Cougars Uncaged, with Jack Heald and Oscar Clarke

In this episode of Cougars Uncaged, hosts Lonnie Preis and Kylie Walker sit down with Cleary men’s soccer standouts Jack Heald and Oscar Clarke, both originally from England, to talk about their journey to Cleary University and life as international student-athletes. Jack and Oscar share how they were recruited through the same agency, committed to Cleary without ever visiting campus, and quickly found their place on the Cougars soccer program.

The conversation dives into the biggest differences between soccer in England and college athletics in the U.S., the impact Cleary’s coaching staff and teammates have had on their development, and why the people and community on campus mean so much to them. From favorite campus spots like the stadium and wellness center to off-the-field friendships, both players reflect on what makes Cleary feel like home.

The episode also brings plenty of personality with spirited debates over favorite restaurants back home (Nando’s vs. Pizza Express), rapid-fire questions, and thoughtful reflections on the family members who have influenced them most. The show wraps up with a fast-paced Premier League challenge and a trivia question for listeners to win a prize.

It’s a fun, honest, and insightful look at international student-athlete life—on and off the pitch—at Cleary University.

Transcript

Lonnie Preis  0:04  
Hey, ladies and gentlemen, we are back Cougars uncaged, with the dead dwellers, Kylie Walker and our guest, Jack Hill and Oscar Clark. Welcome to cougars, uncaged. How you guys doing? I'm excited. You're fired up, definitely. I love it. You've never, ever been in this room before, never perfect. That's what we love to hear. This is new territory, new horizon. All right. We are here to learn about you. Have you guys do most of the talking. So I'll start with you. Oscar, little question about how you got to Cleary, well, actually, before that, tell us a little bit about what you do at Cleary, what year you are, what you're studying, activities that you're involved in, and then then tell us how you got here.

Oscar  0:49  
Okay, so I'm a soccer freshman, and I'm suddenly in sports management. I'm from England, up north in work so, and I got here through the same company as Jack, actually, interestingly, called starbridge. We went on a trip to Florida with the agency, where we played matches against all the colleges to sort of get a feel for it. Sort of went from the Brett from starbridge, got in touch with with Dan, the soccer coach, and they sold it to me straight away, one phone call. And that was a decision.

Lonnie Preis  1:26  
Made love it so you decided to come here without coming to the campus. Yeah, that's I love to hear that. I got a couple other questions about that. Let's Jack, let's hear your your a little bit about you.

Jack  1:36  
It's the exact same. I'm a junior, though, okay, I'm a soccer team, of course, sports promotion, management, my major and hopefully staying for a Master's as well. That's my goal. So yeah, I'm trying to stay here as long as possible. Awesome. Do you know what you'd get your Masters in? No, I'm not going that far yet, because I still got nowhere. Yeah, okay, I'm open to it. So okay, and how did you come to Cleary? It was the same thing, same company, same people we know. So again, put my stuff out there. I went on a trip as well. Okay, my stuff out there. Dan reached out straight away and yeah, went from there. Sorry to me. Love it.

Lonnie Preis  2:10  
I got to ask you quick the biggest, which is amazing that you guys came here without seeing it, the biggest difference between, well, actually, one question before that, did you guys know each other before?

Jack  2:21  
A little bit. We

Oscar  2:23  
both used to play at Chesterfield and Okay, well, he was obviously a few years older than me. I used to do foot style on a Friday night. Our coach would go and coach elsewhere, and he'd sort of fill in for him and coach me.

Jack  2:34  
Yeah, I don't remember it, but

Lonnie Preis  2:36  
he actually coached you. Was he? Was he a good coach? Yeah, he was it was all right. He was okay. He did the job. I love it. I love it. So what's the biggest difference from back home to here? What's one big difference from being in England to here in Michigan?

Oscar  2:53  
Definitely size. Everything's a lot bigger over here. There's a lot more like, focus on sport in terms of, like, the education side of it, the sport is a lot bigger over here, a lot better facilities. They invest a lot more into that coaching and over here, folks, yeah, oh, okay, focusing on the coaches and development of the players is a lot more over here.

