Hatchell, who says she is cancer free, to speak at Raleigh Sports Club

Sylvia Hatchell.
Sylvia Hatchell.

admin-ajax.phpSylvia Hatchell.[/caption]The next meeting of the Raleigh Sports Club will be on January 15, 2014. The Raleigh Sports Club continues celebrating its 50th anniversary with special guest speaker UNC Women’s Head Basketball Coach Sylvia Hatchell tentatively scheduled to appear.

Hatchell temporarily stepped down as head coach to battle leukemia. Hatchell said she is now cancer-free after Jan. 3 tests showed she is in remission but she is still undergoing treatments.

Assistant coaches Billy Lee and Ivory Latta were scheduled to speak in the event Coach Hatchell was unable to attend but the Raleigh Sports Club has confirmed with Jane High, Sylvia Hatchell’s UNC assistant, that Coach Hatchell will be at Wednesday’s meeting. There is very strong interest from local media, guests and members that there is very strong interest in her presence.

With President Obama arriving in Raleigh at 11 a.m., traffic may be re-routed so the RSC is recommending that everyone arrive early. we expect the local interstate (from the airport to N.C State) and streets surrounding N.C. State to be closed.

The RSC will honor a local Wake county student athlete of the week for outstanding achievement in the classroom, community and on the field.

Meetings are held in Bradley Hall in Highland UMC, 1901 Ridge Road at the intersection of Lake Boone Trail, just inside the Raleigh Beltline. Buffet lines open at 11:30 a.m. and the meeting starts at 12 noon. See http://www.raleighsportsclub.org/ for details.

 

ACC leads the way in the Learfield Sports Director’s Cup

acclogo2 The ACC leads all conferences with five schools ranked among the top nine of the Learfield Sports Directors’ Cup Final Fall Standings released on Thursday.

The ACC’s eight schools among the top 27 also lead all conference, as do its 10 schools among the top 50. Twelve of the ACC’s 15 schools placed among the top 86 (tied for the most among all conferences).

“It was an outstanding fall season for our league, and our success is a tribute to the leadership of our schools, coaches and student-athletes,” said ACC Commissioner John Swofford. “As we begin the 2014 calendar year, our league and member institutions look forward to continued success in the winter and spring.”

National championships in football and men’s soccer highlighted a banner fall for the ACC, which also placed three teams among the final four in the NCAA Men’s Soccer, Women’s Soccer and Field Hockey Championships.

Florida State placed third in the overall standings and led all ACC schools with 351.5 points. In addition to the 2013 national football title, the Seminoles posted a runner-up finish in the NCAA Women’s Soccer Championship, placed eighth in women’s cross country and ninth in volleyball.

North Carolina closed out the fall in fourth place with 333 points, led by a third-place showing in field hockey and a fifth-place ranking in women’s soccer.

Virginia sits in fifth place with 323 points. In addition to third-place finishes in both men’s and women’s soccer, the Cavaliers placed ninth in both women’s field hockey and women’s cross country.

Buoyed by the 2013 NCAA Men’s Soccer Championship title, Notre Dame placed eighth with 310 points. The Fighting Irish added a top-10 finish (ninth) in women’s soccer.

Duke, with a runner-up finish in the NCAA Field Hockey Championship and a fifth-place showing in women’s soccer, ranked ninth with 293 points.

Rounding out the ACC’s presence in the top 30 are Maryland in 21st place, Syracuse in 26th and Wake Forest in 27th. Virginia Tech placed 33rd and Boston College 36th to give the ACC 10 schools among the top 50, while Clemson finished 64th and NC State 86th.

Miami (113th), Pitt (133rd) and Georgia Tech (148th) round out the ACC’s fall rankings. Louisville, which will join the ACC on July 1, 2014, placed 34th.

The Learfield Sports Directors’ Cup was developed as a joint effort between the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics (NACDA) and USA Today. Points are awarded based on each institution’s finish in up to 20 sports — 10 women’s and 10 men’s.

The first Division I winter standings will be released Thursday, March 27.

Can Tar Heels hit the broad side of a barn?

unclogoIt’s official, the Tar Heels can’t shoot. They miss from outside, they miss from inside. They miss open shots and contested shots. When they are fouled, they are likely to miss the free throw shot.

The 30.8 percent in the 63-57 home loss to Miami Wednesday was the second worst shooting exhibition by a Roy Williams-coached Tar Heel team.

It really was similar to the Wake Forest loss in that the two “shooters” on the team were hapless. Leslie McDonald was a mere three of 12 while Marcus Paige was an even-worse two of 15. That’s a combined five of 27. That’s less than 20 percent.

