Tuesday, April 16, 2019: Batavia's Leach will play for SUNY Cortland

   Leading off today: It's been a busy day or so for recent New York high school sports standouts making it into the news.

   Leach changes destination: Batavia senior running back Ray Leach, who posted three consecutive 400-yard games and was selected state co-player of the year in Class B football, has changed his college destination.

   Leach has decided to enroll at Division III SUNY Cortland, The Daily News reported. He had previously said he would attend Erie Community College next fall.

   "SUNY Cortland is a fantastic school, it will provide a great opportunity for him to further his education and he will have an opportunity to compete for a spot on that football team," Batavia coach Brennan Briggs said. "Some people will look at it as Division III and think he might be a Division I football player. What they don't understand is how good you have to be to be a Division III football athlete. If he stays on track, he could put together a great career and find himself at a pro day or be at multiple camps beyond college and have an opportunity to make money playing football."

   Leach carried Batavia to the NYSPHSAA finals in the Carrier Dome, rushing for 3,102 yards and scoring 49 touchdowns -- including a pair of eight-TD games -- in 13 games. He broke Section 5 career records with 6,023 rushing yards and 111 touchdowns.

   Policelli transferring: University of Dayton basketball player Frankie Policelli, who was an all-state performer for New Hartford and Long Island Lutheran, has decided to transfer after seeing limited time as a freshman.

   The forward averaged 0.9 points a game in an average of 4.8 minutes a contest for the Flyers. He had a season best of nine points in 9 minutes in Dayton's win at Fordham on Jan. 26.

   Dayton projects to be strong in the follow-up to a 21-12 season with three returning starters and five players coming off red-shirt seasons.

   Stewart facing lengthy rehab: Former Cicero-North Syracuse basketball great Breanna Stewart will likely undergo surgery this week in Los Angeles to repair an injured Achilles tendon injury suffered over the weekend, her father told Syracuse.com.

   The reigning WNBA most valuable player could miss between six and 12 months.

   Stewart, 24, suffered the injury to her right ankle Sunday while playing for her Russian team Dynamo Kursk in the EuroLeague Final Four championship.

   Stewart averaged 21.8 points, 8.4 rebounds and 2.5 assists for the Seattle Storm last season. Like many top female players, she competes in the offseason for European or Asian teams that can play considerably more than their U.S. counterparts.

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   Career-ending injury: Clemson offensive lineman Noah DeHond, a redshirt freshman, is giving up football after neck surgery to decompress a nerve failed to resolve his medical issues.

   DeHond sat out all of last season because of the injury.

   DeHond was honorable mention all-state for McQuaid before leaving to attend prep school in New Jersey as a senior.

   He will remain in school on a medical hardship scholarship and hopes to stay involved in the football program in some capacity.

   Record for St. Joe's senior: Kellen Pulera scored six goals and added three assists to become his school's career scoring leader in lacrosse during a 19-6 win by St. Joseph's over St. Francis.

   Pulera has 155 goals and 67 assists to surpass the 221 career points by 2012 graduate Christian Turatolo.

   St. Joe's is 7-0 this spring and plays Syracuse CBA on Tuesday in a matchup of state-ranked teams. (Full rankings here.)

   Athletes among seven arrested: Two basketball players were among seven Newburgh Free Academy students charged with felony robbery after an investigation into a fight that occurred April 3, The Times Herald-record reported.

   A city police officer assigned to the school observed between 50 and 75 students gathered and a fight began shortly afterward. Police found a 16-year-old male victim had been assaulted by members of the group and suffered minor injuries. Police said their investigation revealed the victim had been robbed of his cell phone.

   Basketball players Jaden Shelby and Percy Smith were among the five 17-year-olds arrested and charged with second-degree robbery on Thursday. Two 16-year-old students were arrested Monday and are being charged as adult offenders with second-degree robbery.

   'Power league' dissolved: Section 1 has ended its one-year experiment with a powerhouse basketball division and will return Ossining, Ursuline, Our Lady of Lourdes and Albertus Magnus to their normal conference status.

   Athletic directors from each conference determine how the leagues are set up, and voted against continuing the power league, The Journal News reported.

   Ossining coach Dan Ricci speculated the decision was related to an extra point awarded to the division members in the sectional tournament seeding process as well as additional slots on the all-league team.

   The experiment was approved last May to provide better competition for some traditional large-school powers and avoid some of the blowouts of the past against opponents from the prior geographic leagues.

   The extra seeding point was seen as a way to compensate for additional losses some or all of the power league members would take while playing a double round-robin.

   "I think we were visionaries when it came to the paradigm we followed this past year," Section 1 girls basketball co-chairman Chris Drosopoulos said. "I think we've turned a corner in Section 1 this past year in a lot of different ways and I just want to keep that momentum going."