Hansen's Sunday Notebook: College coaches flocking to Salpointe to scout Bijan Robinson, Matteo Mele
- Updated
Star sports columnist Greg Hansen offers his opinion on recent sports news.
- Updated
Arizona quarterbacks coach Rod Smith and ASU offensive line coach Rob Sale spent Friday’s late afternoon and early evening watching Salpointe Catholic’s spring football practice.
A day earlier, Oklahoma linebackers coach Tim Kish stood in the same spot, and before him coaches from Boise State, Air Force, Colorado, Cal, Louisville, you name it.
“You almost lose track,’’ said Salpointe coach Dennis Bene. “There was great interest from everybody when we had (center) Kris O’Dowd, but this probably goes beyond that.’’
O’Dowd was a Parade All-American at Salpointe in 2006 and a four-year starter at USC. Now the college football coaches come to see 6-foot-6-inch, 285-pound senior offensive lineman Matteo Mele and whip-quick sophomore running back/receiver Bijan Robinson.
On Friday, two Sun Devils coaches offered Robinson a scholarship. He is just completing his freshman year, but they are late to the party. Utah and Arizona had already done so.
Last fall, Mele was a tight end, catching eight passes for 85 yards. But when Bene decided the grandson of former Arizona NFL first-round draft pick Bill Lueck might have a better future as a tackle or guard, the recruiting floodgates opened.
Washington State’s Mike Leach was the first to offer Mele a scholarship, on Feb. 9. In quick order, Nevada, Hawaii and Fresno State asked Mele to play for their school. Then the stakes grew: Oregon, ASU, Arizona, Colorado, Louisville, UCLA and Cal offered. When Washington coach Chris Petersen offered Mele a scholarship last week, the number moved to 17. Or is it 18?
“It’s been wild but fun,’’ Mele said after Friday’s workout.
Mele is now one of the most heavily-recruited prep linemen in Tucson history, joining Tucson High’s Marvin Lewis (USC) and the Badgers’ Bill Dawson (Michigan State) and brother Mike Dawson (Arizona) from the 1960s and 1970s, Sahuaro’s Mike Ciasca (Arizona) of the 1980s and Sabino’s Mike Saffer (UCLA) of the 1990s. O’Dowd and Mele belong on that list.
Bene, whose team reached the 4A state semifinals last year and won the 2013 state championship, is once again loaded. Last month, Robinson was MVP of all running backs at the annual Rivals Camp in Los Angeles. I watched him run passing routes and make cuts as a running back in Friday’s practice. Wow.
He’s clearly a special talent to compare to past Tucson 5-star type halfbacks such as Amphi’s Mario Bates (ASU), Sunnyside’s Fred Sims (Oklahoma) and CDO’s Ka’Deem Carey (Arizona).
“When Ka’Deem was a freshman at CDO, we started hearing about him so after practice one day I went to the CDO freshman game to watch him,’’ Bene remembers. “He made five players miss on one play when they had him surrounded.’’
Is Robinson in that class?
Bene just rolled his eyes.
- Updated
Arizona’s Pac-12 softball champions got a rare mid-May week off as they prepare for their sport’s version of Selection Sunday.
The off week resulted for two reasons: because USC, Colorado and Washington State do not have softball programs, the Pac-12 has an odd number of teams (nine) and one team has a bye each weekend.
Finding a May non-conference series is difficult because the SEC, ACC, Big Ten and Big 12 all have conference tournaments and the West’s smaller schools are booked this month.
The Pac-12 doesn’t have a post-season tournament mostly because there are so few suitable venues and a relative lack of interest outside of Tucson. It would be a money-losing operation. Only Arizona’s Hillenbrand Stadium and Oregon’s new Sanders Stadium could sell more than 2,000 tickets per day.
No interest? When Utah won two of three from No. 1 ranked Arizona a month ago – the greatest weekend in Utes softball history – attendance was 394, 378 and 836.