Game story and Boxscore

CNN features UNC in analysis that claims athletes “read like 5th-graders”

cnnlogoA CNN investigation published Tuesday, Jan. 7 found that public university student basketball and football players could read only up to an eight-grade level. A former learning specialist at UNC-Chapel Hill claims a Tar Heel basketball player she worked with couldn’t read or write.

Mary Willingham researched the reading levels of 183 UNC athletes who played football or basketball from 2004 to 2012 and found that 60 percent read between fourth- and eighth-grade levels.

CNN Headline: Some college athletes play like adults, read like 5th-graders

To read the article, please click here.

Hurricane’s Skinner named NHL First Star of the Week

Jeff Skinner.
Jeff Skinner.
The National Hockey League announced Monday that Hurricanes winger Jeff Skinner has been named the league’s First Star for the week ending Jan. 5. It marks the second time Skinner has earned the honor in less than a month, as he was also named First Star for the week ending Dec. 8.

Skinner, 21, scored six goals and earned three assists (9 points) in four games as Carolina earned victories against the Montreal Canadiens, Washington Capitals, New York Islanders and Nashville Predators. The Markham, Ont, native had two goals and an assist as the Hurricanes came from three goals down in the third period to beat the Canadiens on New Year’s Eve. Skinner followed that up with his second hat trick of the season, including the overtime, game-winning goal at Washington on Thursday.

After earning the primary assist on Brett Sutter’s game-winner against the Islanders Saturday, Skinner had his third multi-point effort with the game-winning goal and an assist against Nashville on Sunday night. Skinner leads Carolina and ranks tied for ninth in the NHL in goals (20) and game-winning goals (4) this season despite missing 11 games due to injury.

Selected by the Hurricanes in the first round, seventh overall, of the 2010 NHL Entry Draft, Skinner (5’11”, 200 lbs.) has totaled 84 goals and 80 assists (164 points) in 220 career NHL games. He appeared in the 2011 NHL All-Star Game, and won the Calder Trophy as the league’s rookie of the year in 2010-11.

The Hurricanes travel to Buffalo today and will take on the Sabres on Tuesday at 7 p.m. (FOX Sports Carolinas, Hurricanes Radio Network). The team returns home after the game, and hosts the Toronto Maple Leafs at PNC Arena on Thursday.

Nine sports figures to be inducted into the NC Sports Hall of Fame

halloffamelogoThe North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame, established in 1963, have announced its 2014 inductees.

The nine new members are Eddie Biedenbach, A. J. Carr, Bob Colvin, Randy Denton, Lee Gliarmis, Marshall Happer, Rodney Rogers, Bob Waters and Frank Weedon.

Eddie Biedenbach: Recruited by the legendary Everett Case to N.C. State University, Bidenbach was a star on Wolfpack teams loaded with stars. As a three-year starter (freshmen were ineligible then), he was a two-time All-ACC selection. Biedenbach averaged 12 points a game his sophomore year and 16.7 points a game as a junior, when he led N.C. State to the ACC Tournament title with a 21.3 average. He was his team’s MVP his senior year. A masterful dribbler and defensive player, Biedenbach was known for stealing the ball from opposing guards. He was drafted in two sports — the Los Angeles Lakers in the NBA and the New Jersey Nets in the ABA, as well as the Dallas Cowboys in the NFL — and played one year in the NBA before being lured into coaching. He was a key assistant on N.C. State’s 1974 national championship and held head coaching jobs at Davidson College and UNC-Asheville. At Asheville, he led the program for 17 seasons, amassing 256 wins and taking the Bulldogs to the NCAA Tournament three times. A four-time Big South Coach of the Year and the winningest coach in the league’s history, he has joined the staff at UNC-Wilmington as an assistant coach.
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A.J. Carr: Soft-spoken Carr is one of the most respected men in North Carolina sports. Although known as a veteran sportswriter (42 years at the Raleigh News & Observer, plus stops at his hometown Wallace Enterprise and the Greensboro Daily News), he also had a rewarding career as an athlete.

Carr was an all-conference basketball player three years at Wallace-Rose Hill High and team MVP in 1960, the same year he was all-conference in football. He was a four-year starter in baseball and team MVP in 1959. Teams on which he performed won or shared 14 regular season or tournament titles.

He holds nine state titles in Senior Games age-group basketball shooting and 12 Wake County championships. He also set or shared two state records. A member of the Guilford College Sports Hall Sports of Fame, Carr was named North Carolina Sportswriter of the Year in 1978 and 2008, won three national awards for college baseball writing, and was honored by the Triangle Chapter National Football Foundation, North Carolina Tennis Association, and Raleigh Hot Stove League.

