecture opened July 23 at the Chicago Architecture Center.

The exhibit is an overview, not specifically focused on the Thompson Center. But, as Aaron Betsky, director of the School of Architecture and Design at Virginia Tech, notes in a lyrical introductory tribute, “We better save the Thompson Center, which is not only one of [Jahn’s] greatest designs, but one of the few true celebrations of government as a public good.”

“With a burst of shattering, curving, and bulging glass in a rainbow of colors Helmut Jahn danced onto the international architecture scene in the 1980s, translating the discipline of Chicago Modernism into new programs and forms while melting and fragmenting its grids into a post-disco delight of shaped buildings . . . More than the designs of almost any other architect . . . Helmut expressed structure, space, and publicity as an interwoven whole that said: come here, be here, be part of this,” Betsky wrote.

Housed in CAC’s second-floor Drake Family Skyscraper Gallery, the exhibit features 15 tabletop models, a loop of short videos, some of Jahn’s drawings, and three large walls of photos and text, bookended by two timelines–one for significant personal events and professional honors, the other listing major projects. It’s a life/work history, fleshed out with testimonials and abundant, generously enlarged photos, including snapshots plucked from family albums and billboard-size, mythmaking portraits. Jahn, athletic and elegant, was notably photogenic: we see him running, sailing (a model of his boat, the Flash Gordon, is also here), and gracing the cover of GQ in trademark fedora.

The models are a mix of international projects and local buildings, including two still under construction: the 73-story 1000M on South Michigan Avenue, and the Pritzker Military Archives, in Somers (near Kenosha), Wisconsin. You’ll also find models for University of Chicago projects and Illinois Institute of Technology’s State Street Village (now Rowe Village), but the two standouts among these Lilliputian displays are gleaming, glassy sculptural renditions of the landmark Sony Center, opened in Berlin in 2000, and the 1985 building that inspired it, Chicago’s Thompson Center (never mind the ungainly potential tower grafted to its southwest corner).

The show, developed in a necessary hurry, could use a couple of tweaks. It would be good to have a few signs making it clear that the large white models of skyscrapers that dominate this gallery are a permanent exhibit and not part of the Jahn show. (“I don’t think Jahn did Petronas Towers,” I heard one visitor tell another.) Also, it could use a separate, quiet space with seating for the excellent short videos (where, for example, you can catch Jahn explaining that “I can only think when I draw,” and “I haven’t done the perfect building yet; that’s what keeps me going.”).

“This is not a retrospective,” CAC senior curator Michael Wood told me. “This is a celebration of Helmut’s work. It was put together very quickly, without the time to do the deep research a retrospective would require. We did that because we think it’s important that the public understand the place Helmut holds in the lineage of Chicago architecture history. He’s one of the last great designers going back to that iconic era of Chicago building in the International style of Mies. He starts his career there and he is incredibly productive in every decade up until his death. He worked all over the world, he represented us globally.”

Jahn, who was born in Germany and came here in 1966 to study at IIT, “chose us as his adopted hometown,” Wood added. “He immigrated to Chicago, we embraced him, and we’re the better for it.”

CAC does not have an official position on the Thompson Center “at the moment,” Wood said, “other than we think there should be more public discussion.” But in June, CAC partnered with the Chicago Architectural Club to launch a design competition for the future of the Center. The jury for this 2021 edition of the club’s annual Chicago Prize Competition will meet this week to select winners.

The competition had been in the works for a while, Wood said: “With Helmut’s death it seemed more urgent to get the ideas out now, while there would be a moment of appreciation.” Winners will be displayed in a pop-up exhibit in the CAC lobby.

The state’s deadline for proposals to purchase the Thompson Center is August 30. v

“Helmut Jahn: Life + Architecture” at the Chicago Architecture Center, 111 E. Wacker, open daily through October, 10 AM-5 PM, $15 general admission to CAC (free for members).

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American Athletic Conference Commissioner Mike Aresco vehemently denied that his league has ever “plotted” with ESPN to undermine another conference by poaching its schools.

Aresco addressed conference realignment Wednesday during the AAC’s virtual football media day, saying the league is not actively looking to add schools.