The week off can’t hurt Mike Candrea’s squad. Some contend that the UA’s franchise pitcher, Danielle O’Toole, tired down the stretch. True, O’Toole has pitched a Pac-12 high 195 innings pitched – no one else in the league has pitched more than 142 innings – but as of Friday there were 17 Division pitchers with 200-plus innings.
When Arizona last won the NCAA title, 2007, pitcher Taryne Mowatt pitched a school-record 370 innings. Arizona’s hope to get to the Women’s College World Series swings on O’Toole’s ability to win about four games in the next two weeks.
About the last thing a college softball team needs is to squeeze four games into a three-day period before the NCAAs, as is likely for No. 6 Oklahoma this week at the Big 12 tournament in Oklahoma City. Essentially, those games have no bearing on Sooner’s seed in the NCAA playoffs.
- Updated
Empire High School softball coach Shannon Woolridge coached the Ravens to their second state championship in three years last week. Woolridge is 136-34 in his five seasons at Empire, the top individual coaching record in Southern Arizona softball in that period.
Woolridge could win a third title next year, returning six key players, including Emma Garbutt, who is strong candidate as Tucson’s Player of the Year. She hit .432 with 8 home runs and 47 RBI. But choosing Tucson’s softball player of the year is ridiculously difficult.
Trying to determine the best between Garbutt, Amphi’s Kristiana Watson, Tucson’s Mia Trejo and Carlie Scupin , CDO’s Ellessa Bonstrom and Alexis Kaiser and others is like doing advanced physics.
- Updated
When former UA athletic director Greg Byrne arrived for his new job at Alabama, he wasn’t the only Tucsonan getting attention in the Crimson Tide athletic department. Freshman Maddie Pothoff, who had remarkable success on the USTA circuit during her school days in Tucson, became part of Alabama’s top doubles tennis team.
Pothoff and her ‘Bama partner Erin Routliffe, enter the May 24-29 NCAA Tennis championships as the No. 5 ranked doubles team. Both earned first-team All-American honors
- Updated
James Harden’s confoundingly poor performance in the Houston Rockets NBA elimination loss to San Antonio last week isn’t without precedence. I sat courtside at American Airlines Arena in Miami when Arizona State lost 78-67 in a second-round NCAA Tournament game to Syracuse in 2009.
Harden, the Pac-10 Player of the Year, didn’t appear to be engaged in the game. He did not score in the first half and finished with 2-for-10 shooting and 10 points. That’s almost exactly what he did — 2-for-11 with 11 points — last week against the Spurs.
Two hours after Harden’s ineffective performance in Miami, 12th-seeded Arizona qualified for the Sweet 16 by beating Cleveland State.
- Updated
A year ago at West Ranch High School near Los Angeles, UA first baseman Jessie Harper hit 11 home runs. At Arizona, she is hitting .354 with 19 homers and leads the Pac-12 with 130 total bases.
She, not basketball’s Lauri Markkanen, is the school’s top freshman athlete this year. Imagine if softball had an end-game like basketball. Harper would be a one-and-done lottery pick, on the brink of earning $3 million per year.
- Updated
Mustafa Shakur, who was Arizona’s starting point guard from 2004-07, returned to McKale Center last week to receive his diploma. He worked online for two years to earn a degree. His post-Arizona career could be a movie, or if not a movie, an education for those wanna-be draftees.
After not being selected in the 2007 draft, Shakur played for four D-League teams and for EuroLeague teams in Lithuania, Germany, France, Italy, Greece, Lebanon and Turkey. He completed his 10th pro season by averaging 5 points for Germany’s Wuerzburg franchise.
Now 32, Shakur got to the so-called “Show’’ for 22 games with the Washington Wizards in 2011 and for three games at Oklahoma City in 2014.
He was a McDonald’s All-American from Philadelphia in the UA’s recruiting class of 2003 that also included Kirk Walters and Ivan Radenovic.
