The Dartmouth men have completed its staff for the 2019-2020 season with the hiring of Steve Ongley as an assistant coach. Ongley spent last year on Jim Engles’ staff at Columbia, where he worked with the front court players. Prior to that, he was an assistant for four years at Colby College, the alma mater of Big Green head coach Dave McLaughlin.
Ongley replaces John Andrzejek, a Columbia graduate and one-time Lions student manager who joined former boss Kyle Smith’s staff at Washington State. There has been no announcement from Columbia for its replacement of Ongley.
Princeton women’s coach Carla Berube finished the hiring of her new staff, with the announcement of Helen Tau as director of basketball operations. Tau, a 2014 graduate of the University of Texas who was a walk-on in her senior year, spent 2014-2016 as a graduate assistant for the Longhorns and then worked for Georgetown as director of video operations the last two seasons.
Tau replaces Jessica Imhof, who went to the University of North Carolina to join former Tigers coach Courtney Banghart.
Speaking of Banghart, the new UNC women’s head coach was profiled in the student paper, The Daily Tar Heel. She told the author that the desire to reach the top was a major factor in her application for the new job. “I thought there was a ceiling on where I could bring Princeton,” Banghart informed the paper. “I probably couldn’t get perennially to a Final Four. I’m getting to the point in my career where I see the finality of it. I’m not going to coach forever.”
The Tar Heels announced its non-conference schedule, earlier last week, and will welcome Allison Guth’s Yale Bulldogs to Carmichael Arena on December 28th.
Brown’s Mike Martin, who was rumored to be on the verge of a contract extension a few weeks ago, is in Providence working as an assistant coach for USA Basketball as the team of Big East All-Stars gets ready for its Pan American Games competition in Lima, Peru, from July 31st through August 4th.
Princeton junior Jerome Desrosiers and sophomore Max Johns, along with Columbia juniors Tai Bibbs and Randy Brumant, are part of a 12-player practice squad, helping the All-Stars prepare.
Princeton sophomore Jaelin Llewellyn and Harvard senior Bryce Aiken, were two of the twenty four top guards in the nation invited to participate in the Chris Paul Elite Guard Camp, The camp, which took place between July 18-21 in North Carolina, featured drills and scrimmages, as well as the chance to be coached by one of the NBA’s premier backcourt players. Additional attendees were Breein Tyree (Ole Miss), Devon Dotson (Kansas), Ashton Hagans (Kentucky), Tyrese Maxey (Kentucky), Javonte Smart (LSU), and A. J. Lawson (South Carolina).
Llewellyn appears to have impressed Jeff Bendel and Andrew Slater, while at the camp.
Columbia’s Gabe Stefanini’s Team Italy came in 13th place (out of 16 countries) in the recent FIBA U20 European Championships in Israel. Over the team’s seven games, the junior shooting guard from Bologna averaged 19.4 points (second overall) on 28 percent (15-53) shooting from two and 53 percent (27-51) from three. He also averaged 4.0 assists and 3.4 rebounds over 29.6 minutes per contest.
Incoming Princeton first-year forward Maya McArthur has been playing in the FIBA U19 World Cup for Team Japan. McArthur, whose father played professionally in the Japan Basketball League for almost two decades, is averaging 0.5 points, 3.0 rebounds and 7.3 minutes over the team’s first four games. McArthur originally took part in the trials for the United States FIBA U16 Americas Championship in 2017, making it to the final 37 before missing the cut to the last 18. Afterwards, she joined the Japan national team for the U16 Asia Cup and has played with the team ever since. Fortunately, she is able to communicate with her teammates, since she speaks the language with her mother.
Team Japan went 2-1 in Group D and defeated Hungary in the Round of 16. They next face Belgium in the quarterfinals on Friday.
The Columbia women’s team announced its three-person incoming first-year class:
Kaitlyn Davis G/F (Greenwich Academy; Norwalk, CT), Abbey Hsu G (Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School and St. Thomas Aquinas High School – FL; Parkland, FL), Carly Rivera G (St. John’s College High School; Arlington, VA)
The Columbia men’s team announced its five-person incoming first-year class:
Jack Forrest G (Lower Merion High School; Bala Cynwyd, PA), Emmanuel Onuama F (Cardinal Newman High School – FL; Aguleri, Nigeria), Asa Shannon F (Episcopal High School – VA; Hyattsville, MD), Cameron Shockley-Okeke G/F (Milton Academy – MA and Phillips Exeter Academy – NH; Norwalk, CT), Eddie Turner III G (Garfield High School – WA; Seattle, WA)
The Cornell men’s team announced its three-person incoming first-year class: Greg Dolan G (Williamsville South High School – NY and Northfield Mount Hermon School – MA; Buffalo, NY), Marcus Filien F (Albany Academy – NY and Phillips Andover Academy – MA; Albany, NY), Jordan Jones G (Oaks Christian School – CA and Phillips Exeter Academy – NH; Los Angeles, CA)
The National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC) released its list of individual male student-athletes on its 2018-2019 NABC Honors Court and a total of 11 Ivy League players made the grade. To be eligible, students must be a junior or senior varsity athlete, have matriculated at least one year at their current institution, and have a cumulative GPA of 3.2 or higher at the end of the most recent academic year.
