Report: OKC Thunder sign Iowa's Payton Sandfort as UDFA
The Oklahoma City Thunder drafted Georgetown's Thomas Sorber with the No. 15 pick and Northwestern's Brooks Barnhizer with the No. 44 pick. Now, they added somebody from undrafted free agency.
The Thunder have signed Iowa's Payton Sandfort to a contract, per ESPN's Jonathan Givony. He spent four college seasons at Iowa from 2021-25.
Sandfort averaged 16.7 points on 40.7% shooting, six rebounds and 2.9 assists in 33 games last season. He shot 34% from 3 on 7.5 attempts. He was a 89.1% free-throw shooter. The 22-year-old is a 6-foot-8, 215-pound forward.
While the details of the deal are unknown, it's likely an Exhibit 10 deal. Sandfort will get a chance to play for the Thunder on their summer league squad. If he impresses enough, he could get added to their G League's OKC Blue roster.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
37 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Missouri River Conference finalizes future plans
Missouri River Conference finalizes future plans originally appeared on The Sporting News The Missouri River Conference will feature some of the top Iowa high school athletic programs starting with the 2026-27 school year. According to a report by Peter Burtnett, Lewis Central High School has voted unanimously to join the league. The invite is for the 2026-27 academic year. The Titans will be joined by Sioux City Bishop Heelan, Council Bluffs Thomas Jefferson, Council Bluffs Abraham Lincoln, Le Mars, Sergeant Bluff-Luton, Sioux City East, Sioux City North and Sioux City West in the conference alignment. MORE: High school football program returns after three years away All sports outside of football will use the league, as the football schedule is based on districts set by the Iowa High School Athletic Association. Sioux City Bishop Heelan, Sioux City East, Sioux City North, Sioux City West, Council Blufs Thomas Jefferson, Council Bluffs Abraham Lincoln, Le Mars and Sergeant Bluff-Luton are all part of the current version of the Missouri River Conference while Lewis Central is currently part of the Hawkeye 10. Conference realignment has become the norm around Iowa high school athletics in recent years. Several schools first departed from the Central Iowa Metropolitan League to form the Iowa Alliance Conference as a way to separate themselves from the bigger Des Moines-area programs. Since that time, more high schools have sought out different leagues to compete within as a way to try and even the playing field with growing communities. The Western Iowa Conference has pushed out several invites to new schools in hopes to grow from the current nine-team field. That includes to the likes of ACGC, Earlham, Nodaway Valley and Shenandoah among others. MORE HIGH SCHOOL SPORTS NEWS: Two Illinois schools opt out for coming prep football season Nebraska program to just play junior varsity football in 2025 Wildfires in Canada causing problems for Minnesota high school athletics
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Years after abuse reports, ex-coach at renowned US gymnastics academy is arrested by FBI
USA Gymnastics Abuse Inquiry IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) — The U.S. gymnastics world was only just recovering from a devastating sexual abuse scandal when a promising young coach moved from Mississippi to Iowa to take a job in 2018 at an elite academy known for training Olympic champions. Liang 'Chow' Qiao, the owner of Chow's Gymnastics and Dance Institute in West Des Moines, thought highly enough of his new hire, Sean Gardner, to put him in charge of the club's premier junior event and to coach some of its most promising girls. But four years later, Gardner was gone from Chow's with little notice. USA Gymnastics, the organization rocked by the Larry Nassar sex-abuse crisis that led to the creation of the U.S. Center for SafeSport, had been informed by the watchdog group that Gardner was suspended from all contact with gymnasts. The reason for Gardner's removal wasn't disclosed. But court records obtained exclusively by The Associated Press show the coach was accused of sexually abusing at least three young gymnasts at Chow's and secretly recording others undressing in a gym bathroom at his prior job in Mississippi. Last week, more than three years after being suspended from coaching, the FBI arrested Gardner, 38, on a federal child pornography charge. But his disciplinary case has still not been resolved by SafeSport, which handles sex-abuse cases in Olympic sports. In cases like Gardner's, the public can be in the dark for years while SafeSport investigates and sanctions coaches. SafeSport requires that allegations be reported to police to ensure abusers don't run unchecked outside of sports, but critics say the system is a slow, murky process. 'From an outward operational view, it seems that if SafeSport is involved in any way, the situation turns glow-in-the-dark toxic,' said attorney Steve Silvey, a longtime SafeSport critic who has represented people in cases involving the center. While acknowledging there can be delays as its investigations unfold, SafeSport defended its temporary suspensions in a statement as 'a unique and valuable intervention' when there are concerns of a risk to others. Nevertheless, in 2024, Gardner was able to land a job helping care for surgical patients at an Iowa hospital — two years after the abuse allegations against him were reported to SafeSport and the police. And it was not until late May that West Des Moines police executed a search warrant at his home, eventually leading to the recovery of a trove of photos and videos on his computer and cellphone of nude young girls, court records show. Authorities in Iowa sealed the court documents after the AP asked about the investigation earlier this month, before details of the federal charge were made public Friday. Gardner, Qiao and Gardner's former employer in Mississippi did not respond to AP requests for comment. 