Leading off today: Assistant
Eric Loudis was promoted to boys varsity basketball coach at Schenectady this week by the school board,
The Times Union reported.
Loudis, the son of New York State Basketball Hall of Fame coach Joe Loudis, had worked for three years under Mark Sausville, who stepped down last month in order to more closely follow his son's playing career at Scotia.
Loudis, 28, a math teacher at Schenectady since 2005, inherits a team that went 11-9 last winter.
"I have a good rapport with the kids, so I'm not going to get blindsided," Loudis told the paper.
Tulane lands Central N.Y. star: Syracuse CBA rising senior Greg Thomson has given a verbal commitment to continue his football career at Tulane next year.
Thomson, a 6-foot-3, 230-pound standout in football and basketball, is at least the 14th New York player to commit to a Football Bowl Subdivision team this summer. [Full list]. The Green Wave staff reportedly anticipates using him as a combination tight end and H-back.
Kicking off: Fall practice officially commences for most high school sports and school districts on Monday. I'm still cleaning up various files on RoadToSyracuse.com for the start of football season, and I've also begun adding material. A limited list of scrimmages was started this morning.
For the time being it's limited to about three dozen upstate scrimmages set for Aug. 28. Feel free to use the e-mail link below to send me additional scrimmages that you know about.
Helping out: You've got to like John Behner's approach to the most serious of subjects.
The recent Minisink Valley graduate had his baseball season with the Warriors cut short by surgery in mid-May after being diagnosed with testicular cancer. Last week, the community came together and raised $14,000 for him in a benefit walk, The Times Herald-Record reported.
"Being at Minisink, we are all Warriors," Behler told the crowd. "But cancer picked the wrong Warrior from the