Bob Colvin: Of all the eras of dominance among North Carolina’s high school football teams through the decades, perhaps no one was more dominant than Colvin’s teams at 1-A Robbinsville High School in western North Carolina. In a head-coaching career that spanned 18 years (1966-84), he led the Black Knights to 11 state championships in a 15-year period beginning in 1969. In only one of those 11 victories did the opponent manage to lose by less than a touchdown. For his career, Colvin posted a record of 177-57-2.

Randy Denton: A Raleigh native and North Carolina resident for more than 50 years, Denton starred at Enloe High School, where his jersey was retired in 1967. As a center at Duke University, he earned All-ACC honors in all three of his varsity seasons (1969-71), when he led the Blue Devils in scoring and rebounding in each, and he was named All-American as a senior. He held career averages at Duke of 19.7 points and 12.7 rebounds per game. Four times he scored more than 20 points and had more than 20 rebounds in a single game. Denton played eight seasons professionally (ABA, NBA and in Italy). He was inducted into the Duke University Sports Hall of Fame in 1991 and the Duke University Hall of Honor in 2001.

Lee Gliarmis: An outstanding high school athlete in Wilson, Gliarmis was invited to join both the basketball and soccer teams at UNC-Chapel Hill. Yet it was back in Wilson, beginning in the early 1950s, that Gliarmis began to make an indelible mark on young athletes in his youth-coaching career that spanned multiple decades. When Fike High School had its glorious run of football success in the late 1960s, it did so with a high percentage of players who had honed their skills on Gliarmis’ youth league teams. His contributions extended to other sports that include baseball, where he led the efforts to build the North Carolina Baseball Museum at historic Fleming Stadium in Wilson. Visitors from 50 states and 14 counties have enjoyed its memorabilia.

Marshall Happer: Happer is a Raleigh attorney who served as chief operating officer and as commissioner of the Men’s Tennis Council, the governing body for the international tour. He also served the Council as its in-house attorney. As a junior player in Kinston, he was a two-time state champion who went on to play collegiately at UNC-Chapel Hill. Happer has made a major impact on the tennis scene in the state, and he has brought several pro tennis tournaments to the area.

Rodney Rogers: Rogers, a Durham native, averaged 19.3 points and almost eight rebounds per game in his career as a basketball star at Wake Forest University. He was named ACC Rookie of the Year, edging Duke University’s Grant Hill for that honor, and became the ACC’s Player of the Year in 1993. Drafted ninth in the first round of the 1993 NBA draft by the Denver Nuggets, Rogers went on to have a productive 12-year professional career appearing with the Nuggets, Clippers, New Orleans Hornets, Celtics, Nets, Sixers, Spurs and Suns. He became known as the perfect sixth man in the pro league and was named the NBA’s Sixth Man of the Year in 2000.

Bob Waters: (deceased) Considered the NFL’s first ever “shotgun” quarterback in his No. 2 role with the San Francisco 49ers, Waters’ pro career prematurely gave way to coaching because of a series of injuries. He became an assistant coach at his alma mater, Presbyterian College, and then coached wide receivers at Stanford University. Just three years into his coaching career, Waters accepted an offer to become head coach at Western Carolina University. His first team at Cullowhee went 9-1 in 1969, and his 1972 and 1974 teams were the school’s first to appear in post-season competition. His 1983 team played in the national championship game. Waters coached at Western Carolina for 20 seasons and was the school’s athletic director for 15 of those years. The football field at Western Carolina bears his name. He is a member of the South Carolina Athletic Hall of Fame.

Frank Weedon: (deceased) No one has been more closely identified with N.C. State University for a half century than Weedon, who served the institution as the longtime sports information director and assistant athletic director. Born in Washington, D.C., he was a graduate of the University of Maryland. However, he cannot be identified without references to N.C. State.

“It’s sort of like Frank was born at N.C. State,” former Wolfpack coach Lou Holtz once said. “There wasn’t any past. He didn’t play golf. He loved N.C. State and he loved his mother.”

Weedon is famous for his critique of game officials, especially along the sidelines at N.C. State basketball games. But perhaps that notoriety disguised that he was also one of the classic sports information directors in the business. It has been written the he almost single-handedly successfully promoted Roman Gabriel into first-team All-American status in 1960. Weedon also sold the national media on the myth that Tommy Burleson was the tallest basketball player (at 7-feet, 4 inches) in the nation. Actually, Burleson was 7-feet, 2 ¼ inches. Weedon also created the first-ever, university-affiliated regional radio network, and the idea spread to other campuses around the state and then across the country. Weedon worked for seven athletic directors and the press box at Doak Field. N.C. State’s baseball stadium bears his name.

