12:58 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 7, 2009
1:03 p.m. Starters, in 0rder of introduction: senior Damian Hollis, junior Joseph Katuka, freshman Tim Johnson, freshman Dwayne Smith, sophomore Tony Taylor. Also, the players had their arms wrapped around one another during the national anthem. Everyone talks about this team’s chemistry, so there would seem to be a small example of sorts.
12:59 p.m. Head coach Karl Hobbs and his staff just took the floor for the first time to the usual remix of P.O.D.’s “Boom,” yet the traditional bowing toward Hobbs was no where to be seen. The staff, aside from Hobbs, is wearing matching khaki-colored long-sleeve collared shirts and black pants.
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Good afternoon and welcome to the first live blog of the fall, as the GW men’s basketball team hosts West Georgia in a preseason exhibition contest. Today’s contest offers the first in-game glimpse at this year’s Colonials, a chance made all the more interesting by the fact that six of this year’s players are freshmen. One would expect that all five healthy newcomers – center Daymon Warren is still sidelined with a finger injury – should see the floor today.
Also of interest will be the new roles some of the returning players will be asked to fulfill. Junior Joseph Katuka, a 6-foot-11 center from Nigeria, will likely be asked to fill the void left in the post by the graduation of Rob Diggs, while senior standout Damian Hollis will be leaned on more than ever. Sophomore Aaron Ware, an athletic 6-foot-5 slasher, is someone to keep an eye on as well in his second season. Sophomore Tony Taylor and redshirt junior Travis King will likely man the backcourt once again, though they may share duties with freshman Bryan Bynes at times.
Fans are still filtering in as we approach two minutes until tipoff. We’ll have starting lineups and in-game updates for you along the way.
Friday, Oct. 30, 2009 12:52 p.m.
Women’s soccer senior Brittany Eger was honored by ESPN the Magazine with a spot on its Academic All-District 2 First Team, GW’s athletic department announced today.
Eger is tied for the team lead with four goals this season, most recently scoring the team’s lone goal on Senior Day in a 1-0 win over Duquesne Sunday. According to the announcement, the accounting major also maintains a 3.89 GPA and will be working for accounting firm KPMG after she graduates.
District 2 consists of D.C., Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware and West Virginia. The teams are voted on by the College Sports Information Directors of America.
Thursday, Oct. 22, 2009 4:11 p.m.
The GW men’s basketball team was predicted to finish 13th in the 14-team Atlantic 10 by the conference’s coaches and members of the media in a poll released today.
The Colonials have finished 13th the past two seasons after winning the A-10’s regular or postseason championship in each of the previous three years. The team went 4-12 in the conference and 10-18 overall last year after finishing 9-17 overall with a 5-11 A-10 record in 2007-08. Because only twelve teams qualify for the A-10 tournament, GW has been on the outside looking in for the past two postseasons.
Senior Damian Hollis, who tied for the team lead with 13.4 points per game last year while adding 6.1 rebounds per contest, will be the team’s top returning scorer and rebounder. This year’s roster will also feature six freshmen.
Dayton was picked to win the conference, garnering 33 of 57 first-place votes. Xavier, which received 18 first-place votes, was picked second, followed by Richmond. Fordham was picked to finish 14th.
Wednesday, Oct. 21, 2009 1:51 p.m.
The GW women’s basketball team is expected to finish eighth in the 14-team Atlantic 10 conference, according to a poll of the conference’s head coaches released today.
The Colonials went 17-14 overall and 9-5 in the A-10 last year during head coach Mike Bozeman’s first year at the helm of the program. Entering as the league’s fifth seed, they were upset in the first round of the conference postseason tournament by Rhode Island. GW then lost in double-overtime at Florida Gulf Coast in the first round of the WNIT.
This year’s team will feature one of the youngest rosters in the nation, with the team’s lone upperclassman – redshirt junior Ivy Abiona – expected to be sidelined until at least January after undergoing knee surgery this July. Sophomores Tiana Myers and Tara Booker are the team’s top returning scorers and will be joined by a freshman class that ESPN ranked as the best in the A-10 and 42nd-best in the country.
Xavier was tabbed as the favorite to win the conference, garnering 12 of 14 first-place votes. Dayton and Richmond, which were tied for third in the poll, also each received a first-place vote. Charlotte was predicted to finish second.
