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Home > Blogs > Wright State University sports > Archives > 2009 > July
July 2009
Raiders put some names to tough choices
FAIRBORN — Not being much of a financial guy as evidenced by a glance at my messy checkbook, I’m not going to be able to tell you Wright State did the right or wrong thing this morning by laying off assistant athletics director Matt Liddy and assistant athletics communications director Matt Zircher.
Liddy had been with the school 24 years and was a graduate. Zircher graduated from Dayton and had been at his job 16 years.
But WSU had to make cuts, just like every business you and I have come in contact with over the past year.
People may grouse about the cuts, and how they will have to get along with less, but we accept them. There will be fewer media guides this year. Okay. Some teams will have to bus to a game rather than fly. Fine, the players are young enough not to mind.
Hotel stays will be shorter and in more spartan places. That can be dealt with.
But now we have some names to put with those cuts. Some real names, people we know, who have been out in the community. People are are part of the face of Wright State University.
Matt Liddy and Matt Zircher won’t be in the athletics department anymore. Whether it was the right or wrong move isn’t the point. That it happened is the sad part.
It’s not like WSU was padding its athletics department. It’s just that right now, cuts have to be made. When those cuts are real people, they’re the deepest cuts of all.
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Graham wants to continue playing
FAIRBORN — Will Graham has already spent five years at Wright State. What’s another few weeks?
“I’d like a sixth year,” Graham said as he worked his way into another pick-up basketball game at the Setzer Pavilion/Mills-Morgan Center. “Can I get that?”
Well, no. Graham, from Lexington, Ky., sat out a red-shirt year rehabbing surgically-repaired knees. Then he played four years, mostly as a starter, the last three on teams that won 20 or more games.
His next stop, he hopes, will be on some professional team overseas. Toward that end he is close to signing with an agent. He already has his degree from WSU and plans to go into business, but will wait to see if he lands a pro job. What he did as a player at WSU should at least earn him a look.
WSU coach Brad Brownell, who inherited Graham from the previous coach, called it a good career.
“There are only 2-3 guys on your team that are going to be big scorers, or whatever,” Brownell said. “It’s misleading for people to think a kid didn’t have a good career or he was just okay because a kid didn’t develop into an all-conference player. It’s unbelievably hard to be an all-conference player.
“The way your team is set up, you’re only going to have a couple guys be your big scorer. You’re not going to have five guys average double figures unless you play some crazy style.
“I don’t think kids sometimes are given credit for how much they contribute to your program, or how good they end up being, when they really do have good careers.
“Not every kid is going to score 1,000 points. That doesn’t mean he hasn’t had a good career. He may have only scored 500-600 points (Graham finished with 551). He’s probably had a good career. Will Graham had a pretty good career. He wasn’t a big-time scorer. He wasn’t a ‘wow’ guy for the things he did. But he was on a team that won a lot of games, and he was out there for a lot of time. He had a pretty good career.
“If you’re on a winning team, those guys were good players.”
Graham is happy with his career.
“A lot of things have to go your way to have a good career,” Graham said. “I’ll take it (the one he had). I like winning. I like teammates who like to win.”
All the teammates left behind took physicals Monday, then played their pickup game. All were cleared, including freshman Tyler Koch, who had been held back before the weekend after injuring both ankles during his senior season in high school.
Koch seems fine now, as is veteran Vaughn Duggins, who rested his ankle most of last week following earlier minor surgery.
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Raiders bigger and stronger
FAIRBORN — Watched some of an open gym Wednesday night at the Setzer Pavilion/Mills-Morgan Center, and the Raiders certainly do look bigger and stronger.
Senior Todd Brown looks especially sculpted, and not in a grotesque muscle-magazine way.
“I eat weights,” Brown said with a laugh.
He also makes it to the basket more without being bumped off inside.
Three Raiders did not participate. John David Gardner, rehabbing a hip surgery, is home in Alabama for a few days. Freshman Tyler Koch is awaiting clearance from a physical he took Wednesday morning (he suffered two sprained ankles during his senior high school season) and Vaughn Duggins stayed on the sideline with a slightly sprained ankle.
Duggins, who missed all but four games last season with a broken finger, then had an ankle cleaned out, will be fine. He spent nearly an hour before the scrimmage shooting baskets with Cooper Land, who also has added some needed bulk to his 6-foot-8 frame.
Freshman Navy man Paul Darkwa made his presence known inside, although he appears to be a little short of 6-7, and senior Ronnie Thomas not only looks to be in his best shape, but also more of a force inside.
Freshman guard Darian Cartharn? Well-muscled for such a young guy.
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Cartharn does the work
FAIRBORN — He has been on campus three days and Darian Cartharn says not all of it has been spent in the gym.
He has been in the weight room. He has attended classes. He has gone to study table. He has stopped for lunch and dinner.
But one of Wright State’s three freshmen basketball players knows why he is here and knows that’s why he wants to be here.
“My day starts with basketball and ends with basketball,” said Cartharn this morning as he fired shot after shot toward a basket at the Setzer Pavilion/Mills-Morgan Center. “I have to be here at 7 for weights, so I get up at 6. I shoot from about 9-10, go to study table, eat lunch, take a nap, go to classes and come back here to take some more shots.”
Sometimes, there are pickup games at night. Other days, it’s Cartharn and teammates just shooting around.
“It feels good,” said Cartharn, a muscular 6-footer from Canal Winchester. “The very first time I came here (while still in high school) and played in an open gym, I felt a little different. But that goes away. Once you get here, you have to put that nervousness aside. I just have to know there are other guys I have to set up to score.
“In high school, I could do whatever I wanted (on court).”