- Updated
Former Salpointe Catholic basketball coach Brian Holstrom and Catalina Foothills coach Doug D’Amore last week were selected co-winners of the 2017 Dick McConnell Award, emblematic of Tucson’s top prep basketball coach.
More than 50 current and former Tucson basketball coaches attended the banquet. Holstrom’s Lancers defeated D’Amore’s Falcons to get to the 4A state championship game in February.
- Updated
Tucson firefighter and paramedic Grant Cesarek has emerged as Tucson’s leading amateur golfer. The former baseball player from Sabino High School won his third Tucson City Amateur title last week, but this time the script was compelling. He and his brother, Greg Cesarek, finished tied after four rounds, each shooting even-par 285.
Greg had a chance to win at the 18th hole in regulation, at Randolph North, but three-putted. Grant won with a birdie on the first playoff hole. “I would have been happy for Greg if he won,’’ said Grant, “but I just made a putt.’’ Jeff Kern continues to hold the record with nine Tucson City Amateur championships.
- Updated
Salpointe Catholic and UA grad Jonathan Khan, who has been on golf’s mini-tours since leaving Arizona in 2010, won the U.S. Open local qualifying tournament last week at Sewailo Golf Club. Khan shot 7-under 64 against a strong field. Salpointe Catholic senior Trevor Werbylo, who will join Arizona’s golf team in August was second overall at 65.
Talk about a tough field: five-time PGA Tour winner Billy Mayfair, who is 50, shot a 67 to finish fourth and advance to U.S. Open Sectional qualifying in three weeks. Khan qualified for the Canadian Tour for the second straight year.
- Updated
At the NBA Combine last week, Rawle Alkins drew attention to himself, and deservedly so. But sometimes you wonder how many outside influences get to him or any prospect.
On Friday, Alkins retweeted this message: “Talk around Tucson & within pro front office inner circles is that (Alkins) is NBA ready defensively. Ferocious on ball D skill set.’’ It turns out that the person who sent that tweet is a stock trader in Franklin, Michigan, with no ties to the NBA or college basketball.
- Updated
How times change: Since he torched Arizona in the Sweet 16, scoring 27 points, Xavier’s Trevon Blueitt was arrested for possession of marijuana in a traffic stop in Indiana, and was not invited to NBA Draft Combine. Blueitt plans to return to Xavier for a fourth season
- Updated
Former Boise State defensive lineman Dereck Boles last week accepted a football scholarship to Arizona.
Boles, who played last season at Coffeyville (Kansas) Junior College, was dismissed from the Boise State team in February 2016 after biting off part of the ear of BSU teammate Chancellor James in a late-night fight.
Boles was acquitted of felony mayhem charges last month. James had two ear surgeries since Boles bit off what court witnesses testified was “a third to a fourth’’ of James’ ear.
You wonder if Boles’ arrival on the football team will give new UA president Robert C. Robbins reason to more closely scrutinize the background of those in the athletic department.
In the last two years, UA basketball player Elliott Pitts was dismissed from the team after findings of sexual misconduct; former UA track coach Craig Carter was arrested for domestic violence and aggravated assault and related charges against a UA athlete; former UA running back Orlando Bradford was arrested for 10 felonies and five misdemeanor charges in multiple domestic violence issues; and UA basketball player Allonzo Trier was suspended 19 games for ingesting a banned substance.
The trials of Carter and Bradford both are scheduled to begin in Tucson on August 1. That’s not going to look good.
This is a dark period for Arizona’s athletic department. Among his first acts as school president, Robbins should be pro-active in demanding changes and implementing a zero-tolerance policy for UA athletes and coaches.
Arizona quarterbacks coach Rod Smith and ASU offensive line coach Rob Sale spent Friday’s late afternoon and early evening watching Salpointe Catholic’s spring football practice.