'The job that I've always wanted' Chow's Gymnastics is best known as the academy where U.S. gymnasts Shawn Johnson and Gabby Douglas trained before becoming gold medalists at the 2008 and 2012 Olympics. Qiao opened the gym in 1998 after starring on the Chinese national team and moving to the United States to coach at the University of Iowa. The gym became a draw for top youth gymnasts, with some families moving to Iowa to train there. Gardner moved to Iowa in September 2018, jumping at the opportunity to coach under Qiao. 'This is the job that I've always wanted. Chow is really someone I have looked up to since I've been coaching,' Gardner told the ABC affiliate WOI-TV in 2019. 'And you can tell when you step foot in the gym, just even from coaching the girls, the culture that he's built. It's amazing. It's beautiful.' A year later, Gardner was promoted to director of Chow's Winter Classic, an annual meet that draws more than 1,000 gymnasts to Iowa. He also coached a junior Olympics team during his four-year tenure at Chow's. Several of his students earned college gymnastics scholarships, but Gardner said he had bigger goals. 'You want to leave a thumbprint on their life, so when they go off hopefully to school, to bigger and better things, that they remember Chow's as family,' he said in a 2020 interview with WOI-TV. Coach accused of sexual misconduct in Iowa and Mississippi Gardner is accused of abusing his position at Chow's and his former job at Jump'In Gymnastics in Mississippi to prey on girls under his tutelage, according to a nine-page FBI affidavit released Friday that summarizes the allegations against him. A girl reported to SafeSport in March 2022 that Gardner used 'inappropriate spotting techniques' in which he would put his hands between her legs and touch her vagina, the affidavit said. It said she alleged Gardner would ask girls if they were sexually active and call them 'idiots, sluts, and whores.' She said this behavior began after his hiring in 2018 and continued until she left the gym in 2020 and provided the names of six other potential victims. SafeSport suspended Gardner in July 2022 – four months after the girl's report – a provisional step it can take in severe cases with 'sufficient evidentiary support' as investigations proceed. A month after that, the center received a report from another girl alleging additional 'sexual contact and physical abuse,' including that Gardner similarly fondled her during workouts, the FBI affidavit said. The girl said that he once dragged her across the carpet so hard that it burned her buttocks, the affidavit said. SafeSport shared the reports with West Des Moines police, in line with its policy requiring adults who interact with youth athletes to disclose potential criminal cases to law enforcement. While SafeSport's suspension took Gardner out of gymnastics, the criminal investigation quickly hit a roadblock. Police records show a detective told SafeSport to urge the alleged victims to file criminal complaints, but only one of their mothers contacted police in 2022. That woman said her daughter did not want to pursue criminal charges, and police suspended the investigation. Victims of abuse are often reluctant to cooperate with police, said Ken Lang, a retired detective and associate professor of criminal justice at Milligan University. 'In this case you have the prestige of this facility,' he said. 'Do they want to associate their name with that, in that way, when their aspirations were to succeed in gymnastics?' Police suspended the investigation, even as Gardner was on probation for his second-offense of driving while intoxicated. A dormant case reopened, and a year later, an arrest The case stayed dormant until April 2024 when another former Chow's student came forward to the West Des Moines Police Department to report abuse allegations, according to a now-sealed affidavit signed by police detective Jeff Lyon. The AP is not identifying the student in line with its policy of not naming victims of alleged sexual abuse. The now 18-year-old told police she began taking lessons from Gardner when she was 11 or 12 in 2019, initially seeing him as a 'father figure' who tried to help her get through her parents' divorce. He told her she could tell him 'anything,' the affidavit said. When she moved in 2021, she told police, he gave her a hug and said she could text and follow him on Instagram and other social media sites, where he went by the nickname 'Coach Seanie,' because gym policy barring such contact no longer applied. According to a summary of her statement provided in Lyon's affidavit, she said Gardner fondled her during exercises, repeatedly touching her vagina; rubbed her back and butt and discussed his sex life; and made her do inappropriate stretches that exposed her privates. She told police she suspected he used his cellphone to film her in that position. Reached by the AP, the teen's mother declined comment. The mother told police she was interested in a monetary settlement with Chow's because the gym 'had been made aware of the complaints and they did nothing to stop them,' according to Lyon's affidavit. The gym didn't return AP messages seeking comment. It took 16 months after the teen's 2024 report for the FBI to arrest Gardner, who made an initial court appearance in Des Moines on Friday on a charge of producing visual depictions of minors engaging in sexually explicit conduct, which can carry up to 30 years in prison. A public defender assigned to represent him didn't return AP messages seeking comment. It's unclear why the case took so long to investigate and also when the FBI, which had to pay $138 million to Nassar's victims for botching that investigation, got involved in the case. Among evidence seized by investigators in late May were a cellphone, laptop and a desktop computer along with handwritten notes between Gardner and his former pupils, according to the sealed court documents. They found images of girls, approximately 6 to 14 years in age, who were nude, using the toilet or changing into leotards, those documents show. Those images appear to have come from a hidden camera in a restroom. They also uncovered 50 video files and 400 photos, including