Lonnie Preis  3:18  
Okay, great. Same thing for you, something different.

Jack  3:21  
The size is crazy, obviously, like, back home, it's a lot, lot closer together everything. Like, here we're going to games like, three, four hours away. Oh, nowhere near that.

Lonnie Preis  3:31  
Okay, that's interesting. So there's some there's probably so many people playing or so many teams close by back home. Yeah, you don't have to travel as

Jack  3:37  
much. Everything's local back then. Here, it's all

Oscar  3:40  
over the place, okay? You can travel three hours and it's on, like, the other side of the country.

Lonnie Preis  3:43  
Yeah, wow, wow. Well, that's cool. I mean, it's kind of neat to be able to have that experience, to check out different parts of of this country, you know, as you traveled all these games and and so on. Awesome. Okay, little bit about Cleary, what? Who has been most impactful? I know you're a freshman, but who has been most impactful during your time since you've been here?

Oscar  4:07  
Yeah, helped me a lot to be fair. Okay, well, I think as a freshman, obviously, for soccer development, it's got to be done. I mean, it sold it to me straight away in the first place, and then in terms of improving as a player and stuff that advice has given me, it's helped a lot through the season, and it's sort of secured my position. Made me want to stay here.

Lonnie Preis  4:33  
So good, awesome. Thank you. You've been here a little bit longer. What about you?

Jack  4:37  
I'm not gonna say the same answer. I don't want to keep repeating it. Obviously, it's the same sort of thing, but because I've been here a bit longer, obviously the people that I used to play with are now, like, GA's, so for example, like Marcel, Liam Coyle, both people I used to play with when I was, like a freshman, and now they're coaching me. So it's kind of like they've been there a separate way, and that you can kind of relate to them. So they've been a big help with like, soccer and. It also, like, the academic stuff has been crazy, like, help so, yeah.

Lonnie Preis  5:03  
Definitely loves you. Great. Great. Two more questions about Cleary. What do you outside of soccer? What do you love most about Cleary, the university,

Jack  5:13  
I say the people, the friendships we've made, and like, obviously, of our team being so diverse all across the world, like the people, the friendships I've been like, able to make from people everywhere has been ridiculous. Definitely the people, for sure.

Oscar  5:28  
People, yeah, we've got a big squad So, and they're all good lads as well. So love it easy to get along with them.

Lonnie Preis  5:33  
I tell you, coming here without being here, and I'm basically coming on coach. Bullies were, you know, have what he said to you, it's, it's great that you're here and you're enjoying it because, and obviously that shows that coach, you know, Coach, has got a he's being totally honest, because the last thing you want to do, and I know this has happened in other places where somebody talks to somebody tries to convince them to come, and then they show up and it's like, oh, this is what they said, Yeah, yeah. Then you're like, What is going on? So this is that's awesome to hear you guys are having a good experience. Okay, this is a little unique question. Your favorite specific spot on this campus? Favorite spot,

Jack  6:13  
I'd say a mix between wellness and the field, the electric stadium, I think because we spend a lot of time there, obviously, in season, obviously we're playing games training, and now that we're just finished, we're still there big groups of us going to the gym and then playing footsteps in the Wellness Center. So we're always there, like, just having fun and being around people. So I think that's one of the best places.

Oscar  6:34  
Okay, I agree. I think, I mean, you spent, it's bit cliche saying the field, I think, as a soccer player, but you spend a lot of time there is where the magic happens

Lonnie Preis  6:45  
in that field. So many people have said the stadium, whether they even people who don't play a sport on the stadium. And I think with the, you know, you got the big water tower, you got the sun. I mean, I've been at some of your games with the sun setting. I mean, it's just kind of a cool that's the best game,

Speaker 1  7:00  
cool environment. Their other favorite spot has to be the Cougar corner. They're always in there

Lonnie Preis  7:09  
with a shout out, yes, boom. This is random being soccer player. Do you watch TED lasso? I've seen it. Do you like it?

Jack  7:19  
The first season was gooder than it just became a bit more like political and stuff.

