Stephanie Gaitley poses with new players at FDU after being introduced as Knights’ new head coach (top), son Jordan, and former players at Ocean City High School (bottom). (Photos by Ray Floriani/Daly Dose Of Hoops)
TEANECK, N.J. — You can say this all started the afternoon of March 12. It all added up to destiny with a spicing of irony.
While FDU dropped a heartbreaker in the Northeast Conference tournament final to Sacred Heart, Stephanie Gaitley watched courtside to support her long time assistant Angelika Szumilo, the Knights’ head coach and her former longtime assistant. After the game, Tobin Anderson, then the FDU men’s coach, dropped by to talk a few minutes with Gaitley. As they parted, Gaitley wished Anderson luck in the upcoming NCAA Tournament. Anderson thanked her, while adding, “you belong back in (college) coaching.”
Not long after FDU caught the nation’s attention with its historic upset of No. 1 seed Purdue, Anderson was off to Iona after Rick Pitino left for St. John’s. Szumilo later followed, heading to New Rochelle to succeed Billi Chambers, who departed for Xavier. FDU was in the market for a new coach, and AD Brad Hurlbut wasted little time contacting Gaitley. Within a few days of their initial contact, Gaitley signed on as the new FDU coach.
The introductory press conference at the Rothman Center Monday saw Hurlbut and interim university president Dr. Michael Avaltroni comment on Gaitley’s leadership as a key to sustaining the excellence of the program’s recent seasons.
“Her familiarity with our institution and the NEC,” Avaltroni noted, “will help the program immediately as we transition into the next chapter of Knights women’s basketball.”
In over three decades of college coaching, Gaitley has amassed 684 victories. She has been a winner at every stop and turned several programs around. In addition, she is very familiar with the NEC, having coached at two of the member schools. She took over at LIU in 2002, building on the successful foundation laid by her predecessor, Tony Bozzella. Spending six seasons in Brooklyn, the Blackbirds hit the 20-win plateau in both of her last two campaigns. Then, it was off to Monmouth, where she spent three seasons. Then, her most recent foray on the college circuit saw her transform a dormant Fordham program into a perennial winner. Prior to her arrival on Rose Hill, the Rams had zero postseason trips in the prior decade. By her second season, they were in the Atlantic 10 championship game. Overall, she led Fordham to two A-10 titles and seven WNIT appearances. This past season, she was at her Ocean City (N.J.) High School alma mater, leading the Red Raiders to a South Jersey sectional crown.
Gaitley played and learned from two legends in the game, Pat Dougherty at Ocean City and Harry Perretta at Villanova. Given her emphasis on family in coaching and everyday life, she abides by and instills to her charges the words of her late parents: Be the nicest person you can ever be.
The conference has changed a bit membership-wise since Gaitley’s last go-round on an NEC sideline. For starters, Monmouth is no longer a member. Regardless, she has kept in touch with the conference scene, especially since Szumilo took over at FDU four years ago. There is familiarity.
“It will be nice to work again with (commissioner) Noreen (Morris) and (supervisor of officials) Jon Levinson,” Gaitley said. Already building her staff, she added Madison Stanley, who started for Szumilo and spent this past year on the College of Charleston staff, as an assistant.
Recruiting is a program’s lifeblood. Her philosophy is simple and effective.
“I always say in recruiting, win your backyard,” Gaitley opined. “I have international contacts, which we will use, but right here in New Jersey is outstanding talent. South Jersey, where Ocean City plays, has a few players we faced I would want to recruit.”
The Shore Conference, based a little north of Ocean City, is a gold mine of talent. Gaitley has great contacts in the Shore from her Monmouth days, not to mention Sarah Karpell — one of her Fordham players — is the daughter of Dawn Karpell, the coach of arguably the best program in the Garden State, St. John Vianney. And right in FDU’s backyard, Northern New Jersey schools have turned out their share of talent. The recent success of the men’s team is also something to be utilized on the recruiting trail.
“The men’s and women’s programs go hand-in-hand at FDU,” Gaitley said. “The outstanding showing by the men got the FDU name out there nationally. Now recruits know more about us. That recognition is something to use to our advantage.”
A hard worker who enjoys recruiting, the ink was barely dry on her new contract as Gaitley was at an AAU event sizing up future Knights. The transfer portal came up in the discussion. FDU will utilize it if need be, but the downside of the portal is coaches have to essentially re-recruit their players each year. Lauren Park-Lane’s name was mentioned, as the dynamic Seton Hall guard recently announced she will be headed to Mississippi State.
“I am friends with (Seton Hall coach) Tony (Bozzella),” Gaitley said. “I know losing Lauren to another school was tough. She is talented, a great kid and in a great conference, the Big East. But like I was telling Ang, if you lose a kid in the portal, just don’t take it personally. It’s happening all over and that’s the way college basketball is these days.”
Keeping in touch with her philosophy of facing tough non-league competition to prepare for the conference slate, Gaitley is excited about the schedule she inherits. On the docket are Seton Hall, Vanderbilt and Georgetown. The opener is at Iowa.
“(Iowa coach) Lisa Bluder and I are good friends,” Gaitley said. “For our kids to go out there, play the NCAA runner-up, a great player in Caitlin Clark, and experience that atmosphere is special. And hey, once the ball goes up you just never know.”
The transition from Szumilo to Gaitley will be a seamless one. Both look on defense on the court as job one. Off the court, the priority is academics.
“You come here to be a student-athlete,” Gaitley said. “The student comes first. (Szumilo and I) coached together 16 years. She did a great job of building a culture here we are looking to continue and sustain.”
That makes it easier on the returning players. Speaking with the returnees in attendance, at the press conference they are all aware Gaitley’s emphasis is defense. They unanimously embrace it, having experienced it with the prior coaching staff.
NEC commissioner Noreen Morris was also in attendance, and remarked how it speaks volumes of a coach to go from college to high school in one year, connecting with younger players and with the same outstanding success, on and off the court.
What Morris pointed out was evident when several of Gaitley’s Ocean City players walked into Rothman Center for the press conference. A three-hour trip aside, those girls wanted to be there for someone who meant so much and impacted their lives in such a short time. Tori, a senior, Madison, a sophomore, Ayanna, a senior, Avery, a senior and Sophia, a sophomore, all attended and spoke so highly of their coach. Tori recalled the first practices under Gaitley.
“We dove on loose balls,” she said. “Coach instructed the proper way to dive for the ball. If we didn’t talk on defense, we ran.” Madison noted how they constantly changed defenses.
“We played 2-3, man, 2-2-1 pressure,” she said. “We constantly mixed it up.”
Each young lady genuinely enjoyed the experience playing for Gaitley, whose sister, FDU alumna Coco Vanderslice, served as an assistant. Ocean City captured the South Jersey championship, defeating Mainland Regional to avenge two losses in the regular season and cap off the season a most memorable few months together.
Family is the foundation of a Stephanie Gaitley program, and ultimately, the way she lives her life. Present on Monday was her aforementioned sister Coco who played at FDU in the 1980s. In fact, Gaitley and her sisters, Coco and Courtney made NCAA history. The trio competed in the same game during the 1981-82 season, with Stephanie and Courtney playing for Villanova and Coco for FDU. Her husband of over 40 years, Frank, was also in attendance, as was Jordan, one of their three sons.
