Latest news with #St.Bonaventure
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Oklahoma State men's basketball adds Dana Valentine to coaching staff
STILLWATER — Oklahoma State men's basketball coach Steve Lutz completed his staff with the addition of Dana Valentine, as reported Tuesday. Valentine comes to the Cowboys after serving as an assistant at St. Bonaventure the past two seasons, his first in college basketball. His hiring was first reported by Jeff Goodman of Field of 68. Advertisement Valentine, who was a running back in college at Worcester (Massachusetts) State University, began his basketball coaching career at Notre Dame Prep, as well as with the AAU New England. From 2018-23, he was the varsity head coach and an assistant on the prep team at Putnam Science Academy in Connecticut — the same school that produced OSU incoming freshman center Ben Ahmed. The addition of Valentine fills the final vacancy on Lutz's staff after two coaches departed in recent weeks. Lutz also added Lou Gudino from Ball State last week. More: Oklahoma State men's golf rallies past Virginia to win 12th NCAA championship Scott Wright covers Oklahoma State athletics for The Oklahoman. Have a story idea for Scott? He can be reached at swright@ or on Twitter at @ScottWrightOK . Support Scott's work and that of other Oklahoman journalists by purchasing a digital subscription today at . This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Oklahoma State men's basketball adds Dana Valentine to coaching staff
Yahoo
27-04-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Kansas Gets Major Transfer Portal News on Wednesday
The Kansas Jayhawks are coming off a disappointing season for their standards. They went 21-13 and failed to reach the second round of the NCAA Tournament for the first time since the 2004-05 college basketball season. Jayhawks head coach Bill Self knew hitting the portal this offseason would be crucial to getting the program back on track. He already landed commitments from Illinois transfer small forward Tre White and Loyola Chicago transfer point guard Jayden Dawson. Advertisement And on Wednesday, Kansas landed another one in St. Bonaventure shooting guard Melvin Council. Kansas announced the move on social media, sharing that Council had signed and made things official. Self spoke about the addition of Council. "We're very excited to announce Melvin Council Jr. has signed," Self said. "He's a 6-4, long, rangy guard that can play with the ball and without the ball. Melvin will remind our fans physically and athletically of Tyshawn Taylor. He's a superior athlete who can score the ball and has the potential to be one of the more elite defenders that we've had in recent memory." Advertisement Council spent last season at St. Bonaventure after previous stops at Wagner and Monroe College (JUCO). The Rochester, New York native averaged 14.6 points, 5.4 rebounds, and 4.1 assists per game in his lone year with the Bonnies. "They want to play fast, similar to when they had Frank Mason and Devonte Graham, and that's how (Self) is looking at the backcourt," Council told 247Sports. Kansas Jayhawks head coach Bill Self.© Jay Biggerstaff-Imagn Images With Council on board, Kansas has now added three players from the transfer portal. But it's also seen some departures. Power forward Zach Clemence is headed to Texas A&M, shooting guard AJ Storr transferred to Ole Miss, point guard David Coit landed at Maryland, and small forward Rylan Griffen and shooting guard Rakease Passmore have yet to announce their next move. Related: Former Five-Star Recruit Sends Message to Departing Kansas Star
Yahoo
23-04-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Kansas basketball receives commitment from St. Bonaventure transfer Melvin Council Jr.