“Our conference has never strategically aligned or plotted with ESPN to influence conference structures,” Aresco said. “We wouldn’t do that. ESPN has never done that and would not do it. We do consult with our television and business partners on issues related to our conference. Everyone does, of course. But any suggestions or statements that we colluded with ESPN with regard to the structure of any other conference is a completely unfounded and grossly irresponsible accusation.”

Big 12 Commissioner Bob Bowlsby sent a cease-and-desist letter to ESPN last week, accusing the network of encouraging at least one other conference to raid that league as it tries to find a way forward with Texas and Oklahoma on their way to the Southeastern Conference.

The AAC was reported to be the conference ESPN was incentivizing to woo Big 12 teams. ESPN denied any wrongdoing. Bowslby said earlier this week the parties have agreed not to escalate the dispute publicly.

Aresco said he has not been in contact with any Big 12 schools, but did say the conference will always act in its best interest.

“If there are schools interested in us and they enhance our brand, why wouldn’t we consider them?” Aresco said.

He added: “We never talk about whether anybody reaches out to us.”

Aresco has experience rebuilding a crumbling conference.

The American was birthed from the demise of the Big East in the last round of sweeping conference realignment in the early 2010s.

After losing several of its marquee major-college football schools, and having the traditional Big East schools break away to re-form a basketball-centric conference, the league added schools such as UCF, SMU, Tulane, Houston and Memphis and rebranded as the American in 2013.

The conference has become the best and most lucrative of the non-Power Five in football, sending a team to New Year’s Six bowls five times in the seven-year history of the College Football Playoff.

The American has pushed its “Power Six” slogan and Aresco has become a vocal advocate for College Football Playoff expansion. But even with its new 13-year, $1 billion television contract with ESPN, the AAC lags far behind the Power Five in annual revenue.

The Big 12 distributed $34.5 million to each of its 10 members this years, though that number would likely drop as much as 50% in the future without Oklahoma and Texas.

Under the new ESPN deal, the AAC expects distribution to reach about $8 million per team per year.

Five years ago, when the Big 12 explored expansion, AAC schools were among those that applied. If the eight Big 12 schools being left behind by Texas and Oklahoma were to look to for replacements, it would make sense that AAC schools would be candidates.

Still, Aresco said the American is stable and no one is panicking about the next potential wave of realignment.

“Anytime you talk about stability, you never know what can happen down the road. So you don’t want to overdo it,” Aresco said. “We think we’ve got a group of great schools. And who, by the way, early on may not have had as much in common as they do now. Having played together for a number of years, having developed that kind of camaraderie that comes with not only getting to know each other, but having great success and having great collective success, I think that’s really helped our conference brand and helped our cohesion.”

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SAITAMA, Japan — Wake up. Take a coronavirus test. Go to an empty arena. Practice or play a game. Return to the hotel. FaceTime family and friends who they’ve been separated from for weeks. Watch other games on television. Sleep.

Such is the typical itinerary for basketball players at the Tokyo Olympics.

For those who were in the NBA and WNBA bubbles in Florida last summer, it seems familiar. That has no doubt played a role in both U.S. basketball teams reaching the Olympic semifinals.

There are clear similarities between what basketball players are having to endure at these Tokyo Olympics and what went on last summer for NBA players in Lake Buena Vista, Florida and WNBA players in Bradenton, Florida. The days have seemed a bit monotonous, there’s separation from loved ones and there’s hardly anyone in the buildings to cheer for them.

“The bubble was brutal,” said France guard Evan Fournier, who played in the NBA’s bubble with the Orlando Magic. “It was, it really was.”

The Olympics, in Fournier’s estimation, aren’t quite as difficult as the bubble was. The rules in Tokyo designed to keep everyone safe are restrictive, yes. But Fournier said there are at least some opportunities to see other athletes, whether it was through taking part in the opening ceremony and then going to the Olympic village or simply by being able to get away from basketball by tuning into something else on television.

U.S. women’s player Breanna Stewart said the flashbacks to last summer are only natural to have.

“This is even more because we are in a foreign country,” Stewart said. “We go to the hotel, the practice gym, the arena and we’ve gone to the village a couple of times. We’re not getting out and we don’t have areas to just chill outside. That’s one thing that is unique to the Olympics, spending time inside cooped up.”