“When I visited FDU, I just felt a family atmosphere,” Gaitley admitted.
That family atmosphere will continue and thrive under her watch, as will success on the court.
Rutgers during pregame warmup prior to October 30 exhibition against Fairfield, the first of 90 games I covered this season. (Photo by Jaden Daly/Daly Dose Of Hoops)
We’ve reached the time of year again where reflection and recollection takes center stage amid the transfer portal, the ever-present recruiting rumors to which I continue to be painfully and blatantly oblivious, and the slow, sometimes painful but forever meandering path into the offseason.
Yup, this site celebrates another birthday today. And this one, the 14th for those of you scoring at home or blessed with a memory that has allowed you to place significance to April 17, 2009, is more a coming-of-age moment than any that came before it.
Last year placed me at a crossroads, as I’ve mentioned many times in the past 12-15 months. It wasn’t until March of 2022 that I emerged with a rejuvenating sign from the universe that my work and mission was yet unfinished. I won’t ever shy away from the fact that the postseason runs of both Saint Peter’s and North Carolina saved my career a year ago. That magical month gave me new purpose and direction when I thought my shelf life had expired. This season lacked a face-to-face staredown with my journalistic mortality, so to speak, but at various points this season, I felt like the year was over before it could even begin with some of the losses that were incurred before and after the ball was tipped.
The first came in July with the passing of longtime Bergen Record scribe J.P. Pelzman, the lovable and hysterical gatekeeper of the Seton Hall media circle I’ve been a proud member of for the past decade-plus. Even though I’ve always been open with my emotions, it takes a lot these days to get me choked up. Getting word of J.P.’s passing during an otherwise routine day at the office almost brought me to tears. Remembering him still does, but quickly elicits a smile thereafter, because if you were blessed and fortunate enough to have known J.P. in your travels, very rarely did you leave such an encounter feeling dissatisfied. Be it a helpful perspective about how you should approach a story or a moment of comic relief with his impressions of Mike Francesa, Chris Russo, or fellow veteran colleague and all-around awesome dude Roger Rubin, J.P. always had the uncanny ability to make you laugh and smile at a time when you needed it most. He just never realized that, but the great ones don’t have to. Getting him on the podcast a month before he passed, and then returning the favor in a longform interview of his that is now his penultimate byline — his final published work was a similar piece with Zach Braziller of the New York Post — now ranks as one of the greatest honors of my 16-year career. I liked J.P., he was solid. And I know he’s grinning and adjusting his mic in the press room up above.
The second came on October 25, only 13 days before opening night, on a train to South Orange for Seton Hall media day. That was when Manhattan athletic director Marianne Reilly made the short-sighted and ill-timed decision to move on from Steve Masiello despite the fact that the Jaspers were picked second in the preseason MAAC poll, with the preseason player of the year in Jose Perez, who I’ll get to again before this piece wraps up. Had Reilly made the move in March, hardly anyone would have questioned it given Masiello had one more year on his contract and a change of direction would have given his successor — whoever it may have been — a full offseason to implement his style of play and recruit a full roster to circumvent whatever movement would have come via the transfer portal. Instead, the decision to cut ties with a man who built a program to be proud of and cultivated a family environment came at the cost of Perez, Omar Silverio and Samba Diallo leaving. RaShawn Stores went on to do an admirable job keeping the core of the Manhattan program together and upholding its potential, taking a team everyone abandoned after the coaching change to within one game of a first-round bye in the MAAC tournament and proving himself worthy of leading his alma mater into the future, while Masiello resurfaced shortly thereafter at none other than Manhattan's bitter rival when Rick Pitino added him to his staff at Iona.
Five days after the fallout in Riverdale, I covered the first of 90 games this season — the highest number for me in five years — when Rutgers and Fairfield met in Piscataway for an exhibition that would benefit Eric LeGrand and his foundation. The Scarlet Knights won that unofficial contest, confirming the potential of a third straight NCAA Tournament appearance was on its side between the leadership of Paul Mulcahy and Cliff Omoruyi while the emergence of newcomers Cam Spencer and Derek Simpson offered a new facet of what was to come. As for Fairfield, head coach Jay Young had reason to be optimistic about a renaissance for the Stags and his team’s depth and talent. The end result for both teams proved to be vastly different than anyone would have prognosticated that Sunday in October, but there’s a reason why these games aren’t played on paper. As Josh Adams so eloquently puts it: Buy the ticket, take the ride. Speaking of Josh, I hope he’s back at full strength on press row next season, but his absence was brought on by the honorable cause of spending time with his family, notably his stepson, Dominic. There truly is no substitute for love or family, and it makes me happy to see that some people in this crazy, screwed-up world still share that mindset.
November commenced with a handful of familiar faces in new places. From Shaheen Holloway and his Saint Peter’s staff now at Seton Hall to Monmouth in the Colonial Athletic Association, Bashir Mason at Saint Peter’s to former MAAC rotation pieces in Aidan Carpenter, Brendan McGuire and Raheem Solomon at Sacred Heart, and Tyler Thomas at Hofstra, the first week of the season felt like a reunion tour of sorts. And it was an almost perfect juxtaposition with the return of college basketball without restrictions, so no complaints were had. Mounds of words were written, however.
“Sometimes you gotta lose to win, right?”
That was the way a candid Holloway approached his first loss at the reins of his alma mater, when Seton Hall stepped up in class and came up short against Iowa. It wasn’t Sha doing his best Steven Tyler impression of bridging the first and second verses in Dream On, either. It was more a glimpse into how the Pirates’ leader wears his heart on his sleeve and realizes that you can’t always get what you want, but at the same time, recognizes the concept of a minor setback before a major comeback. And as the universe would soon reveal, Sha was vindicated in his words heading into conference play.
After that first taste of adversity for Seton Hall, it was on to Mohegan Sun for the first time. Rutgers and Iona playing separate ends of a doubleheader justified the four-hour trip for me, at the expense of two load management days that followed. Actually, it was one load management day after going to Newark for AEW All Out, because when MJF is winning the world championship in reasonable, commutable distance from you, you gotta go see it happen. Priorities, y’all. But in that Connecticut twin bill, Rutgers proved vulnerable without Caleb McConnell and Paul Mulcahy in a loss to Temple that saw the Scarlet Knights fractured, yet cognizant of what they needed to do to persevere. Later that night, Iona showcased its fortitude in the face of injury for the first of many nights, as Quinn Slazinski was unavailable against Vermont. Rick Pitino’s depth and knack for placing the right players in the right situations mitigated the absence and rendered it a non-factor in a 21-point win. The rest of November was spent watching St. John’s pad its then-undefeated record with wins over the likes of Central Connecticut, Temple, Syracuse and LIU, but still leaving something to be desired as to its ability to take a punch from a higher-level opponent.