Lonnie Preis  7:23  
Yeah, I think it is little bit, it's just, it's kind of, when you said, it made me it came in my mind when you said how diverse it is. Because obviously, on that team, on that show, and I think you're right, the first season was probably the best. So diverse, obviously. So okay, thank you guys so much. We are going to get into a little bit different type of segment. This is called Hot takes. You guys talked about what you wanted to debate, you know, kind of see what's better, what's worse, whatever. And you guys brought up something that this will be very informative for us, because we are not going to know what, or most of us are going to not gonna know what. You're talking about, restaurants back home. What are the best restaurants and why? And definitely convince all of us that your restaurant is the one we want to try. Don't go to the other one. Jack, I

Jack  8:10  
said Nando's, which is like a Portuguese like chicken, like restaurant, grilled chicken. I think it clears everything back up. Because not only is it great food, it's like, it's not too bad for you either. You know what I mean? A little healthy.

Oscar  8:22  
I'll give you that one. So I said the Pizza Express, but I honestly think that's the best place.

Jack  8:29  
I don't even think that's the best pizza spot. Bro, nice. So I'm very curious, so

Lonnie Preis  8:34  
that people are like, there's obviously different kinds of restaurants. When you say pizza, many people here in America thinking, you know, they got their favorite kind of pizza. How does that pizza compare to pizza here in the United States?

Oscar  8:48  
Well, for me personally, I like a bit of variety with pizza. I don't like to go for the same thing every time it's good to go somewhere specific for pizza. I mean, they do a bit of pasta and stuff as well. Mac and cheese. The mac and cheese is really nice. I mean, it's good over here, but, okay, it's unreal.

Lonnie Preis  9:05  
When you say Pizza Express, I'm just thinking, like a, like, a gas station, pizza, like Express, like fast, it's actually a nice restaurant, sit down restaurant. Oh, okay, all right. So why is pizza better than whatever he's talking about, this healthy stuff. I mean,

Oscar  9:17  
it is healthy and it's good. But I, honestly, I just don't think you can be nah.

Jack  9:21  
If you're going for a pizza you want, you're going for some, like, dirty food. You're not looking to be healthy, are you? So why would you go to, like, a nice little one there, bro, get like, a little

Oscar  9:30  
takeout or eat. So it's nice to sit in there. I mean, for me, because I had student discount and stuff, there we go. Then, yeah, you could get offers to get a pizza, and you could get mac and cheese on the side and dough balls as well. The dough balls are

Lonnie Preis  9:44  
a dough ball, yeah, interesting is it just a hunk of dough,

Oscar  9:48  
hunk of dough, and they have a little pot of garlic butter.

Jack  9:52  
Oh, grilled chicken, butterfly, spicy rice, some fries. Look garlic bread, and you get mac and cheese to be. Of it

Oscar  10:00  
everywhere in England,

Jack  10:04  
Chicago, what? When you go back, what's the first place you're going to eat? You think of Nando's

Oscar  10:11  
row because it's like two minutes down

Jack  10:16  
the road our local pub. If you go argue with every English guy on the team, the majority would say, you can't just say this. Would agree.

Lonnie Preis  10:31  
We might have to run a poll. Kylie, I love I love this. You guys sound like food connoisseurs. We have a cooking club. Starting these guys would be phenomenal with it. Maybe not him, Jack. Think about Jack. Okay, I'm curious, though, because obviously I can do by the way, I'm extremely hungry right now, just hearing you talk about a dough ball and what you're talking about with Nando, I mean, that just sounds great. Here. Is there a restaurant? And maybe we can put a plug out there and get another sponsor. What's a restaurant that you enjoy here,

Jack  11:02  
maybe like a restaurant, but like a food spot that I like my go to spot, especially before a game or something, is Peter way.