A day earlier, Oklahoma linebackers coach Tim Kish stood in the same spot, and before him coaches from Boise State, Air Force, Colorado, Cal, Louisville, you name it.
“You almost lose track,’’ said Salpointe coach Dennis Bene. “There was great interest from everybody when we had (center) Kris O’Dowd, but this probably goes beyond that.’’
O’Dowd was a Parade All-American at Salpointe in 2006 and a four-year starter at USC. Now the college football coaches come to see 6-foot-6-inch, 285-pound senior offensive lineman Matteo Mele and whip-quick sophomore running back/receiver Bijan Robinson.
On Friday, two Sun Devils coaches offered Robinson a scholarship. He is just completing his freshman year, but they are late to the party. Utah and Arizona had already done so.
Last fall, Mele was a tight end, catching eight passes for 85 yards. But when Bene decided the grandson of former Arizona NFL first-round draft pick Bill Lueck might have a better future as a tackle or guard, the recruiting floodgates opened.
Washington State’s Mike Leach was the first to offer Mele a scholarship, on Feb. 9. In quick order, Nevada, Hawaii and Fresno State asked Mele to play for their school. Then the stakes grew: Oregon, ASU, Arizona, Colorado, Louisville, UCLA and Cal offered. When Washington coach Chris Petersen offered Mele a scholarship last week, the number moved to 17. Or is it 18?
“It’s been wild but fun,’’ Mele said after Friday’s workout.
Mele is now one of the most heavily-recruited prep linemen in Tucson history, joining Tucson High’s Marvin Lewis (USC) and the Badgers’ Bill Dawson (Michigan State) and brother Mike Dawson (Arizona) from the 1960s and 1970s, Sahuaro’s Mike Ciasca (Arizona) of the 1980s and Sabino’s Mike Saffer (UCLA) of the 1990s. O’Dowd and Mele belong on that list.
Bene, whose team reached the 4A state semifinals last year and won the 2013 state championship, is once again loaded. Last month, Robinson was MVP of all running backs at the annual Rivals Camp in Los Angeles. I watched him run passing routes and make cuts as a running back in Friday’s practice. Wow.
He’s clearly a special talent to compare to past Tucson 5-star type halfbacks such as Amphi’s Mario Bates (ASU), Sunnyside’s Fred Sims (Oklahoma) and CDO’s Ka’Deem Carey (Arizona).
“When Ka’Deem was a freshman at CDO, we started hearing about him so after practice one day I went to the CDO freshman game to watch him,’’ Bene remembers. “He made five players miss on one play when they had him surrounded.’’
Is Robinson in that class?
Bene just rolled his eyes.
Arizona’s Pac-12 softball champions got a rare mid-May week off as they prepare for their sport’s version of Selection Sunday.
The off week resulted for two reasons: because USC, Colorado and Washington State do not have softball programs, the Pac-12 has an odd number of teams (nine) and one team has a bye each weekend.
Finding a May non-conference series is difficult because the SEC, ACC, Big Ten and Big 12 all have conference tournaments and the West’s smaller schools are booked this month.
The Pac-12 doesn’t have a post-season tournament mostly because there are so few suitable venues and a relative lack of interest outside of Tucson. It would be a money-losing operation. Only Arizona’s Hillenbrand Stadium and Oregon’s new Sanders Stadium could sell more than 2,000 tickets per day.
No interest? When Utah won two of three from No. 1 ranked Arizona a month ago – the greatest weekend in Utes softball history – attendance was 394, 378 and 836.
The week off can’t hurt Mike Candrea’s squad. Some contend that the UA’s franchise pitcher, Danielle O’Toole, tired down the stretch. True, O’Toole has pitched a Pac-12 high 195 innings pitched – no one else in the league has pitched more than 142 innings – but as of Friday there were 17 Division pitchers with 200-plus innings.
When Arizona last won the NCAA title, 2007, pitcher Taryne Mowatt pitched a school-record 370 innings. Arizona’s hope to get to the Women’s College World Series swings on O’Toole’s ability to win about four games in the next two weeks.