The next familiar face in a new place opened December, as Mount St. Mary’s christened its MAAC membership in Jersey City against Saint Peter’s, and walked off the floor at Run Baby Run Arena with a 15-point victory. It’s a shame, but such is the life of a mid-major in today’s day and age, that the conference only got to enjoy one year of Jalen Benjamin at The Mount, especially after his career night against the Peacocks in which he erupted for 28 points. After the game, head coach Dan Engelstad told me he hoped it was always this fun in league play. Four months later, that evaluation may still hold true, and I came away impressed with the new kid in town.
A three-game homestand for Iona followed the Mountaineers’ MAAC baptism, and the Gaels handled business with convincing victories over Niagara, Canisius and Saint Louis. The middle game in that trio offered an unexpected curveball when Rick Pitino sent none other than Steve Masiello in to pinch-hit in the postgame press conference for what became Mas’ first public comments since resurfacing in New Rochelle. In his remarks, Masiello spoke of how thankful he was for the opportunity to be brought into the family on such short notice after his shocking ouster at Manhattan. It just proves, as he himself said in 2014 after the Jaspers beat Marist: If you can survive when you’re supposed to go down, you’re going to live a long time.
A few days later, after an impromptu trip to the nation’s capital to watch Siena nearly beat Georgetown, I got to revisit my roots covering the alma mater’s women’s basketball team. I always try to get to a few of those every year, going back to my play-by-play days, but in recent years, it hasn’t been as easy with all the conflicts everywhere else. Nevertheless, seeing Joe Tartamella build a veteran core in the transfer portal to replace Leilani Correa turned out to be a stroke of genius, and it played a huge role in the Red Storm’s undefeated start. Seton Hall capped off the second week of the month with a gritty victory at Rutgers that looked to be the momentum shift the Pirates needed before injuries reared their ugly head later on in the year.
December was also marked by a third loss of sorts during the year, when the NCAA — in its all-powerful and omniscient wisdom — denied Jose Perez’s waiver to play immediately at West Virginia, where he committed shortly after the Masiello fallout at Manhattan. The bond between the two transcended the hardwood, and should have had a chance to be fortified even more before circumstances rendered that a moot point. Whether you believe Manhattan did or did not approve the waiver for Perez does not matter, it is more the fact that a player who did nothing wrong was unjustly penalized yet again. The good news is that Jose will return next year in Morgantown to wrap up his college career the right way, and I know a few people back up here in New York — and in other places — who will be rooting for him.
The month, and the calendar year, wrapped up with St. John’s going through the motions in a loss to Villanova where Mike Anderson watched idly as the Wildcats snatched momentum away from the hot-shooting Johnnies in the first half. AJ Storr sat on the bench as it all went down, despite galvanizing the Red Storm in the opening minutes, in a decision Anderson nonchalantly dismissed by saying the freshman was tired. Tired would be a more apt description of the alma mater’s fan base as conference play wore on, particularly in a loss to Xavier that offered a behind-the-scenes look at the sources of the consternation, thanks to FS1’s all-access broadcast. The exposure was enough to write a column about it, influenced partly by Eric Clapton, but mostly by the first of many boiling points on the corner of Union and Utopia. On the bright side, my last game of 2022 came in the new Mahoney Arena, as Fairfield offered a glimpse of its upside in a 19-point takedown of Marist that gave Jay Young some much-needed stress relief going into the new year.
Mahoney Arena, Fairfield’s new state-of-the-art facility, opened in December. This shot was after the Stags defeated Marist on December 30, one of my many quiet court photos that were inspired by Jeff Gluck of The Athletic doing the same with quiet tracks after NASCAR Cup Series races. (Photo by Jaden Daly/Daly Dose Of Hoops)
January started somewhat innocuously with Iona hosting Saint Peter’s on New Year’s Day, but the first sign that business picked up came two years later. As time goes by in this crazy little business of ours, I’ve come to find that the changing of the calendar from December to the first month of the next year is when things really start to get serious in the college basketball world. The first true vestiges of conference play usually separate, to use Full Metal Jacket parlance, the phony tough from the crazy brave. It only took 72 hours, actually about 68, to see just how far Marquette had come.
My relationship with the Marquette community is one I’ve come to treasure. Its fan base was one of the first to embrace me when I started tweeting from the site’s account in 2010, and still manages to put up with me and show me some love over a decade later despite being 14 hours away from Milwaukee. In honor of Marquette Twitter’s embrace of me, and mind you, this is the same group who willed Steve Wojciechowski’s firing into existence two years ago, I always try to write something to showcase the facets of the Golden Eagle program that usually get overlooked from a distance whenever I cover a Marquette game (as well as post advanced stats at halftime and after the final buzzer). On this particular January 3 evening, it came following a 55-point second half from Shaka Smart’s roster that was picked third-to-last in the Big East. What ensued was a deeper dive into the Golden Eagles getting lost in the fight and displaying the quiet confidence that took root following a 96-85 takedown of St. John’s.
Following that short 15-minute journey to Carnesecca were three reunions: One with Tony Bozzella in South Orange as his Pirates handed St. John’s its first loss and showed their NCAA Tournament potential, another with Kevin Willard as he made his return to New Jersey when Maryland came to the RAC to face Rutgers. The highlight of the quote book — which was a necessity considering how well-received those transcripts were when Kevin skippered the Seton Hall ship — was his pregame excursion to an Italian restaurant. The third came in the Hudson Valley, where I visited McCann Arena for the first time in almost six years to watch Marist host an Iona team that still won by 27 despite Walter Clayton, Jr. being unavailable. January was most notable, though, for the rise that took place beyond the wall of the New York city limits, in Nassau County.
Speedy Claxton’s first season as head coach at Hofstra, the same school that turned him into a first-round draft pick and two-time America East Conference champion, was marked by 21 wins and an abundance of talent whose development in its second go-round hit another gear after a stranglehold of a second half against UNC Wilmington. The 16 points the Pride allowed after halftime represented the fewest surrendered to an opposing team in program history since 2006. That year strikes a nerve in Hempstead the same way 2004 did for me when I was still moderately into baseball and enough of a Yankee fan to let it affect my mood, but Claxton and the Pride just kept winning. Nine days later, Hofstra beat Charleston to take control of the CAA standings, and ultimately wrested the lead away for good two days into February with a win over Towson and Charleston loss at Drexel. In between that, Rutgers beat Ohio State in what was just a great basketball game, Seton Hall came back from 14 points down to beat a UConn team that would go on to win the national championship, and the Scarlet Knights again imposed their will, this time on Penn State. The 20-point waxing of the Nittany Lions was so resounding that Micah Shrewsberry took his team to task after the game, questioning its toughness before voicing his chagrin with being run out of Jersey Mike’s Arena.
Then, as the first month of the year neared its end, Steve Miller was proven right when he once posited you had to go through hell before you get to heaven. And given the game I’m about to introduce, the pun is by no means intended.
Michael Baer’s basketball journey was already worthy of chronicling long before he arrived at Siena this summer. A former manager and walk-on — under former Saints coach Fran McCaffery, no less — at Iowa, the Quad Cities native sought a chance to make more of an impact in his final season. He did that consistently in his one campaign donning green and gold, and under circumstances no man should bear.