Stewart and the U.S. women have had familiar faces at some of their games at the Olympics. Those faces belong to the U.S. men, who have sent contingents to the arena to watch their fellow Americans on off days.

Typically at an Olympics, the NBA stars pop into some of the other big events — like swimming, track and field, gymnastics — whenever possible. It creates a stir, a buzz in the crowd and even the athletes in those sports have said it’s a big deal to have some of the best-known players in the world in attendance.

In Tokyo, that’s just not an option.

“The restrictions don’t allow us to do that,” Durant said. “That was the fun part about the last few Olympics, is that we could go out and support other athletes, watch other sports that we probably never get a chance to watch, take in the whole Olympic experience. But again, it’s somewhat of a bubble and we can’t do that.”

Even without a bubble, at least not the same sort that the NBA and WNBA players had last summer, the restrictions in place this summer likely deterred some from coming to the Olympics. There are undoubtedly other factors on that front: the NBA, for example, saw its 2019-20 season resume in July 2020, go through October, resume in December and some players haven’t gotten much of a break since — which will be a talking point when NBA training camps start up again next month.

“If you put it frankly, it kind of sucks,” Australia guard Joe Ingles said.

Put simply, nothing has been easy. And sometimes, it doesn’t seem fun. It can appear to be light-hearted at times — U.S. men’s coach Gregg Popovich is a well-known wine connoisseur, and getting wine into the famous staff dinners has been more of a challenge than usual, for example — but it’s a clear grind.

“A lot of them called me and wanted to play and then later, for whatever reason, said, ‘Hmm, I’m not so sure,'” USA Basketball men’s national team managing director Jerry Colangelo said. “I can understand it. I mean, there’s a lot of things going on. We’ve had to adjust, I mean, how would you like to get a group of guys coming to Japan and tell them they’re going to be in another bubble, basically, because that’s the way it is. That’s really challenging.”

Yet when the winners get their gold medals this coming weekend, it’ll all seem worth the trouble.

“We still get to do what we’re here for,” Ingles said.

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As we view and read unending news stories about the devastation wrought by climate change (wildfires, historic flooding, super-heated waters killing fish, record heat waves all over the world), it’s worth noting that the State of Illinois recently missed an historic opportunity to cut pollution that is a major cause of this problem.

Climate scientists the world over are saying that we must reduce carbon pollution caused by the burning of fossil fuels that power our heating, cooling and transportation sectors. Renewable sources of energy are available right now that would reduce pollution and improve public health, but clean energy legislation that would have helped us reduce our reliance on dirty fossil fuels recently failed to pass the Illinois State legislature. How could we have missed this opportunity to clean our environment?

SEND LETTERS TO: [email protected]. Please include your neighborhood or hometown and a phone number for verification purposes. Letters should be approximately 350 words or less.

Supporters of dirty fossil fuels say we need a “balanced” approach to energy policy. The truth is that the Illinois power grid is out of balance now. Clean renewable energy only accounts for 8 to 10% of Illinois energy production. This percentage is woefully inadequate and shows that we are failing to live up to our responsibility to give future generations healthy air to breath. If we are to be responsible stewards of our environment, we must pass legislation that insures we use more clean, renewable energy (solar and wind) to power our state. Failure to do so is to make a future clean up much more difficult for our children and grandchildren.

The Illinois state legislature must act as soon as possible to pass clean energy legislation that will create good jobs and clean our air and water.

Mark Kraemer, Wilmette

Following up on cop tips

As a frequent reporter of incidents to the Chicago Police Department’s TipSubmit website (new.tipsubmit.com), I’m frequently disappointed because nothing seems to get done. Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Police Supt. David Brown seem to agree with what Brown said earlier this week, that the police can’t solve crimes “alone” and need the public to “work with us.”

Yes, as reported on June 18 in the Sun-Times, the city for years sought “security fixes” at home where eight people recently were shot, “ut nothing was done.”

I can assure you this was not the only time a house was reported to the police for criminal activity and nothing was done. Though the narrative from City Hall is that residents don’t report problem locations, that’s certainly not the case in all situations. The four murders at that house might have been avoided had reports to the police actually been acted upon.