some that appeared to be child pornography, according to the FBI affidavit. One video allegedly shows Gardner entering the bathroom and turning off the camera. Investigators also found images of an adult woman secretly filmed entering and exiting a bathtub, and identified her as Gardner's ex-girlfriend. That woman as well as the gym's owner, Candi Workman, told investigators the images appeared to come from Jump'In Gymnastics' facility in Purvis, Mississippi, which has since been closed. SafeSport's power has limits SafeSport has long touted that it can deliver sanctions in cases where criminal charges are not pursued as key to its mission. However, Gardner's ability to land a job in health care illustrates the limits of that power: It can ban people from sports but that sanction is not guaranteed to reach the general public. While not commenting about Gardner's case directly, it said in a statement provided to AP that a number of issues factor into why cases can take so long to close, including the 8,000 reports it receives a year with only around 30 full-time investigators. It has revamped some procedures, it said, in an attempt to become more efficient. 'While the Center is able and often does cooperate in law enforcement investigations,' it said, 'law enforcement is not required to share information, updates, or even confirm an investigation is ongoing.' USA Gymnastics President Li Li Leung called the center's task 'really tough, difficult to navigate.' 'I would like to see more consistency with their outcomes and sanctions,' Leung said. 'I would like to see more standardization on things. I would like to see more communication, more transparency from their side.' A case that lingers, even after the SafeSport ban As the investigation proceeded, Gardner said on his Facebook page he had landed a new job in May 2024 as a surgical technologist at MercyOne West Des Moines Medical Center. It's a role that calls for positioning patients on the operating room table, and assisting with procedures and post-surgery care. Asked about Gardner's employment, hospital spokesman Todd Mizener told the AP: 'The only information I can provide is that he is no longer" at the hospital. Meanwhile, the case lingers, leaving lives in limbo more than three years after the SafeSport Center and police first learned of it. 'SafeSport is now part of a larger problem rather than a solution, if it was ever a solution,' said attorney Silvey. 'The most fundamental professional task such as coordination with local or federal law enforcement gets botched on a daily basis, hundreds of times a year now.' ___ Pells reported from Denver. AP National Writer Will Graves contributed.
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
B.J. Armstrong reveals why it was hard leaving the Bulls for the Warriors: "I learned very quickly the NBA is much different
B.J. Armstrong reveals why it was hard leaving the Bulls for the Warriors: "I learned very quickly the NBA is much different originally appeared on Basketball Network. B.J. Armstrong was one lucky player. He was expected to be a lottery pick in the 1989 NBA Draft after a standout career at Iowa. However, after suffering a broken hand during one of the pre-draft workouts, Armstrong slipped outside the lottery spots. B.J. ended up getting drafted by the Chicago Bulls with the 18th overall pick and became one of the final pieces of the Bulls' championship puzzle. He was part of Chicago's first three-peat and earned an All-Star spot in 1994. However, after his time ran out in the Windy City, Armstrong realized that life elsewhere in the league wasn't as easy. "When I got traded, I'd only known the Bulls. So I didn't know any other system of play other than what I learned there in Chicago. And I learned very quickly that the NBA is much different, when I left Chicago," said Armstrong on former teammate Bill Cartwright's podcast. The Bulls left Armstrong unprotected in the 1995 Expansion Draft Actually, the Bulls did not trade Armstrong. Because Michael Jordan was coming back in 1995 and Chicago was eyeing to add Dennis Rodman, they needed to free up cap space. And so, since B.J. was coming off an All-Star season in 1995, they felt they could no longer afford him, so the Bulls left him unprotected in the 1995 Expansion Draft, where he easily became the No.1 overall pick. However, because he did not want to play for the Raptors, Toronto traded him to the Golden State Warriors for Victor Alexander, Carlos Rogers, and the draft rights to Michael McDonald, Martin Lewis, and Dwyane Whitfield. In the Bay, B.J. had teammates like Latrell Sprewell, Joe Smith, Tim Hardaway, Chris Mullin, Rony Seikaly, and Kevin Willis, who were all double-digit scorers during the 1995-96 season when Armstrong arrived. However, Golden State won only 36 games and missed the playoffs. The following year, the Dubs were worse, going 30-52 during the 1996-97 campaign. Playing with MJ's Bulls was special After two seasons in Golden State, B.J. was traded to the Charlotte Hornets during the 1997-98 season. Armstrong also played for the Orlando Magic before finishing his career where it started — in Chicago. However, the point guard never got to play in another NBA Finals and admitted that his first stint with the Bulls was very special. "I really didn't know what to expect. But I knew the game was different. We had some good players. We had some injuries. I remember Tex would say this, 'Wining covers a multitude of things'. And that's when I really learned how special those moments were in Chicago, because in Chicago, all I knew was that I was preparing to win games. But it's really hard to win this league, so it wasn't eye-opening, but I had a deeper appreciation when I played and went to other places to play," he added. MJ's Bulls were one of the most dominant teams in NBA history. They won six NBA championships during a six-year period from 1991-1998. You could argue that they could have won more if MJ hadn't left for baseball in 1993 and if they had not broken up after "The Last Dance." Armstrong was blessed to be a part of the first three.