With his father, John, battling bladder cancer, it would be largely forgivable for Michael to not be in the strongest frame of mind. But the younger Baer exemplified himself as a soldier willing to do the dirty work for a scrappy Siena team. When John Baer passed away on the morning of January 22, Michael played that same day against Fairfield in a game he would later admit felt as though everyone’s eyes were fixated upon him. Mere hours after the loss of his father, the Siena community saw one more of its own taken from it when Evan Franz, the upstate New York native who became an honorary Saint after his frequent visits to practice, succumbed to brain cancer the following day. The stage was set for a fairytale performance entering Siena's next game, a pivotal clash with MAAC leader Iona with a nationally televised audience watching it unfold on ESPNU. The composer of that finest hour reaffirmed why this game can be so rewarding to all involved.
Michael Baer ended the night with 18 points and 12 rebounds in the Saints’ commanding 70-53 defeat of Iona, with both his coach and teammates praising not only his effort, but how he handled adversity in the process. And after that game on the other side, Iona was reawakened as well, with the Gaels not dropping another game as the rest of the MAAC collapsed around them en route to a runaway regular season championship.
February opened with a pair of statement wins for Seton Hall over St. John’s and the aforementioned Hofstra comeback against Towson that served as a validation of sorts for the Pride, who had spent a majority of the year in the shadows of nationally-ranked Charleston. The first Saturday of the month was also a confirmation of a program having fully turned the corner, not that it needed any further testimonials through that process, albeit in what ultimately became a Pyrrhic victory.
Its home game against Michigan State having been moved from the RAC to Madison Square Garden to accommodate the Big Ten’s basketball-wrestling doubleheader, Rutgers lost a homecourt advantage on paper. But the Scarlet Knights packed the home of the Knicks and Rangers in ways no one could have imagined five years prior, when Steve Pikiell was still struggling to give tickets away. Rutgers locked down the Spartans and earned Tom Izzo’s respect once more, but its makeup entering a pivotal stretch drive was altered drastically when Mawot Mag suffered a torn ACL late in the first half. Mag, the linchpin of the vaunted Scarlet Knight defense, proved to be irreplaceable, as subsequent games saw Rutgers unable to feed off his energy and convert it into offense as easily as it could with him on the floor.
After several more trips to Seton Hall, the middle of the month offered an unlikely reunion in a place I had only been to once in the past five seasons after making my second home there for many years when I was in the process of expanding the site into what you see today. What greeted me was something I probably would not have seen coming, but at the same time, was long overdue.
Fordham and St. Bonaventure, contesting the opening tip on February 15. It was my first trip to Rose Hill since December 2019. (Photo by Jaden Daly/Daly Dose Of Hoops)
If you’re a longtime reader and/or follower, you’ll remember the multiple times a week where this space would set up shop at Rose Hill Gym to cover Tom Pecora and Fordham. Yes, the Rams back then may not have been the most successful area school to cover, but transcribing Pecora’s press conferences and benefitting from his extroverted nature were indispensable in establishing myself as a reputable journalist. And I’ll admit, Jeff Neubauer being the complete antithesis of that — and only placing the program further behind the proverbial 8-ball at the same time — alienated me from one of my favorite places to watch a game. It got to a point where I, like many of my other contemporaries, wondered if I’d ever have a reason to champion the Rams in this space again.
Keith Urgo gave me more than just one.
The fireball of unbridled energy that is Urgo, the players’ choice to succeed Kyle Neptune after he unexpectedly bolted to replace Jay Wright at Villanova, has turned Fordham into what all of its alumni have spent most of the last half-century clamoring for. Rose Thrill, as Urgo dubs his home gym, has become the place to be on game nights, backed by a boisterous throng of supporters all too happy to come out of the woodwork. And after 25 wins, the most for the program in 32 years, why wouldn’t they? Urgo and athletic director Ed Kull, who I’ve been blessed to know for almost the entirety of my career from his time at St. John’s coinciding with my undergrad years there and the advent of my broadcast days, deserve all the credit in the world for their Herculean efforts to raise what was long viewed as dead.
February closed with two instances where coaches whose place as the shepherds of their respective alma maters took their mission seriously, bordering on life and death, to an extent. The context for each, however, was as far from similar as could possibly be.
Moments after his Hofstra team wrapped up the CAA regular season championship in a blowout of Northeastern, Speedy Claxton talked about how the privilege of leading the Pride was more than just a job to him. And in more ways than one, the reverent tones in which he spoke resonated with me. For me, I’ve approached operating this outlet in a similar fashion. It’s more than just a job to me, especially when it comes to the MAAC and some of the mid-major coverage you just don’t get anywhere else. Anybody can read about what somebody does, especially in an era of hot takes and instant gratification that gets fostered through the rise and prevalence of social media. It’s how someone does it that makes for the better story, and that’s where we — and by we, I mean myself and my colleagues, come in.
Three days after Hofstra’s celebration on its home floor, Shaheen Holloway addressed the media after Seton Hall’s home finale, a narrow loss to Villanova that eliminated the Pirates from securing a first-round bye in the Big East tournament. Sha has always been one to march to the beat of his own drummer, and the contrast is refreshing for those of us accustomed to hearing coachspeak and boilerplate in a press conference. You don’t get that with him, he wears his heart on his sleeve and tells it like it is. Sometimes it can be spicy, like it was when he said Alexis Yetna “wasn’t f****** playing this year,” and sometimes it can be heartfelt, as it was when he wrapped up how his first season had gone to that point.
After that press conference ended, I caught up with Sha in a hallway outside the bowels of the Prudential Center for further, off-the-record, words. And what followed put a lot of things in perspective:
“J, I’m fighting for my f****** life! What (do) they want me to say?”
It’s not easy moving up the ladder. It’s even harder to manage when you’re at a place that has defined you as a person for so long like Seton Hall has for Holloway through all of his adult life. Add that to his insatiable desire to win at all costs, balance it with the shift in the landscape that is beyond his control (Sha has been open about his difficulty recruiting when Seton Hall is being outbid by schools with greater NIL resources, frequently repeating that the question he gets most often is, “how much can you give me?”), and it feels like your back is against the wall. But one thing is for sure. Sha will find a way to overcome that. It’s just who he is. He’s a fighter who has more faith in himself and his own abilities than any handicap that gets in his way. It may not be pretty, but Seton Hall isn’t going away anytime soon.
Then, there was March.
And March began — for me, at least — in a place I hadn’t been in almost a decade, thanks to a 21-year-old who conducts himself with the professionalism of someone three times his age while also juggling an undergraduate class schedule. Jordan Sarnoff is a celebrity now after what FDU would go on to do at the midpoint of the third month of the year, and deservedly so. When I met him in November of 2021 when the Knights came to Draddy to face Manhattan, he made it a point to introduce himself to me, and it didn’t take long to see — through the tone of his conversation and genuine passion for which he approached what tends to be regarded as a thankless job in some circles — that he would go places in this crazy world of ours sooner rather than later. Ever since that night in the northwest corner of the Bronx, Jordan had been after me to come to Hackensack for a game, something I hadn’t done since Greg Herenda and Joe Mihalich were in their respective first years at their programs when FDU and Hofstra did a rare, in-season home-and-home series in 2013-14.