About the last thing a college softball team needs is to squeeze four games into a three-day period before the NCAAs, as is likely for No. 6 Oklahoma this week at the Big 12 tournament in Oklahoma City. Essentially, those games have no bearing on Sooner’s seed in the NCAA playoffs.
Empire High School softball coach Shannon Woolridge coached the Ravens to their second state championship in three years last week. Woolridge is 136-34 in his five seasons at Empire, the top individual coaching record in Southern Arizona softball in that period.
Woolridge could win a third title next year, returning six key players, including Emma Garbutt, who is strong candidate as Tucson’s Player of the Year. She hit .432 with 8 home runs and 47 RBI. But choosing Tucson’s softball player of the year is ridiculously difficult.
Trying to determine the best between Garbutt, Amphi’s Kristiana Watson, Tucson’s Mia Trejo and Carlie Scupin , CDO’s Ellessa Bonstrom and Alexis Kaiser and others is like doing advanced physics.
When former UA athletic director Greg Byrne arrived for his new job at Alabama, he wasn’t the only Tucsonan getting attention in the Crimson Tide athletic department. Freshman Maddie Pothoff, who had remarkable success on the USTA circuit during her school days in Tucson, became part of Alabama’s top doubles tennis team.
Pothoff and her ‘Bama partner Erin Routliffe, enter the May 24-29 NCAA Tennis championships as the No. 5 ranked doubles team. Both earned first-team All-American honors
James Harden’s confoundingly poor performance in the Houston Rockets NBA elimination loss to San Antonio last week isn’t without precedence. I sat courtside at American Airlines Arena in Miami when Arizona State lost 78-67 in a second-round NCAA Tournament game to Syracuse in 2009.
Harden, the Pac-10 Player of the Year, didn’t appear to be engaged in the game. He did not score in the first half and finished with 2-for-10 shooting and 10 points. That’s almost exactly what he did — 2-for-11 with 11 points — last week against the Spurs.
Two hours after Harden’s ineffective performance in Miami, 12th-seeded Arizona qualified for the Sweet 16 by beating Cleveland State.
A year ago at West Ranch High School near Los Angeles, UA first baseman Jessie Harper hit 11 home runs. At Arizona, she is hitting .354 with 19 homers and leads the Pac-12 with 130 total bases.
She, not basketball’s Lauri Markkanen, is the school’s top freshman athlete this year. Imagine if softball had an end-game like basketball. Harper would be a one-and-done lottery pick, on the brink of earning $3 million per year.
Mustafa Shakur, who was Arizona’s starting point guard from 2004-07, returned to McKale Center last week to receive his diploma. He worked online for two years to earn a degree. His post-Arizona career could be a movie, or if not a movie, an education for those wanna-be draftees.
After not being selected in the 2007 draft, Shakur played for four D-League teams and for EuroLeague teams in Lithuania, Germany, France, Italy, Greece, Lebanon and Turkey. He completed his 10th pro season by averaging 5 points for Germany’s Wuerzburg franchise.
Now 32, Shakur got to the so-called “Show’’ for 22 games with the Washington Wizards in 2011 and for three games at Oklahoma City in 2014.
He was a McDonald’s All-American from Philadelphia in the UA’s recruiting class of 2003 that also included Kirk Walters and Ivan Radenovic.
Former Salpointe Catholic basketball coach Brian Holstrom and Catalina Foothills coach Doug D’Amore last week were selected co-winners of the 2017 Dick McConnell Award, emblematic of Tucson’s top prep basketball coach.
More than 50 current and former Tucson basketball coaches attended the banquet. Holstrom’s Lancers defeated D’Amore’s Falcons to get to the 4A state championship game in February.