LAWRENCE — The Kansas basketball fan base received some good news on Wednesday, as St. Bonaventure transfer guard Melvin Council Jr. revealed during a livestream on Instagram that he has committed to play for the Jayhawks. Council, listed as a 6-foot-4 and 180-pound senior this past season, spent just one season at St. Bonaventure. He spent the previous year at Wagner and also has experience at the junior college level. With St. Bonaventure, he was an Atlantic 10 Conference all-league third-team honoree. Advertisement RELATED: Where could Kansas basketball be ranked to start 2025-26 season? Here are poll projections "We're very excited to announce Melvin Council Jr. has signed," head coach Bill Self said in a KU release that followed Council's announcement. "He's a 6-4, long, rangy guard that can play with the ball and without the ball. Melvin will remind our fans physically and athletically of Tyshawn Taylor. He's a superior athlete who can score the ball and has the potential to be one of the more elite defenders that we've had in recent memory. He's been very well drilled and well coached at Monroe (College), Wagner (College) and Saint Bonaventure. We could not be more excited to have him in the fold." Council won't arrive at Kansas as someone who's expected to be a reliable 3-point shooter, but he has been a productive player who brings experience to the roster. He'll be someone who can be relied upon to be a pivotal part of the rotation. As the Jayhawks look to deal with the departure of numerous players who could have returned from this past season's squad, his presence will be valued. Last season, Kansas finished 21-13 overall and saw its postseason end in the round of 64 of the NCAA tournament with a loss against Arkansas. The Jayhawks also saw their Big 12 Conference tournament run end in the quarterfinals with a loss against Arizona. As coach Bill Self and company look to regain the momentum that followed a national championship run in 2022, Council will look to play a key role. Melvin Council Jr. has elected to transfer to play for Kansas basketball after playing at St. Bonaventure. Jordan Guskey covers University of Kansas Athletics at The Topeka Capital-Journal. He was the 2022 National Sports Media Association's sportswriter of the year for the state of Kansas. Contact him at jmguskey@ or on Twitter at @JordanGuskey. This article originally appeared on Topeka Capital-Journal: St. Bonaventure transfer Melvin Council Jr. picks Kansas basketball
Washington Post
09-04-2025
- Sport
- Washington Post
The latest innovation for Woj as St. Bonaventure GM: Insurance
SAN ANTONIO — Six months into his new life, Adrian Wojnarowski plugged in his phone and set it face down on the floor of a hotel conference room. It would stay that way for more than 30 minutes, buzzing alone, untouched. Back in the fall, Wojnarowski — widely and colloquially known as Woj — traded an attachment to his phone as a preeminent NBA news-breaker for an even deeper attachment to his alma mater, St. Bonaventure University in western New York, where he became the general manager of the men's basketball team. He was at the Final Four this past week to help the program in ways normal and not. Sure, he mingled with coaches, spoke at a conference, talked hoops over dinner. But he also took dozens of photos with fans, signed memorabilia for future auctions and squeezed in a mini press tour. Little is normal about what St. Bonaventure is trying to do with its mid-major resources. And little is normal about having a GM with 6.4 million followers on X who became famous for his reporting with ESPN. 'I'm trying to get high-major players for mid-major money,' Wojnarowski said in an interview Saturday, his first season finished, his first transfer portal cycle almost wrapped, too. The Bonnies went 22-12, including 9-9 in the Atlantic 10 (good for seventh out of 15 teams). But in the past month, two desired big men — Frank Mitchell and Joe Grahovac — committed to the program, something that might have seemed impossible before Wojnarowski arrived. Mitchell, who has signed with the Bonnies, played at Canisius and Minnesota. Grahovac, a 6-foot-10 redhead from Fullerton College, a junior college in California, is expected to sign next week. To close the gap between what St. Bonaventure and what most other programs can offer in name, image and likeness (NIL) money, Wojnarowski has been creative. In the fall, at least one rep from every NBA team will attend a practice on campus, his way of tapping connections to promote the players to pro evaluators. Beyond that, he gives a hard sell for longtime coach Mark Schmidt, who he said is at a Hall of Fame level. St. Bonaventure also is using insurance policies. Yes, insurance policies. Division I sports are amid a period of rapid, uncertain change. That Wojnarowski is the Bonnies' GM is one example. Another is that he used insurance policies to build next year's