Lonnie Preis  11:08  
Peter way, oh, I had it so good. I've had it. Yes, I've never been there, okay, Qdoba, especially

Oscar  11:16  
before a game, yeah. But the place that surprised me, though, actually, when my parents came over was, I forgot what it's called, but you sort of, I think it's called black iron. This the steak place, a black rock steak out on the Yeah, and you cook it

Lonnie Preis  11:32  
yourself. I'm hungry. What Kylie

Speaker 1  11:36  
I was it was black rock. Black

Lonnie Preis  11:37  
Rock. Yeah, love it. All right. We ever go to England? Any of y'all? Check them out. Check them both out. Maybe we'll get them to hop on board Pizza Express Nando's guys. Thank you so much. All right. Now, this is a little segment we call behind the curtain. You ready for this? Here we go. This is the get you all get to know you all a little bit better. First question is this, if you can meet anybody who's passed away or is alive that you have not met yet, who would it be and what would be the first question you'd ask them?

Jack  12:17  
I think, because I'm obviously a football soccer I think I'd have to go with someone like that, and maybe like a David Beckham, because not only has he done well in his football career, but his career after that, we've obviously into Miami and all that. I think either will have so much knowledge that you can just get out of, yeah, I don't know what specific question, but I think you can get so much information. Okay, good.

Oscar  12:42  
I think in terms of football, well, soccer, I think I'd have to pick someone obviously plays the same position as me. Go like Kevin De Brett, who I watched a lot when I was younger. Maybe like, I like listening to Roy Keane talk a lot on interviews and when he's pundit in but I think outside of football or soccer, I'd probably pick someone funny, like Jeremy Clarkson.

Lonnie Preis  13:06  
I love a bit of Jeremy Clark All right. All right, good. So here's a follow up question about that. If you could hang out with these people for two hours, you got the afternoon, but you can't do anything related to soccer. What would you do with them.

Oscar  13:22  
It's an easy one for Jeremy Clarkson, what would you do? I go driving with

Lonnie Preis  13:25  
him, yeah, just go cruising. Yeah. Love it. Where would you where would you go? Where do you want to drive?

Oscar  13:33  
So when he started his grand tour program, he had his own race track.

Lonnie Preis  13:38  
David Beckham, what's David Beckham. David Beckham is here, Jack. What do you want

Jack  13:44  
to do? I would say go to go watch a game of him, because then you can, kind of like think, but not related to soccer. I'm not too sure. I don't know. Okay, clocks is easy. I said dragon. Beckham is known for his football I

Lonnie Preis  14:00  
go for a drive with Beckham. Just pick his brain. Just talk to him.

Jack  14:06  
A race me and Beckham versus him. Oh, very good drive out with very good

Lonnie Preis  14:12  
next question kind of related, who in your life? Who, obviously, now you know, who is in your life, or they could have passed away. But who has had the most impact on you as a person, and how and how have they impacted you?

Oscar  14:27  
I probably say my granddad back home. I mean, I live with him. He lives with me and my family, quite a lot of us in the house, but he's always like, watch my games, and spoken to me about math. So even watches the games, I was gonna ask it back home, yep, yep. If it's too late, I'll watch him in the morning with his breakfast. I used to be a PE teacher, so he taught sports when he was when he was working, and so any sport, really, even if I go for a round of golf, he'll give me some advice on what to do. He's happily come with me and.

Lonnie Preis  15:00  
If I asked him to awesome, is the advice he gives, like, What's is it obviously sport related, but it, is it life?

Oscar  15:07  
Yeah, definitely, definitely a lot of experience in his life, so it definitely got a lot of lot of knowledge to give that's awesome. How about you?

Jack  15:16  
John, say my dad for sure. He's watched every single game since I was since I started, and even now, we still watch it, and he comes over once a year. So 100% Good.

Lonnie Preis  15:26  
What and how? Besides being there, how else has he impacted you?

Jack  15:31  
Obviously, he advised, like, playing wise, but also, like, sort of dealing with any setbacks like you might get. Obviously, it's a sport, so you never know what can what can happen. So any setbacks, he's always been there, supporting, giving me the right advice, whether to, like, stay with a team, maybe a move, or, like, how to deal with stuff, like revolving around that, but also just, like, just life in general, like the amount of stuff.