Jordan’s last request to seek my presence in Bergen County came in February. I’ll make a deal with you, I told him. You get a home game in the NEC tournament quarterfinals, and I’ll be there. I was a man of my word on March 1 when the Knights hosted St. Francis Brooklyn and laid the foundation for an historic postseason, but it was the interweaving of two stories after that game that stands out most, even more now after how each one played out.
It was after that NEC tournament game that I finally had the pleasure of meeting Tobin Anderson, who I can best describe as a basketball savant who finds ways to not only win, but disprove the impossible. Having worked under Mitch Buonaguro a decade ago at Siena, he knew who I was from when I had just begun to set the standard for MAAC coverage that this site proudly bears, and remembered the early installments of MAAC Monday when he followed from a distance at St. Thomas Aquinas. The good news for Tobin is he now gets to be part of a few of those weekly columns in his new capacity at Iona, where I look forward to getting to know him better as he becomes the latest caretaker of a Gael program that has remained among the better brands in the area for a large part of my lifetime.
St. Francis Brooklyn's Pope Physical Education Center hosted its last game in November before the college sold its longtime campus home at 180 Remsen Street. Terriers would go on to drop all athletic programs four months later. Four of the most formative years of my career came in this building. (Photo by The Brooklyn Eagle)
Little did I know that when I walked out of the Rothman Center that night, I’d have been on hand for St. Francis Brooklyn's hardwood swan song. Following the postgame press conference, Glenn Braica — as humble and honest a dude as you’ll find anywhere in this world, let alone this game — was upbeat about a promising future after navigating a season rife with changing campus locations, losing a home gym and having to coordinate practice and game times at a Division III venue. Never one to get down on himself or his circumstances, Glenn made light of the inconvenience, calling that the easy part of managing a year where both of his best players were ultimately injured for almost all of the conference season. Nearly three weeks later, he and everyone else under the athletic umbrella of an institution that billed itself the small college of big dreams found themselves out of a job in a decision made by the college’s interim president.
On a day where St. John’s stole local headlines by announcing its hire of Rick Pitino (more on that later), I didn’t have the time to properly eulogize St. Francis. I’d like to take some time in this space to do so now, because without the Terriers, there’s a very strong chance I wouldn’t be where I am today. I spent four years working on the corner of Remsen and Court Streets, honing my on-air skills. St. Francis Brooklyn was my first professional Division I home after Brian Morales brought me in for a one-off public address announcing gig that quickly morphed into a hybrid of PA and on-air work handling basketball, soccer and volleyball. Between Brian, Dave Gansell and Irma Garcia, their confidence and belief in me helped me along the ladder more than any of them probably realize. Nick Guerriero, Dexter Henry and Paul Becker were the best set of producers any on-air talent could possibly have, and years later, I haven’t had a change of heart there. I miss Meghan O’Brien obsessing over North Carolina more than me (if that’s even possible), and I’ll always have a place in my heart for all the 1980s and early ’90s hockey memories that Jim Hoffman and I conjured up for hours before games. The coaches were just as awesome as the staff, from Glenn Braica to John Thurston, from Tom Giovatto to Micah Acoba. The next time I find my way to O’Keefe’s, I’m raising my glass for everyone who helped make St. Francis Brooklyn such a great place, and I encourage you to do the same if you’re ever there. Some of the better nights of my career were spent in great company, and that’s what I’ll remember most about my time there.
FDU and St. Francis Brooklyn also started the annual stretch of crazy, superhuman conference tournament travel for me. The NEC was one of five conferences I handled tournament coverage of, with the CAA, MAAC, Big East and Atlantic 10 soon to follow. But on the second night of March, I was in a regular haunt (Iona) watching a legend pick up what would turn out to be the 914th win of an illustrious career that spanned 40 years across two completely different levels of girls’ and women’s basketball.
For much of my time covering the MAAC, Brian Giorgis was largely misunderstood outside the conference, and even within some of its auspices during his 21 seasons at Marist. But beneath what a first-time observer might sense as a gruff exterior lied a man with a heart of gold and gregarious personality to match, an equal opportunity aficionado of both player development and Diet Coke from the fountains at McDonald’s.
In all my time around this game, very few have embodied the role of father figure and demanding coach quite as well as Giorgis has. It’s why so many of his former players always come back to support him so long after their time with him has passed. Whether it was learning the nuances of his motion offense or ending a practice with his famous half-court shot ritual that even he himself participated in (practice wasn’t over until everybody made one), every Giorgis experience was unique in its nature and positive in its transpiring. And very few were as consistently humble, without fail. Consider this quote moments after what ended up being his final win after Marist defeated Iona, when I asked him how he would ultimately want to be remembered:
“You always want to make a difference and make a difference in people’s lives, and I think I have, but I have with a lot of great assistant coaches and other teammates. I could go out and just say, ‘you know, you’ve done good.’”
Good doesn’t even scratch the surface of what Brian Giorgis has done to elevate the women’s game, or the skills of anyone he was fortunate to impact on or off the hardwood. He’ll be irreplaceable, but as the baton in Poughkeepsie has been passed to Erin Doughty — who has been with him every step of the way to this point — the dropoff, if any, will be minimal.
After Hofstra’s CAA tournament experience was abruptly ended in a semifinal loss to UNCW that saw the Pride go cold in the second half and overtime, it was on to Atlantic City for the first of two MAAC tournament stops. Tuesday’s opening round saw Mount St. Mary’s and Canisius play arguably the game of the tournament, an overtime thriller that The Mount pulled out courtesy of Dakota Leffew. Saint Peter’s knocked off Fairfield in the middle game of a tripleheader before Marist kick-started its improbable run to a conference championship game with a takedown of Manhattan for the second time in less than two weeks. Wednesday and Thursday of championship week were spent back home, with St. John’s defeating Butler before losing in overtime to Marquette in what turned out to be Mike Anderson’s final game in charge of the Red Storm. Also in the Big East tournament, Seton Hall lost to DePaul after an uncharacteristic meltdown and a game-ending block of Femi Odukale by Nick Ongenda. UConn survived a furious Providence rally in the quarterfinals on Thursday, and across town in Brooklyn, Fordham brought 8,000 fans to Barclays Center to watch the Rams defeat La Salle and advance to the semifinals of the A-10 tournament for the first time in 17 years.
The second stint in Atlantic City began with polar opposites on the spectrum, with top seed Iona surviving Niagara before Marist — still standing after upsetting Quinnipiac in the quarterfinals the night before — sent Saint Peter’s packing to earn its first-ever MAAC title opportunity. The Gaels closed the championship game on a 19-2 run and outscored Marist 30-9 after the Red Foxes tied the game in the second half, but the highlight of the week was getting to see John Dunne vindicated by the upside of his young squad manifesting itself in lockstep with a resiliency beyond its years.
Selection Sunday revealed Iona’s NCAA Tournament fate, with the MAAC champions drawing eventual national champion UConn while rumors swirled regarding Rick Pitino’s immediate future. While the Gaels downplayed the speculation leading up to the battle with the Huskies in Albany, Steve Masiello was simply enjoying the ride after his reunion with his former mentor resulted in the 14th dance of his career, and first in eight years.