The Colonials’ opening tip will come Nov. 17 at North Texas. Their first home game will be Nov. 19 against Coppin State at 7 p.m.
Tuesday, Sept. 22, 2009 11:21 p.m.
Earlier this month the GW basketball blogosphere gained a new member: Buff and Blog, featuring posts from members of the GW women’s basketball team.
Updates have been sparse thus far (hey, they’re busy), but sophomore Tiana Myers and redshirt junior Ivy Abiona have each written posts, with Myers adding a second yesterday. The blog also mentions that freshman Megan Nipe will be participating.
It should be interesting to read more from them as the year progresses.
Tuesday, Sept. 22, 2009 11:38 a.m.
Erik Copes, a 6-foot-8 junior at Philadelphia’s Imhotep Institute Charter High School and nephew of GW men’s basketball assistant Roland Houston, has committed to play for GW, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer.
As the Inquirer notes, Copes’s team won the PIAA Class AA state championship last season while he averaged 2.5 points, eight rebounds and three blocks per game as a sophomore. In the championship game, he collected 11 rebounds and seven blocks.
According to the Northstar Basketball Blog, Copes was also recruited by UConn, Wake Forest, West Virginia, Temple and Niagara. They list GW and Temple as being the two schools to have offered him a scholarship at that time.
Saturday, Sept. 19, 2009 7:25 p.m.
Daymon Warren, a 6-foot-9 freshman center on the men’s basketball team, is expected to be out of action for the next 12 weeks after fracturing his middle finger, Sports Information Director Brad Bower said today.
Warren’s expected recovery time extends into mid-December and would include the Colonials’ first seven or eight games. The Richmond, Calif. native played for Worcester Academy in Massachusetts last season, where he averaged 12 points and eight rebounds per game.
Thursday, Sept. 17, 2009 5:03 p.m.
The women’s basketball schedule for this upcoming season was released by the athletic department this afternoon.
In addition to the previously reported games at Tennessee and Auburn and against Rutgers at home, GW will host nonconference games against Western Kentucky, Rice, Marshall, Coppin State and – perhaps most intriguingly – Mount St. Mary’s. Former Colonial Lisa Steele, who graduated last year, was recently named an assistant coach for the Mount.
The Coppin State game will serve as the team’s home opener Nov. 19.
The Colonials will also travel to the Bahamas for the Junkanoo Jam tournament, where they will play Michigan State and either Marist or Oklahoma State, and play at George Mason, Villanova, North Texas and Ohio.
The full schedule, including conference games, can be viewed here.
Friday, Sept. 4, 2009 5:40 p.m.
Hatchet file photo
Is recent men’s basketball alum Rob Diggs heading to Holland to play professionally?
That would seem to be the case based on his Twitter account, where he announced earlier this week that he “just signed the contract” and was heading to Holland. I’m working on getting in touch with the former Colonials forward to confirm everything, but it sure looks like that’s what’s happening.
Diggs led the team in scoring and rebounding as a senior last season, averaging 13.4 points and 7.3 rebounds per game as well as tallying a team-best 47 blocks. He scored more than 1,000 points as a Colonial and finished with the second most blocks in GW history.
Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2009 9:29 p.m.
Hatchet file photo
Lisa Steele, a member of the GW women’s basketball team from 2004 until January of this year, has been hired as an assistant women’s basketball coach at Mount St. Mary’s, the school announced today.
As noted in the press release, Steele totaled 206 points, 107 rebounds, 36 assists and 25 steals during her GW playing career. Despite a reputation as one of the Colonials’ top shooting threats, Steele’s court time was limited during her time in Foggy Bottom due to a number of injuries. She redshirted in the 2004-05 season during her first year at school because of a stress fracture to her foot before missing nine games the next season with another foot injury.
She would play in a total of 60 games over her sophomore and junior seasons and averaged 7.8 points per game as a second-year player. It was in that season that she hit a game-winning shot against a nationally ranked Auburn team in one of the team’s most dramatic victories of what would be a Sweet Sixteen season.
Steele played only six games as a senior in the 2008-09 season, averaging 1.3 points in just under nine minutes of action per contest. She was declared ineligible Jan. 12 for undisclosed reasons, though head coach Mike Bozeman said she remained a part of the team “family.”