Lonnie Preis  15:53  
Like, it sounds like both of these gentlemen, is your is your granddad still alive? Awesome. I would imagine that both of these are, you know, you're going through a tough time. Straight to them. Straight to them. They're the they're the go to Oh, did you really well, we don't know how many millions or 1000s of people are going to watch this, but definitely have your granddad and your dad watch this so they can hear you. You know, we could get, we can get some view. That's that is great. Thank you guys for sharing that. Okay, we are now into the segment called Rapid Fire. This is one of our fun segments. We're going to get you guys to answer some things pretty quickly. Oh, you got the do we have that one? I am going to we're going to go fast with this so you can't think too long. I'm going to ask you a question, whatever it is. You're both going to answer it, but we'll go first to you, then we'll go back and forth. Sound good? This is not the game. There's no this is not the challenge we got coming up. But this is just some fun answers. All right, here we go, Oscar, we'll start with you. What's one food item? I'm sure you're gonna not Pizza Express, but what's one food item you could eat every day? Steak? Jack, just straight up grilled chicken. Yeah, love it. Your celebrity crush,

Jack  17:09  
Ruby Rose, okay,

Oscar  17:12  
Mila Kunis, Mrs. Rope. No celebrities, yeah, I know.

Lonnie Preis  17:17  
Okay, good, favorite season of the year,

Oscar  17:21  
winter. Summer, summer.

Lonnie Preis  17:23  
Okay, by the way, on this on a tangent back home. I should know this, but you guys get snow

Jack  17:30  
a little bit. Yeah, tiny, tiny bit.

Oscar  17:32  
Have you little snow? And it'll settle maybe a couple of inches at most, and then it'll rain, so it'll just

Lonnie Preis  17:38  
okay. Have you gone sledding?

Jack  17:40  
Yeah, ever as a kid, but not since, Oh,

Lonnie Preis  17:43  
you, when we get a good snow, we should go sleight, all right, you should get a group of people go sliding. Okay? Your favorite class that you've taken at Cleary

Jack  17:51  
Andrew Chamberlain is my freshman year. I think it was a clear remind. Oh, that was a good one.

Oscar  17:55  
Good, yeah, I've got clear in mind with Tommy Egan. So I like that one, because nice, interesting.

Lonnie Preis  18:00  
Yeah, yeah, they do a phenomenal job bringing in people to talk about stuff. Good. If you could be any movie character, who would it be? Spider Man,

Jack  18:14  
I don't watch many movies, you know, if you're going Spider Man, I'd go Superman,

Lonnie Preis  18:19  
the heroes. Good. Would you rather text somebody or call them?

Jack  18:23  
Depends on the situation. But normally I'm a texter.

Lonnie Preis  18:26  
Yeah, same man. Texter. Okay, your favorite sports team, Sheffield Wednesday,

Jack  18:33  
I must say, Nottingham Forest.

Lonnie Preis  18:37  
They both approve. Okay, your dream vacation spot. You could go anywhere in the world.

Jack  18:42  
Well, my dad's just come back from the Maldives, and the photos he sent me, I have to go there one day. That's so nice.

Oscar  18:48  
Nice, nice. I love to go to Australia. A few people that have been I've never read anything.

Lonnie Preis  18:53  
The same thing. I just ran into a couple of people. And everybody talks like it's amazing. Good. A couple more one word piece of advice, even though you're a freshman. For freshmen, What's one word you piece of advice you'd give them?

Oscar  19:09  
I'd say one word, perseverance. Persevere.

Lonnie Preis  19:18  
Perseverance. Good. I'd say confidence, yeah. Oh, good. Deep. I like this. We've had people say sleep or study, or you guys are deep. I like it. What's the weirdest thing you've ever tried to eat?

Jack  19:31  
I don't even know. I'm a really picky hero. Oh, I don't really like branch out that much. I don't know. On that one,

Lonnie Preis  19:37  
don't know that could be something you guys could try. That could be a little challenge.

Oscar  19:45  
Okay, I've eaten meal ones before, but while they're alive, no, no, no, okay, I won't do that. Okay, but I've had the alligator before.

Lonnie Preis  19:53  
Alligator, that's, I've tried that. Yeah, it's pretty good alligator. You could try alligator, maybe, maybe one. It, okay, your biggest pet peeve, that's a tough one.