With Steve Masiello after the 2015 MAAC tournament, when I was on the call as his Manhattan team defended its conference championship. We’ve both been up and down professionally over the years, but we’ve lived to tell the tales. Mas was just named associate head coach at St. John’s, where he will continue to be Rick Pitino’s right hand. (Photo by Jaden Daly/Daly Dose Of Hoops)
If you’ve read my work for a while or know me fairly well, you probably know of my relationship with Mas, and how it’s been forged over time. Aside from the basketball end, and covering the entirety of his 11-year run at Manhattan, he and I have a lot more in common than people may realize: We’re both only children from Italian and Irish backgrounds, we both have a fierce competitive streak, and once we know we can trust someone, we’ll run through a brick wall for that person. We’ve also both had similar low points in our careers that occurred around the same time. I was let go at St. Francis Brooklyn a few months after the whole saga with Steve’s degree happened in 2014. That’s why the 2015 MAAC championship run that I was fortunate to be able to broadcast is so special to me. While getting a shot at vindication when I thought my on-air career was dead in the water was a blessing, it was an even greater one to see someone I consider a friend away from the hardwood reach the summit after being dragged through the mud. In later years, when my coverage of the Jaspers was not as warmly received, Steve supported me and assured me that I would always be welcome and given whatever I needed. That commitment continued on while he remained at Manhattan, and was upheld this past year at Iona. Mas, his mother, Kit, and his wife, Andrea, are like family here. As Steve himself said many a time over the years, it’s bigger than basketball. It always has been.
Allow me to backtrack just a little bit here. After Selection Sunday, but before Iona’s NCAA Tournament game, Hofstra’s season continued in the NIT, where the Pride picked up its first postseason win in 17 years by shocking Rutgers in overtime. The loss for the Scarlet Knights marked a disappointing end to a season that looked promising just five weeks prior, when the State University of New Jersey was on track for a No. 4 or 5 seed and perhaps the homecourt advantage in Albany that UConn got to enjoy. Instead, an emotional Steve Pikiell showed a rare crack in his stoic facade during a 26-minute press conference in which he intimated how thankful he was for a senior class that took him and the program on a journey that had not been experienced on the banks of the old Raritan in quite some time. The finale in Piscataway also closed the book on the career of Caleb McConnell, who will go down as one of the more appreciated players in Garden State lore for his willingness to do anything to win on top of his blanket-like defense that earned him a pair of Defensive Player of the Year honors in the Big Ten. Hofstra’s season continued amid the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament, when it hosted Cincinnati in the second round of the NIT because the Bearcats’ home floor at Fifth Third Arena was undergoing previously scheduled renovations. The Pride lost that game to end a dream season, and as it turned out, it would be the last time I’d see a longtime friend.
With longtime friend/supporter/colleague Jack Styczynski at halftime of Siena's home win over Iona on January 27. Jack passed away on April 6, but his memory and one-of-a-kind personality will live forever. (Photo by Mark Styczynski)
Jack Styczynski was one of the more unique figures I’ve come to know over the years in this profession of ours. A Hofstra alumnus and exceptional writer in his own right, Jack was the original curator of Hofstra’s old site on Rivals.com in the late 1990s and early 2000s, often making light of the fact that Jay Wright’s wife, Patty, was a huge fan of his (Jay made it a point to tell Jack that, and it always reminded me of how Jimmy Patsos would mention on MAAC conference calls that his wife, Michele, loved me). Jack’s bylines also stretched into more reputable outlets such as Basketball Times and the New York Times during his long and winding career. When the pandemic started, his viewpoints about COVID and its origins differed from some, but his love for life never waned. In fact, it grew stronger when he returned to his second home of New Orleans and got to partake in activities that were shut down back up this way. This past year, I got to see Jack at several games, and he had mentioned to me that his health had taken a turn for the worse, but never revealed exactly how that came to be. Basketball, whether he watched or played it, and he was surprisingly adept at the latter for his age, had become his salvation.
I always enjoyed interacting with Jack, be it in person or on Twitter, where he frequently communicated with me. Every Siena game I covered almost always saw Jack in my mentions, as his father instilled a love of the Saints dating back to his childhood in the Capital Region. Jack always made sure to send me a message whenever I was on Long Island to cover Hofstra, too. When the calendar turned to March and the CAA tournament, his communications would carry three words, merged together into one hashtag:
End the jinx.
The jinx Jack had spoken of was in reference to Hofstra not making the NCAA Tournament since leaving the America East in the summer of 2001, a move he felt would hurt the basketball program in the long run when then-athletic director Harry Royle and then-president Dr. James Shuart positioned Hofstra to make the jump. It appeared Hofstra had ended its drought when it won the CAA tournament in 2020, but the pandemic’s cancellation of the NCAA Tournament that year reactivated the dry spell. But if Hofstra hopes to reach the NCAA Tournament for the first time in what would be 23 years if it wins the CAA championship next year, it will happen without one of its alumni and former media present among us to watch it unfold.
Jack Styczynski sadly took his life on April 6, at the age of 57. It is not exactly clear why that is, but I hope his suffering has disappeared and he has gone to a better place alongside his beloved father, who passed away just six months ago. I’ll miss him next year, especially after the first Hofstra win I cover, when I instinctively look for his “hit me, JD” tweet in response to me posting the final score, which was his cue to await the impending recaps of mine that he called “JD specials.” Life is a precious thing, and every day we get to spend above ground is always a blessing. I’m grateful that Jack made sure to appreciate all of his in the short time he had it, and while he rests in power, I implore all of you to make the most of what you have on this earth. And if there’s ever a moment where it feels like it’s too much, or if you know someone is going through something, reach out. The voice on the other side could very well be your savior. Just remember: It ain’t no sin to be glad you’re alive.
With that, I come to the last week of live basketball I covered this past season, with Madison Square Garden as the backdrop. I’ve been critical of the Garden at times during my career, mainly because as a jaded journalist, when you’ve been to games in that building that were largely forgettable and sparsely attended, it becomes just another venue no matter how much you’ve seen it at its best. Before any regional semifinal balls were tipped or passes were thrown, and I’ll get to the latter part soon enough, the lobby of the Garden served as the host to a press conference introducing Rick Pitino as the new head coach at St. John’s. As he reconstructs the roster to his liking, the sensible and logical decision made by Father Brian Shanley becomes the perfect storm — no pun intended — for the beleaguered and star-crossed Johnnies as the once-proud program again tries to find its way in the shark-infested waters of the Big East. Pitino has brought his entire Iona staff down the Hutch and over the Whitestone Bridge to help him embark on this new endeavor, so the once-improbable concept of Steve Masiello having an affiliation with my alma mater is now a reality with Mas as associate head coach. If nothing else, the Red Storm has my support again, which is something that has been taken into question way too often over the years.
Having started out covering St. John’s at a time when it was the only place I could get a credential, I had been labeled “the St. John’s guy” early in my career. It was a label I admittedly worked to shed, because after all, who wants to be typecast? I’ve since been considered “the MAAC guy” by a number of you, and that means a lot considering the relative lack of coverage that conference receives. It just sucks that it sometimes comes at the expense of “Jaden hates St. John’s” or “he roots against his alma mater.” The fact is, the alma mater did a lot of things and operated in a lot of ways I previously was not proud of. Hiring Pitino to fix a decades-old malaise was the best decision the hierarchy there has made since Looie retired, so my faith is restored.