Cartharn is one of two guards in WSU’s newest class, the other being Tyler Koch of Winchester, Ind. He’s 6-4. The other recruit is 6-7 Paul Darkwa, an 8-year Navy veteran attending college for the first time.
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New Raiders on campus
FAIRBORN — Second session summer school began today at Wright State, and all the men’s basketball players (except for John David Gardner, who went home to Alabama for a bit to continue his hip rehab) started the week with a weight-lifting session followed by the first day of classes.
That means Paul Darkwa, who already was in town to attend first session classes, as well as freshmen guards Tyler Koch and Darian Cartharn.
The previous two weeks, most of the players were in town, while the coaches were out recruiting, viewing AAU tournaments in Cincinnati, Indianapolis, Louisville and West Virginia.
“You’re at the gym at 7:30 a.m. and games usually start at 8 o’clock,” WSU coach Brad Brownell said. “The games are a little over an hour, so they’re at 8, 9:15, 10:45…they don’t start games at night after 10, so the last game is over by 10:45 or 11.”
It’s evaluation time, which means coaches can watch, but not talk to players. It’s a time to decide if a player is good enough, or just good enough to beat somebody with less talent.
Sometimes, you don’t even get a kid after watching him in an AAU game, or even in a regular game at his high school.
“N’Gai Evans was a guy we signed late,” Brownell said. “We knew we needed a guard, and Eric (Stevenson) came in and said he was homesick (for North Carolina).
“We went up to see N’Gai in the spring and saw him play at an open gym. He had no other Division I schools interested in him, but a lot of Division II schools. He must have weighed 145 pounds, so his body scared everybody off.
“But we talked with his coach and his parents. They were great. We didn’t expect him to play as a freshman, but we had some injuries. Now, he’s played more than we anticipated and he has done some nice things. I would have loved to have redshirted the kid, but he probably helped us win 1-2 games off the bench.”
He has also been a part-time starter, added some weight and will be a key player for the Raiders this winter.
A Wright State trainer’s scholarship fund has been set up in the name of Tony Ortiz in honor of Ortiz’s 25 years at the school.
Over the weekend, a dinner and reception were held with several alums returning as well as former WSU basketball coach Paul Biancardi.
To contribute to the fund, donations can be made in Ortiz’s name to the WSU athletic department.
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Raiders busy during summer
FAIRBORN — While most of the basketball coaching staff is out recruiting, watching AAU games (in Cincinnati and Indianapolis this week), there is plenty going on in Raider Nation.
On the baseball side, outfielder Casey McGrew is having a nice summer in Japan, batting .346 for the USA team on tour. The Americans lost their first game recently, to Budo University, 7-1. It snapped an 11-game winning streak this season for the USA team, and a 35-game winning streak dating to last season.
McGrew has played in nine of the 12 games, starting five.
Teammate Alex Kaminsky, who was 6-2 with a 2.66 ERA during the regular season with the Raiders, made the Jewish Sports Review All-America team for the second straight season.
Michael Bonelli, late of Northwestern, has been hired by new men’s soccer coach Bryan Davis as an assistant.
Softball coach Mike Larabee, who took the Arkansas job, will be joined by his WSU assistant, Sue Carpenter. That means the Raiders are still looking for two head coaches, as they have not yet hired a golf coach.
Looking for camps? WSU tennis coach Sean McCaffrey is holding his second and final camp of the summer at Five Seasons Monday-Wednesday, while basketball coach Brad Brownell’s final camp is at the Nutter Center Aug. 3-6.
McCaffrey recently signed three for his women’s team, including Amanda Albuquerque of Weymouth, Mass.; Taylor Hines of Lexington, O., and Amy Nini from New Albany, O.
Kyle Pressley, late of the WSU basketball team, has enrolled at Indiana Tech near his home in Fort Wayne. He plans to play basketball there for the NAIA school.
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Raiders add strength
FAIRBORN — Vaughn Duggins never looked scrawny, but he never looked muscular, either.
Until now.
Duggins, along with just about all his Wright State teammates, have undergone a transformation over the past year that makes them look bigger and will make them stronger.
“This year, people will be pleasantly surprised,” said WSU strength and conditioning coach Jason Bradford. “We didn’t want to add weight for weight’s sake. If it doesn’t help being athletic on the court, you’ve wasted your time.”
Bradford thinks the Raiders haven’t wasted their time. He says each player has added 10-15 pounds of body weight, and it shows.
“Basketball has become more of a contact sport,” Bradford said. “Football is a collision sport. We’ve tried to add 10-15 pounds to Todd Brown so he can get some easier baskets inside. We not only want to add weight, we want to prevent injuries.”
This summer, Bradford has had players who are in town run through his training sessions four times a week for about an hour and a half each session. By July 20, all team members will be in town, “and we’ll probably go five days a week,” Bradford said.
The Raiders won’t look like a football team, but they won’t look like stick men, either.
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WSU gets first commitment for 2010
FAIRBORN — After visiting Wright State for the second time on Tuesday, Kegan Clark of Jeffersonville, Ind., made a commitment to the Raiders for the 2010-11 season.
Clark, who had his official visit Tuesday with his parents, is a 6-foot-4 wing. He also participated with his high school team at a recent WSU shootout and was a member of the Indiana Junior All-Star team.
Clark averaged about 12 points and seven rebounds for Jeffersonville, which made it to the Indiana sectional championship.
He will spend much of the rest of the summer playing for an AAU team.
After this season, the Raiders lose two senior guards in Todd Brown and John David Gardner, both of whom are about Clark’s size.
Originally, Clark was going to wait until the end of July to commit, “but my family and I visited and we liked the coaching staff and the facilities,” he said. “And they’ve had three straight 20-win seasons, which shows they know how to win.”