Christy speaks at 50th anniversary of Raleigh Sports Club

Dick Christy.
Dick Christy.
The Raleigh Sports Club will be celebrating it’s 50th anniversary with special guest speaker, Dick Christy, University of North Carolina at Pembroke Athletic Director on Wednesday (Jan. 8).

Last year, Christy, who has spent the last 13 years in athletic administration, came to Pembroke from NC State University, where he was associate athletics director for external relations for the last eight years.

The RSC will honor Chris Corchiani Jr., Ravenscroft basketball player, as the Wake county student athlete of the week for outstanding achievement in the classroom, community and on the field.

Meetings are held in Bradley Hall in Highland UMC, 1901 Ridge Road at the intersection of Lake Boone Trail, just inside the Raleigh Beltline. Buffet lines open at 11:30 a.m. and the meeting starts at 12 noon. See http://www.raleighsportsclub.org/ for details.

Hurricanes are on a roll to start the new year

canesstreakEven without captain Eric Staal, the Carolina Hurricanes keep rolling, winning their fourth straight game by topping the Nashville Predators 2-1.

Alexander Semin and Jeff Skinner tallied for Carolina, and Anton Khudobin made 31 saves for his third win in as many starts.

“I thought we did a pretty solid job all game … being responsible defensively and getting pucks in when we needed to,” Skinner said. “It was nice to get one there and have that hard work pay off for us.”

Skinner scored the game-winning goal with just 3:31 remaining in regulation, as he fired one five-hole after Semin and Tuomo Ruutu worked the puck out from behind the net. Skinner has only played in 32 games this season, but he already has a team-leading 20 goals and is second in team scoring with 33 points (20g, 13a).

The difference continues to be his knack of scoring big goals when the team needs them the most.

“He keeps on ticking. I’m really happy for him, and I’m very happy for our hockey team. He’s scoring, and he’s scoring clutch goals. That’s the difference,” head coach Kirk Muller said. “The guys that we needed to score tonight in a grinding-type game … came through for us.”

– Carolina Hurricanes news release

Wake Forest made more of an effort in win over Tar Heels

Jeff Bzdelik.
Jeff Bzdelik.
UNC didn’t really deserve to win the game at Wake Forest… but they could have. The Tar Heels fell 73-67 in the ACC season opener for both teams.

You’d think that outrebounding an ACC foe by 19 would do the trick. And it would have if the Heels could have made a few shots. You aren’t going to win many games hitting 39 percent.

A lot of those shots were relatively easy follow shots, tips and short jumpers. Several were open threes.

As Coach Williams said, the Tar Heels couldn’t finish. But Wake could. They scored 19 points off Carolina’s 17 turnovers.

“We just made effort plays,” said Wake Forest coach Jeff Bzdelik.

Ouch. They kinda says that the Tar Heels didn’t make as much effort because the favored Heels certainly have the talent to beat the Deacs.

Even the UNC trapping defense was only successful a couple of times and the Tar Heels didn’t convert on the opportunities.

“We knew they would trap us and we handled the trap really well,” Bzdelik said.

I had thought the trap might be Carolina’s calling card this year but it takes more effort, more aggression to work.

For more on the game, please click here.

Offensive linemen now leaving early for the NFL? UNC’s Bodine to enter draft

Russell Bodine.
Russell Bodine.
I don’t think I ever remember an ACC offensive lineman underclassman who didn’t even make the All-ACC first or second team making himself available for the draft.

University of North Carolina junior offensive lineman Russell Bodine has decided to forego his final season of eligibility and will enter the 2014 NFL Draft. A native of Scottsville, Va., Bodine was a two-year starter, primarily at center. He also saw action at left guard in 2013.

“It’s been a dream of mine to play in the NFL and I feel I’m ready to take the next step in my playing career,” said Bodine. “I have been thinking about this for several weeks, weighing all my options and discussing it with my parents and the coaching staff. I feel it is the right time to move forward.

“I want to thank the coaching staff at North Carolina for helping me become a better player and person. I’ve had the opportunity to play in both a pro-style offense and a spread offense and I think that will enhance my opportunities at the next level.”

Bodine averaged 73 snaps per game in 2013 and was an honorable-mention All-ACC selection.

“We wish Russell the best as he takes the next step in athletic career,” said head coach Larry Fedora. “He has been a good player for us over the last two years, starting every game on the offensive line, and has a bright future ahead of him.”

– From News release