Michael Pearson, Englewood

All public schools require multiple vaccinations when registering children for classes. This is for the sake of protecting all children. If you don’t feel your child should have to comply, send them to a private school. It’s that simple.

Edwina Jackson, Washington Heights

Ultra-right are not conservatives

Why does the media describe the ultra-right or “alt-right” as conservatives? What do they conserve? They certainly aren’t interested in conserving civil rights, human rights or our planet.

When House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy “joked” about hitting House Speaker Nancy Pelosi with a gavel, he was not being conservative; he was pandering to his base, the Republican Party’s motley crew of far-rightists, white supremacists, white nationalists, neo-fascists and advocates of violence. All those people whom the previous occupant of the White House helped his party solidify.

They should be described as far-right, ultra-right, or alt-right — definitely not as “conservatives.”

Muriel Balla, Hyde Park

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SAITAMA, Japan — They believe they are the best basketball team at the Olympics, too good to consider anything but gold.

“If we do what we do well, we bring the intensity on defense, we play our roles but we’re ourselves in our roles, we’re free, we’re the best players in the world,” U.S. guard Zach LaVine said. “I don’t think anybody’s going to be able to beat us.”

Australia and France already have this summer.

And Slovenia has beaten everyone its ever played with Luka Doncic in the lineup.

So the semifinals might be as wide open as any time during the Americans’ run of three straight titles. The U.S. is the only team left that has won Olympic gold, but the other three teams think this is their time.

“We’re well experienced,” Australia guard Patty Mills said. “We’ve been to this stage many a time and haven’t crossed the line. But we’ve bottled those experiences up, and I think we’re well prepared for this moment and for this stage to make the next step.”

The U.S. plays Australia in the first semifinal Thursday at Saitama Super Arena, with a victory assuring the Australians their first medal in men’s basketball.

But they’d have to win again Saturday to get the one they believe is in reach.

“Our goal is the gold medal,” guard Matthew Dellavedova said.

France faces Slovenia in the nightcap. The winners meet Saturday for gold.

The U.S. was beaten 91-83 by Australia in an exhibition game and fell to France 83-76 in the teams’ Olympic opener. But the Americans, who didn’t have their full roster for the game in Las Vegas, may have rounded into top form.

They pulled away from Spain in the quarterfinals for a 95-81 victory, getting 29 points from Kevin Durant and improving to 3-0 since Jrue Holiday and Devin Booker joined the starting lineup after arriving on the eve of the tournament after the NBA Finals.

“I think the potential of this team is endless,” forward Draymond Green said. “Unfortunately, we got two games left and so we need to make sure that we’re continuing to get better each and every time we step on the floor, and I think that’s what we’ve done.”

Australia and France had big head starts, with a generation of players who have been together for years.

Mills, Dellavedova and Joe Ingles are the heart of an Australian team that has finished fourth four times at the Olympics, including 2016 in Rio. The French veterans, including Nicolas Batum, Rudy Gobert and Evan Fournier, won a European title and two Basketball World Cup bronze medals since 2013, but had lost in the quarterfinals of the last two Olympics before beating Italy 84-75 on Tuesday.

The French haven’t medaled at the Olympics since winning silver in 2000. Like the Australians, it’s been a long wait and a lot of heartbreak since.

Slovenia is trying to avoid all that.

The Slovenians reached the final four of their Olympic debut by beating Germany 94-70 on Tuesday. Doncic had 20 points, 11 assists and eight rebounds, the second straight game the tournament’s leading scorer was just shy of a triple-double.

Now he has his country two wins from adding Olympic gold to the European title it won in 2017.

“They are the reigning European champion for a reason. Luka is 17-0 with the national team. He is a great player, one of the best in the world, but they are a great team,” Batum said.

“Of course we have to stay focused on him, but we can’t disrespect the other guys.”

The French showed how good their defense can be in the opener, when they held the U.S. to 36% shooting from the field.

The Americans have responded by averaging 111.3 points in their last three games, but now comes an opponent that has had their number. The Australians also beat them in a tune-up for the 2019 Basketball World Cup before the victory in Las Vegas.

That July 12 defeat was the Americans’ second straight to begin their Olympic preparations, following a loss to Nigeria. A gold medal seemed a long way off.