Oscar  20:06  
Actually, I think it depends on the person, because I feel like you've got different tolerances for different people.

Lonnie Preis  20:15  
Okay, well, think of a person that really kind of rubs you around. You don't have to say their name, but what's you know,

Oscar  20:24  
I say people that eat really loudly.

Lonnie Preis  20:26  
Oh, shoot. Their mouth open. Oh, yeah, you hear it all. Might I have a problem with that. I can keep my mouth shut, and people still say they hear me. How about you

Jack  20:34  
say people that aren't texting you back? Well, like, you can see them on their phone, like safety, and you're getting food with them, and they're scrolling on the phone. You just think,

Lonnie Preis  20:42  
just thinking, oh my goodness, that is important that you need to know as well. That's the worst. Yes, that is a good one. We've had some good ones, all right. Last question, describe yourself in three words, confident.

Jack  20:58  
I'm gonna say funny. Sometimes, coming up funny and I don't know, outgoing, okay, I say, I got three words.

Lonnie Preis  21:17  
Well, we'll see. We'll see what he says. Then you can say what I'd say, I'm pretty

Oscar  21:24  
confident as well. So confident I'd say,

Oscar  21:37  
athletic. I'm not really fast, but like, I love, I love sports, yeah, and I can't say

Oscar  21:52  
outgoing, same as you. I'd say pretty extroverted. Yeah, extroverted.

Jack  21:58  
What would, is that? What you're upset. We have a nickname for him on the team. We got to hear that. I call him Captain dents, because some of this stuff in his brain, he just doesn't comprehend stuff. So when I'm tired, when I'm hungry,

Lonnie Preis  22:11  
hey, that happens a lot of people. That happens a lot of people, all right. Captain dance, that's a cool nickname, I mean, in a way. Captain Yeah, do you what's your Nick I don't

Jack  22:23  
have one like that. People like, have, like, a way out of my name, but not like, Jackie Turner's probably closer to everyone.

Lonnie Preis  22:31  
I love it. Love it. Okay, we are to our segment where we're gonna get a little challenge here. Okay, this is called Showtime. Show us what you know, and here we go. You guys picked premier league soccer teams. So the way this game works is, you start Oscar, you go back, we go back and forth. If somebody repeats a team, they lose. If someone takes more than three seconds to answer, the other person wins. Does that sound good? If you guys rattle through all these, then you said you're gonna go to another

Jack  23:04  
league, yeah, my mind's gonna go,

Lonnie Preis  23:07  
I know many, many people think, Oh, we know this. And then you get in the pressure, yeah, here we go. Showtime. Start it up.

Jack  23:15  
Arsenal, Tottenham, Brett, Chelsea,

Oscar  23:20  
Palace, Leeds Burnley, not as far as Palace. I said, Palace, did you I said, Crystal

Lonnie Preis  23:29  
Palace, Crystal Palace. You guys are the fastest, though, well done. Well done, Oscar. You win that round. Very good. That's honestly the fastest. People have gone back and forth. Some people went a little bit longer, but you guys did a good job. All right, I don't right. Last thing we have for today is our quiz. You guys came up with a trivia question. Oscar, I think you're going to share with the audience what that is. Audience, once you hear this trivia question, go to student life@cleary.edu The first one to respond correctly is going to win a Jimmy John's gift card. Oscar, go ahead and explain to us our trivia question.

Oscar  24:06  
So the trivia question was, who won the most premier league titles overall

Lonnie Preis  24:14  
in the history of the Premier League? History of the Premier League? Okay, easily looked up online, or you might know it some of you, you can obviously go online first person respond to student life@cleary.edu Kylie, how you feeling about that? Do you know the answer?

Speaker 1  24:28  
Jimmy John's gift card? All right, Jimmy

Lonnie Preis  24:30  
John, get a Jimmy John's gift card. All right, let's, let's wake it up. Here we go. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for being here on Cougars uncaged on behalf of Kylie Walker, the dead dweller, Lonnie priest and our special guests, Oscar and Jack. Till next time, 123, go, go. Cougars!