If Lovie Smith has free time after coaching the Illini today, he’s invited to hang around Memorial Stadium, where hundreds of Boy Scouts will spend the night sleeping in tents.
“We weren’t sure about Lovie’s camping history,” said Prairielands Council’s Kurt Brown, who helps coordinate the event, “but we’re confident he could teach sports merit badge.”
Area kids will put up tents — stakes, chairs and cots are prohibited — on Zuppke Field soon after the Illini play Purdue as part of the annual Scout Camporee. The Boy Scout-Illini relationship dates to the 1930s and remains strong today, with about 600 expected to attend the game, cook out afterward and take in a movie — “Cool Runnings” — on the giant stadium scoreboard.