Anyway, I digress. Back at the Garden, Florida Atlantic, Tennessee and Kansas State wouldn’t normally be the trio of teams casual fans in this area would line up for tickets to see. However, those three outfits, joined by Michigan State, offered two days of basketball that were worth the price of admission even if the name on the marquee was not as gaudy. The Wildcats and Spartans put on what was, to that point, the game of the NCAA Tournament, a 98-93 K-State win that made a legend out of East Harlem’s Markquis Nowell. Listed at 5’8, and looking no taller than me (I’m 5’7”), Nowell delivered the best passing around these parts since Jason Brickman was averaging 10 assists per game for LIU in the early 2010s. Against Tom Izzo’s Spartans, Nowell poured in 20 points and an NCAA Tournament single-game record 19 assists, his most notable being a trick play that turned into an alley-oop to Keyontae Johnson while Nowell looked at head coach Jerome Tang to distract the defense. The pride of 109th and Lexington ended the proceedings with a walkoff steal and layup. How could you not love a player like that?
In the nightcap on Sweet 16 night, Florida Atlantic did what it did best over the course of the season, outrebounding Tennessee at will and using its defense to fuel a run that started with a scoreless drought by the Vols. FAU came back again two days later and held off Kansas State in the East Regional final to cut down the Garden nets and reach a Final Four many had either Purdue, Duke or Marquette penciled in for. In many ways, it was reminiscent of 2017, when South Carolina knocked off Baylor and Florida en route to a Final Four when almost every insider had Duke and Villanova slugging it out on the Garden floor. Lesson learned, boys and girls: Games aren’t played on paper. And after covering 90 games this year, the most I’ve done since 2017-18, perhaps it was fitting that it ended in a win for the mid-majors considering most of my work and the majority of my stories are told and shared at that level.
Quiet court at Madison Square Garden after Florida Atlantic completed improbable run to Final Four with East Regional final win over Kansas State. (Photo by Jaden Daly/Daly Dose Of Hoops)
Prior to the Final Four, Manhattan finally made a decision about its own future, turning to former Hartford coach John Gallagher to lead the Jaspers. And while Gallagher seems to be a good man and leader by most accounts, I won’t hide my disappointment with athletic director Marianne Reilly on this one. The timing of pulling the trigger on Masiello put the program in a bad spot, and the decision to not give RaShawn Stores — who I watched grow up over the last dozen years from a boy and a walk-on into a man and a worthy head coach — the full-time gig at his alma mater only doubled down on the sabotage of Manhattan’s flagship athletic program for the second time in five months. Stringing Ray along through the search process was also something that leaves a bad taste in not only my mouth, but a majority of mouths with greater ties to Riverdale than those in this space. I don’t blame the alumni and Stores’ former teammates, many of whom now swearing they will not support what was once their team, for feeling slighted. I will cover Gallagher as I do every MAAC coach and do so fairly and impartially, but on the surface, hiring someone with a worse record than Masiello when you cited wins and losses to the New York Times as the reason behind Mas’ dismissal, and at the expense of a popular ex-player and alum who rallied the fan base and reignited its passion is just a bad look all around.
I watched the Final Four just like most of us did, at home with no real dog in the fight. UConn won its fifth national championship, the third for Tom Moore to join the two he won alongside Jim Calhoun, and the first for Dan Hurley. Knowing Moore and Hurley as well as I do, I won’t lie to you, I was rooting for both of them two weeks ago today. And as the final minutes played out, I couldn’t help but remember my favorite Hurley anecdote from all the years I’ve been able to get to know him. If I may, I’d like to share it here. Picture it, as Sophia Petrillo would say. Rose Hill, January 2018.
Dan Hurley and Rhode Island had just wrapped up a 78-58 win over Fordham about a half-hour ago to improve to 8-0 in Atlantic 10 play during a season in which Hurley’s Rams would later receive an NCAA Tournament at-large bid. Following the press conferences, Dan and I talked off the record inside the ancient Bronx gym for several minutes about his team, the game in general, and just general musings on life. In what could now be considered a foreshadowing of his growing zen-like mindset and existentialist nature, Hurley offered this gem after he looked toward the visiting bench:
“Man, I was a real asshole my first year in this league. No wonder I didn’t have any friends!”
Dan Hurley and I shared Tom Moore stories at Big East media day, while Jon Rothstein photobombed us. Rothstein would later meet my mother at Acquista Trattoria before St. John’s hosted Seton Hall in February, Hurley would go on to lead UConn to a national championship. (Photo by Adam Zagoria/NJ Advance Media)
Very few coaches have the ability to analyze themselves so succinctly and put things in perspective so eloquently. And very few coaches are Dan Hurley. He may have been a self-admitted asshole on that cold January night five years ago, but he stands among everyone a national champion now. And for all he’s endured, from being in the dual shadow of his Hall of Fame coach of a father and record-setting NBA lottery pick of an older brother, nobody deserves it more. Hurley was not the only former Seton Hall Pirate to reap the rewards of his labor this April, as Grant Billmeier was recently named the head coach at NJIT, to be introduced later this week. Having watched Grant be an indispensable asset to Kevin Willard for what feels like an eternity, I look forward to watching him work in the captain’s chair with the Highlanders this season, and will make it a point to visit NJIT’s arena in short order. Then I’ll only need Princeton for New Jersey bingo. That’s right, I’ve never been to Jadwin. Let the derisive comments commence.
Well, I guess that puts a wrap on the 2022-23 season, with way more words to summarize it than I ever thought it would take. I decided to go into further detail in the chronicles of my travails this year, and I hope you all enjoyed it. That said, I’d like to give special thanks in the ensuing paragraphs to all those who made it possible.
To my mother, Julie, for being my inspiration, role model, greatest achievement, most profound influence, best friend, and bottomless fountain of advice I’ll ever know. This site, as I’ve frequently mentioned in the past, was her idea as an insurance policy in case I didn’t make it behind the microphone. Whenever I didn’t see the light at the end of the tunnel, she did. She always does. Mothers know best.
To every coach and player who granted me and my staff the opportunity to tell and share their stories with the world. It’s a privilege none of us ever take for granted, and without your support, we wouldn’t be here.
To every sports information director that helped the site this season by going out of his way to do so even when it wasn’t necessary. I’ll mention them all here, in the order I saw them during the year: Chris Corso, Drew Kingsley, Steve Dombroski, Peter Long, Gary Kowal, Stephen Gorchov, Brian Beyrer, Jack Clark, Rich Behan, Mark Vandergrift, Shawn Gillen, Matt Reitnour, Mike Demos, Kevin Wehner, Phil Paquette, Nick Solari, Mike Sheridan, Mike Ferraro, Scott Kuykendall, Matt Sweeney, Joe Browning, Mex Carey, Greg Ott, Joe DiBari, Jordan Sarnoff, John Wagoner, Miles McQuiggan, Hamilton Cook, John Paquette, Drew Dickerson and Dylan Smith.