Now, it’s just two victories away.

“So, I love how we stuck with it throughout this whole period of time and guys started to figure out what we needed to do,” Durant said.

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A police officer who accidentally shot a budding teenage musician in 2019 while pursuing a bank robber on the Northwest Side won’t face criminal charges, Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx’s office has decided.

Des Plaines Police Officer James Armstrong was “justified in using deadly force” against the bank robber, Christopher Willis, on Nov. 19, 2019, Foxx’s office concluded.

And even though Armstrong also struck 15-year-old Rylan Wilder, it was unintentional and the officer acted “reasonably,” the state’s attorney’s office stated in a memo dated Oct. 19, 2020.

The decision came to light after Foxx’s office recently posted a letter on her website in support of her actions from a state prosecutors’ agency that reviews counties’ charging decisions. Foxx’s memo was attached to the letter.

“A criminal prosecution for either first- or second-degree murder would require proof beyond a reasonable doubt that the involved officer was not legally justified in using deadly force against Christopher Willis,” the memo states. “In other words, a judge or a jury would have to find that Officer Armstrong’s belief that he or others were in imminent danger of great bodily harm or death — was not reasonable. In this case, however, the uncontroverted evidence shows that Officer Armstrong did have a reasonable belief that Christopher Willis put Officer Armstrong and others in imminent danger of great bodily harm or death.”

Patrick J. Delfino, director of the State’s Attorneys Appellate Prosecutors, backed up that decision in a letter to Foxx dated July 7, 2021.

“Based upon a comprehensive and independent evaluation of the information provided, we find that the decision by the Cook County state’s attorney’s office to decline prosecution is consistent with the evidence,” Delfino wrote. “This finding is strictly limited to the conclusion as to criminal charges and makes no determination regarding the existence of any administrative violations or the potentiality of civil liability.”

A lawyer who represents the Wilder family in a civil lawsuit said he’s outraged that he only learned Tuesday of Foxx’s decision not to charge Armstrong.

“We just obtained the Cook County state’s attorney’s report now. The family was not notified of the decision in advance, which was devastating for them. The reckless behavior by the officer is clearly negligent,” Attorney Tim Cavanagh said in a statement. “Why did he pursue a suspect into the city, in violation of department policy, and why did he use his personal gun — a military-style assault rifle? The multiple wounds to Rylan’s arm inflicted damage commensurate with a war victim. His life will never be the same. We are lucky more kids were not shot as a result of the officer’s reckless actions.”

Before the shooting, Willis had robbed a bank in Des Plaines and then fled in a stolen car to Chicago, pursued by Armstrong and officers from multiple police agencies. After ditching the car, Willis ran into Upbeat Music and Arts, a music school on the Northwest Side where Wilder was an intern.

Surveillance video from inside the school shows a man holding a handgun running in through the front entrance. Moments later, Armstrong, with a rifle at his shoulder, yells, “Drop it!” Wilder is seen in the video, ducking and running for cover just as Armstrong squeezes the trigger. Wilder suffered catastrophic injuries to his left arm and is still undergoing treatment for those injuries.

In April of this year, the Des Plaines Police Department’s new chief, David Anderson, told the Chicago Sun-Times that after viewing the UpBeat surveillance video multiple times, he is uncertain whether Armstrong actually struck Wilder. He said it might have been the bank robber.

“If you listen to the video, what I hear is the potential of a shot being fired just prior to Officer Armstrong firing his weapon,” Anderson said.

Anderson also said Armstrong was trying to stop “a very violent, active shooter” and that he did the best he could under quickly changing circumstances.

Chicago police spokesman Tom Ahern told the Sun-Times in April: “We did confirm that the 15-year-old victim and the offender were shot by Des Plaines police.”

Cavanagh has said the suggestion that anyone other than a Des Plaines police officer shot Wilder is “nonsense.”

In a lawsuit filed in Cook County, the Wilders claim that Armstrong’s use of force was “excessive” and that it constituted “reckless, willful and wanton conduct.”

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Eight years ago, in a report the NCAA asked Big East commissioner Val Ackerman to write, she recommended the men’s and women’s Final Fours be played at the same venue on the same weekend.