Harvard placed six players on the list, which was tied with Wright State and Kyle Smith’s University of San Francisco, for the most in Division 1.
The named Ivy athletes were Justin Bassey (Harvard), Alex Copeland (Yale), Balsa Dragovic (Harvard), Robbie Feinberg (Harvard), Devon Goodman (Penn), Chris Lewis (Harvard), James McLean (Harvard), Miye Oni (Yale), Trey Phills (Yale), Thomas Ryan (Yale), and Henry Welsh (Harvard)
Ivy League Executive Director Robin Harris has been named one of eight recipients of the Administrator of the Year Award by the Women Leaders in College Sports organization. Each award winner was nominated by her peers and selected based on her service during the 2018-19 academic year.
Harris, a graduate of Duke University and the Duke University School of Law, has been the Ivy League’s Executive Director since the summer of 2009. Prior to that, she worked at Ice Miller law firm and the NCAA national office, both based in Indianapolis.
Former Princeton and Georgetown head coach John Thompson III was chosen to lead the new athlete development & engagement department for Monumental Sports & Entertainment, a newly-formed collective which includes the Washington Wizards, Washington Mystics, Capital City Go-Go and Wizards District Gaming. Thompson’s group will focus on maximizing player potential both on and off the court, using a holistic approach to educate athletes on financial literacy, post-playing career opportunities and the overall empowerment.
JTIII, the son of Hall of Fame coach John Thompson, Jr., played at Princeton from 1984-1988 for another Hall of Famer, Pete Carril. From 1995-2000, he returned to his alma mater as an assistant coach on the staffs of Carril and Bill Carmody. After Carmody left for Northwestern, Thompson led the Tigers for the following four seasons, winning three Ivy titles and making two NCAA Tournament appearances.
In the spring of 2004, he was hired to take over his father’s Georgetown program and stayed there until the end of the 2016-2017 season. During his 13 seasons in charge of the Hoyas, JTIII won over 65 percent of his games, captured three Big East championships and took his 2006-2007 team to the NCAA Final Four.
Recent Penn graduate, Collin McManus has chosen to attend Fairleigh Dickinson University as a graduate transfer. The 6′ 10″ center sat out this past season, serving as an everyday practice player, in order to preserve his final year of eligibility. In his three seasons playing for Penn, the Northfield Mount Hermon alum totaled 19 points, 14 rebounds and 59 minutes over 29 games.
The other Ivy grad transfers who have made a decision for next season include Penn’s Tyler Hamilton (William and Mary), Dartmouth’s Guilien Smith (Northeastern), Harvard’s Tommy McCarthy (Rice), and Columbia’s Quinton Adlesh (USC). In addition, junior Desmond Cambridge transferred from Brown to Nevada and Adrease Jackson has moved from Dartmouth to Northern Arizona.
Recent Harvard graduate Corey Johnson has signed a contract with Zornotza Saskibaloi Taldea in the LEB Plata in Spain. Johnson, a co-captain for the 2018-2019 season, finished his career with 7.2 points and 2.4 rebounds per game in 105 appearances. He was a three-point specialist for the Crimson, leaving the program with a first-year record of 74 made threes and third all-time with 206 treys.
Michael Thompson, a member of the Cornell men’s basketball team from 1975-1977 and the CEO of Fair Oaks Farms, has been profiled by Black Enterprise magazine after his organization was named the publication’s Company of the Year. The 6′ 9″ forward, who averaged 2.0 points and 2.5 rebounds a game over 35 contests in his time with the Big Red, told BE that he uses the lessons of the Ivy back-to-backs as inspiration 40-plus years later.
After the disappointment in missing a game-winning shot against Princeton on a Friday night, his coach told him that the effort was appreciated, but the team needed him to get ready for the next night’s game. “It’s the same thing in business,” he says. “You don’t win in business every day. You have to pick yourself up off the floor if you have a bad day in the facility, which happens, and then go: ‘But tomorrow’s another day.’”