Tucson firefighter and paramedic Grant Cesarek has emerged as Tucson’s leading amateur golfer. The former baseball player from Sabino High School won his third Tucson City Amateur title last week, but this time the script was compelling. He and his brother, Greg Cesarek, finished tied after four rounds, each shooting even-par 285.
Greg had a chance to win at the 18th hole in regulation, at Randolph North, but three-putted. Grant won with a birdie on the first playoff hole. “I would have been happy for Greg if he won,’’ said Grant, “but I just made a putt.’’ Jeff Kern continues to hold the record with nine Tucson City Amateur championships.
Salpointe Catholic and UA grad Jonathan Khan, who has been on golf’s mini-tours since leaving Arizona in 2010, won the U.S. Open local qualifying tournament last week at Sewailo Golf Club. Khan shot 7-under 64 against a strong field. Salpointe Catholic senior Trevor Werbylo, who will join Arizona’s golf team in August was second overall at 65.
Talk about a tough field: five-time PGA Tour winner Billy Mayfair, who is 50, shot a 67 to finish fourth and advance to U.S. Open Sectional qualifying in three weeks. Khan qualified for the Canadian Tour for the second straight year.
At the NBA Combine last week, Rawle Alkins drew attention to himself, and deservedly so. But sometimes you wonder how many outside influences get to him or any prospect.
On Friday, Alkins retweeted this message: “Talk around Tucson & within pro front office inner circles is that (Alkins) is NBA ready defensively. Ferocious on ball D skill set.’’ It turns out that the person who sent that tweet is a stock trader in Franklin, Michigan, with no ties to the NBA or college basketball.
How times change: Since he torched Arizona in the Sweet 16, scoring 27 points, Xavier’s Trevon Blueitt was arrested for possession of marijuana in a traffic stop in Indiana, and was not invited to NBA Draft Combine. Blueitt plans to return to Xavier for a fourth season
Former Boise State defensive lineman Dereck Boles last week accepted a football scholarship to Arizona.
Boles, who played last season at Coffeyville (Kansas) Junior College, was dismissed from the Boise State team in February 2016 after biting off part of the ear of BSU teammate Chancellor James in a late-night fight.
Boles was acquitted of felony mayhem charges last month. James had two ear surgeries since Boles bit off what court witnesses testified was “a third to a fourth’’ of James’ ear.
You wonder if Boles’ arrival on the football team will give new UA president Robert C. Robbins reason to more closely scrutinize the background of those in the athletic department.
In the last two years, UA basketball player Elliott Pitts was dismissed from the team after findings of sexual misconduct; former UA track coach Craig Carter was arrested for domestic violence and aggravated assault and related charges against a UA athlete; former UA running back Orlando Bradford was arrested for 10 felonies and five misdemeanor charges in multiple domestic violence issues; and UA basketball player Allonzo Trier was suspended 19 games for ingesting a banned substance.
The trials of Carter and Bradford both are scheduled to begin in Tucson on August 1. That’s not going to look good.
This is a dark period for Arizona’s athletic department. Among his first acts as school president, Robbins should be pro-active in demanding changes and implementing a zero-tolerance policy for UA athletes and coaches.
View this profile on Instagram#ThisIsTucson 🌵 (@this_is_tucson) • Instagram photos and videos
Most viewed stories
-
27 exciting events to check out this weekend, January 16-18 💎
-
New eats! 10 new restaurants that opened in Tucson this fall
-
Tucson's twin winter music festivals kick off this weekend 🎵
-
Horchata lattes and breakfast burritos: Tucson's Barista del Barrio opens 2nd location
-
Looking ahead to Tucson's new and cool for '26
-
Nearly 50 fun events happening in the month of January! ✨
-
Get ready to eat all the spicy tuna rolls you can at this viral sushi spot 🍣
-
Presta's newest location is bringing coffee culture to the foothills ☕
-
Pilates is so hot, demand for space and classes is booming
-
Create the icy dessert of your dreams at this new frozen yogurt spot 🍨