She also suggested the women’s basketball tournament have its own television contract, not one combined with other sports as is currently the case, and that the NCAA streamline its governance structure, among other things.

Nothing happened.

After Tuesday’s release of a report ripping the NCAA for failing to uphold gender equity in its management of men’s and women’s basketball, Ackerman said she’s confident changes are coming because momentum is on the side of the women’s game after the embarrassing revelations of unequal treatment of athletes at the 2021 tournaments.

Some of the recommendations by the law firm hired to investigate rang familiar to Ackerman, like her ideas about combining the Final Fours, negotiating a stand-alone TV contract and restructuring the NCAA organizational chart.

“What I don’t know is how long it will take,” she said. “I hope quickly. That remains to be seen. My questions will continue to revolve around structure and how best to navigate the NCAA bureaucracy to bring these ideas into being.”

Kaplan Hecker & Fink LLP was hired in March after the NCAA failed to provide similar amenities to the teams in the men’s and women’s Division I basketball tournaments. The situation blew up on social media amid player complaints and prompted apologies from NCAA executives.

Ackerman, founding president of the WNBA and past president of USA Basketball, said she was interviewed twice for the Kaplan report and she provided investigators her 2013 white paper and other materials.

The Kaplan report gave a nod to Ackerman’s work and other studies of the NCAA’s treatment of women’s basketball, noting that “while it is true that some progress has been made, all too often, the proposed reforms that came out of these efforts ended up doing no more than sitting on a shelf.”

Ackerman praised the thoroughness of the 113-page Kaplan report and said, “This can’t be a report that sits on a shelf for the next eight years. That can’t happen. It can’t happen again. I hope many see that and that everybody can be part of the solution this time.”

Ackerman said the problems, and solutions, are rooted in the NCAA’s structure.

The Kaplan report found the organization of men’s and women’s basketball leadership makes it difficult for women to get a fair hearing of its issues with some of the NCAA’s top leaders.

“You have this sort of multitude of committees, and I think we make it hard on ourselves by having a murky pathway to decision-making,” Ackerman said.

The senior vice president of basketball, Dan Gavitt, is supposed to oversee both the men’s and women’s games. Gavitt acknowledged in the report he has devoted most of his time to men’s basketball, the NCAA’s cash cow with a tournament whose TV contract value approaches $1 billion. NCAA staff told investigators that vice president for women’s basketball Lynn Holzman has been left to run women’s basketball autonomously.

Gavitt, as a senior VP, is on the senior management team and attends meetings led by the NCAA president. Holzman, as a vice president, does not.

Under that setup, women’s basketball is not fully represented in important discussions within the NCAA or with broadcast and corporate partners.

Despite having the same senior vice president, the report found the men’s and women’s basketball staffs operate largely independently of one another and that there is little communication between the two.

“When you’re working in the same company,” Ackerman said, “I think there is an expectation that the right hand is talking to the left hand.”

Former Notre Dame coach Muffet McGraw, now an ACC Network analyst, said the lack of collegiality between the men’s and women’s staffs troubles her.

“That’s something that should be a much better situation for the women’s staff, to have the help of the guys that are running the men’s tournament and get some feedback and some comments,” McGraw said. “We just haven’t had a good working relationship there. That can change overnight.”

Kaplan recommended that the leadership of men’s and women’s basketball should be at equivalent levels of seniority within the organization and should coordinate to ensure gender equity in the athlete experience. They should report to a head of championships who would review budgets and participation opportunities with an eye toward spotting disparities.

Several coaches expressed interest in looking at a combined Final Four weekend.

“You know I’m an advocate for the synergy of the men’s and women’s game and think creative thinking should always be valued as we chart the future course for the NCAA and (women’s basketball) in particular,” USC women’s coach Lindsay Gottlieb said

Also recommended was a reset of the budgeting process to make spending more equitable, and that the NCAA allot an equal number of staff to work both tournaments.

“It’s hard work and it’s going to require some real leadership and a better effort at organization, pulling together the governance structure in the right way to implement this with all due speed and effectively,” Ackerman said. “That’s what I’ve got my eye on. Now what? How do we take this and do what we’re supposed to do to make this come to life?”

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