To Jason Guerette for reprising his role as my tag team partner at Seton Hall games whenever he didn’t have a broadcast of his own, and offering an unmatched perspective on his alma mater. To Jason Dimaio for making a strong freshman to sophomore jump alongside me at Hofstra this year, and also for being my ride to Villanova, the CAA tournament and Rutgers. His growth as a writer from the day I met him makes me proud to this day. To Bob Dea for capturing the sport through his camera lens and always providing the lasting images that can’t be put into words. Bob’s become a quasi-celebrity now, and it’s awesome. I wouldn’t trade him for any photographer in the world. To Ray Floriani for his contributor emeritus role and ability to tell a story that 50-plus years in the game makes effortless.
To the three rookies on staff this year for being a big part of the family. Pete Janny came on board this year to help with MAAC coverage from his Connecticut base, and became my point man at Fairfield and Quinnipiac. To Jacob Conley and Justin Mathis for allowing me to expand the site into North and South Carolina to cover the Big South Conference, namely Gardner-Webb and USC Upstate.
To Jerry Carino for providing the blueprint of covering multiple schools simultaneously without missing a beat, and being more welcoming, helpful and professional than I could ever imagine for the past decade at Seton Hall and Rutgers. Jerry’s warm embrace of me in the New Jersey media circle means a lot, and I don’t know if he truly knows just how much it’s touched me.
To Zach Braziller, Kevin Connelly and Roger Rubin for being the three wise men on the St. John’s beat and somehow not losing their minds in the vortex on the corner of Union and Utopia. You’ll see more of me next year if you don’t mind putting up with me.
To Jerry Beach for showing everyone that you could be a serious writer and a big kid at the same time, as evidenced by his always hilarious, never filtered Hofstra coverage and endless Simpsons references that brought us together so many years ago.
To Brian Wilmer, my sounding board and companion in these year-end pieces for most of the last decade. Brian actually recommended Jake and Justin for me to introduce my audience to the Big South, and that’s another favor I could never repay him for.
To my MAAC media colleagues, of whom there are too many to mention, for helping me treat this conference like a high-major league by keeping the same commitment to quality and excellence on a nightly basis.
To Sam Federman for being almost like my son in this unforgiving business of ours. The energy and passion Sam has at just 18 years old eclipses mine at twice that age, and even when I was that young, too. Sam has been my co-host on Twitter spaces during the season, my reference whenever I don’t have a stat off the top of my head, and my analyst whenever I can’t fully explain what just happened in front of me. He’s given me new life over the last two seasons since he started his own career, which takes a greater flight this fall when he enrolls at Syracuse. The Newhouse School still has no idea what kind of a superstar it just accepted, but it will in fairly short order.
To Erika Fernandez, who’s like a little sister to me, for helping me realize it’s not a big deal when life gets in the way sometimes, because you can still inspire in other ways. Working for The Sporting News and still being a full-time mother isn’t easy, and neither is working for the city and then traveling to and from games with post-midnight returns home more often than not. We’ve inspired each other since we connected on social media, and her Curls and Sports podcast (which better be coming back soon) helped me start my own endeavor on that front.
To Jim Nantz for narrating the big moments and the greatest memories of our game better than anyone else could over the last three-plus decades. Nobody will ever do it better. Ian Eagle gets a well-deserved Final Four nod beginning next year, but when Jim signed off two weeks ago with a simple “thank you for being my friend,” it felt like part of our childhood — if you’re a child of the ’80s like I am, or later — died that night.
To Baker Dunleavy, and this is an acknowledgment I had to go back and add, for being class personified over the last six years at Quinnipiac. Baker stepped down this past Thursday to take on a general manager role at Villanova — a further sign of the shifting landscape in the sport — and will be replaced by our old friend Tom Pecora, whose accessibility and candor at Fordham helped me cut my teeth as a writer. I’m looking forward to covering TP again, but Baker will definitely be missed in the MAAC.
Speaking of being missed around the MAAC, my penultimate show of gratitude goes to Rich Ensor, who retires next month after a 35-year run as MAAC commissioner, the longest tenure in Division I. Without Rich’s support, none of us who cover the MAAC would be where we are. No other conference commissioner availed himself to everyone for everything the way Rich did, and he didn’t discriminate subject matter, age or experience. Whether you're a student journalist or someone with 40 years in the business, Rich treats you with the utmost respect at all times. It’s not going to be the same without him, but I look forward to renewing the same relationship with his successor, Travis Tellitocci, who returns to the conference he spent 10 years in at Marist to now usher it into a new era with his outside-the-box thinking and proactive foresight to better position the MAAC among the nation’s best mid-major leagues.
Finally, to all of you for reading, listening, and just coming along for the ride. The biggest reason I do what I do is for you, the fans. I miss all of you in the offseason, and some during the year (shoutout to the Monmouth faithful that I hope to see again in West Long Branch next year), because the interaction is the best part of every train or bus trip wherever I go. I’m an extrovert who loves communicating with people, and more often than not, your tweets, messages, or in-person greetings make my day. I really mean that. And I’m sure my indulgence of your special types of crazy is equally appreciated on your end, too. If we weren’t crazy, we wouldn’t be us, right? So thank you again for all you do.
The first phase of every offseason is always a struggle. You’re readjusting from being at a game two or three times a week to, unless you’re covering the NBA, NHL or Major League Baseball, having very little to do. The potential to go stir crazy is too damn high sometimes, and I’m just being real with you here. I haven’t written as much in the offseason as I used to, largely because I feel like I passed the age of content just for the sake of content, instead opting for quality over quantity. I’ll still be around over the next few months, though, and I’m always here whenever you want to talk. And if you want to join the family, all you have to do is reach out and we’ll go from there. I can’t pay much, sometimes at all, but I hope I can provide an opportunity for you to advance yourself if you’re so inclined. Regardless, I’ll once again reiterate the old Irish blessing I always include in my closing remarks.
May the road rise up to meet you. May the wind be always at your back. May the sun shine warm upon your face, the rain fall soft upon your fields. And until we meet again, and that time will come sooner rather than later, may God hold you in the palm of His hand.
The number 14 is usually symbolic of two touchdowns and two extra points in football. With that being said, I do intend — and this is subject to change — to touch down more than once on a little more travel next season, with several opportunities to cover marquee games beyond the area next year. As for the extra points, my objective next season is to end it in Arizona with what would be my first Final Four. I thought about applying for it in each of the past two years, but with no strong angle for my site and the region it serves, thought I’d be denied a credential. Now that I’ve seen similar outlets to mine get approved in New Orleans and Houston, I think it’s time to try. And if it really is Hoops Weiss’ last one, it would be pretty awesome to make it my first and recreate the Richard Petty-Jeff Gordon moment from 1992 at Atlanta.
Sometimes I feel like it’s all been done, but I always find the machinations to be different every time, and that’s what keeps me coming back. The roads and flight patterns now carry me to my home for the foreseeable future, but unlike the majority of last season when I felt I was done, now I feel like I’m once again just getting started. And I’ll be back.