roster. All of it is done through a company called Players Health. The insurance works in two ways: First, the Bonnies will have critical injury insurance for their entire payroll in 2025-26. And second, depending on the player and contract, the team has insurance policies on performance incentives, allowing the Bonnies to offer more money than they actually have to spend. This is all new for college hoops. In Wojnarowski's first year, St. Bonaventure, like all programs, relied solely on donors and other third-party deals to pay its players. Soon, though, pending a major legal settlement, schools could be permitted to pay athletes directly for the first time. But whatever the situation is moving forward, Wojnarowski believes insurance is an edge for his mid-major team. With the critical injury insurance, the Bonnies can sign players to contracts that aren't fully guaranteed to be paid by the school. If a player is injured and misses a certain amount of time, a bulk of his agreed-upon salary would be paid out by the insurance policy, meaning the Bonnies would save some cash for a future roster. With the insurance on performance incentives, think of this way: If Wojnarowski is going for a player and another school is offering $10,000 more — $10,000 the Bonnies don't have — he can offer $10,000 in insured performance incentives to make up the difference. Maybe the premium, paid to Players Health, is $1,000. But if the player is first-team all-A-10, he could make that $10,000 in incentives, all paid out by the insurance policy. The school would have bet the $1,000 premium to land him. The insurer would have bet, too, seeing as it would have collected the $1,000 premium if the player didn't reach the incentive. Everyone is hedging and calculating what's worth it. Wojnarowski believes that, more than anything, the incentives helped close the deal on players who want to find a reason to pick St. Bonaventure. As for what the incentives are for, he said it ranges from individual accolades (all-defense teams, newcomer of the year, etc.) to team success (a certain number of wins, making the NCAA tournament, etc.). The Bonnies are not doing stat-based incentives, wanting to avoid a player pushing himself through injury or going outside the system for numbers. Plus, he doesn't think that would be within the rules. Overall, he said, these insured incentives have been a major factor in recruiting and retaining players in this cycle. 'The third one that I'm fascinated by, and I don't have the money yet to invest in it, is [transfer] portal insurance,' Wojnarowski said, 'where you would pay a premium, probably a higher premium … [to] protect yourself against the player leaving in the portal, to be able to get back that player's money.' Now for a critical wrinkle: As of this week, Wojnarowski is a brand ambassador for Players Health and a member of its NIL advisory board. That means he'll promote the company and its college sports services. In turn, there are significant benefits for the Bonnies, including that Players Health will cover all of the critical injury insurance policies for next year's roster and payroll. And whenever he brings a new program to the company, Players Health will pay a referral fee to St. Bonaventure's NIL collective, the booster group that has funded any salaries to this point. This is the Woj Effect at work. Before the season, Schmidt, the Bonnies' coach, said that in the 24 hours after Wojnarowski announced his career change, the program got the most exposure it will in the next 50 years. To raise NIL money, the Bonnies recently auctioned off some of his old work phones. (The one he used in March 2020 to report that the NBA had suspended play early in the coronavirus pandemic sold for $3,250.) His partnership with Players Health is in that vein, though it could double as a competitive advantage. And the partnership also explains why he's being so open about a new team-building strategy. 'Even though I'm sharing it with people in our own league, that creates a stream of revenue,' Wojnarowski said. 'I'm willing to live with that because I need that revenue in a really difficult climate for us. So I'm trying to be as creative as I can be with a lot of these marketing deals. 'I made a decision when I came back that I'm going to try to parlay my whatever it is to fund our team,' he continued. 'This is another way for me to do it.' Whatever it is is what the rest of us would just call fame.
Yahoo
26-03-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Binghamton Men's Lacrosse gets overtime win over St. Bonaventure
ST. BONAVENTURE, N.Y. (WIVT/WBGH) – The Binghamton Bearcats men's lacrosse team started the season 0-4, but have since gone unbeaten and opened conference play 2-0. They faced off with St. Bonaventure in an inter-New York game to move to .500 on the season as they won in overtime, 6-5. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
