Author: Jimmy Sullivan

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in January 2020.

Fordham senior pitcher Madie Aughinbaugh is expected to have a big year for the Fordham softball team. Those expectations were ratcheted up ever so slightly this week.

Aughinbaugh has been named to Softball America’s list of the top 100 players in America, in the 99th position. This honor comes off the heels of another NCAA Tournament appearance for Fordham Softball and another stellar campaign by Aughinbaugh.

In 2019, the Rams’ ace pitched to a 2.44 ERA and 17 wins in a staggering 33 starts. The then-junior stalwart really picked it up, though, as the season wound to a climactic close, starting each of Fordham’s final six games — four in the Atlantic 10 Tournament and two in the NCAA Tournament. She gave up just 10 runs in those games and went the distance in all of them.

With her large part in Fordham’s seventh straight conference title and the team’s trip to the NCAA Tournament, Aughinbaugh was unsurprisingly named the Atlantic 10’s Pitcher of the Year. Fordham needed everything Aughinbaugh had at the end of last season, and Aughinbaugh was up to a task that few other pitchers in America would have been able to achieve. 

The senior was the best player on the field for Fordham last season, and it was not just for her exploits in the circle. For as good as Aughinbaugh was there, she also provided great value from the plate, where she hit a team-high .354 and tied for the team lead in hits with 63. As easy as that is to forget in her pitching exploits, she can do it all with the bat in her hands as well.

Madie Aughinbaugh will look to build off of a historic 2019 season that saw her make her mark on Fordham’s softball program and the school’s record books. The Rams will need her to be at her best again, with the team replacing several key losses at important positions.

That being said, if last year taught us one thing, it is that as long as Madie Aughinbaugh is playing for Fordham, the Rams’ potential is almost limitless.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in January 2020.

Fordham Women’s Basketball entered Sunday’s matchup with George Mason University with up-and-down performances to its name in Atlantic 10 play. Fordham started the conference schedule with a win over St. Bonaventure University but followed it up with a loss to conference-leading Davidson College. The Rams’ third A-10 game of the year turned into a slugfest between Fordham and George Washington University, with the Rams prevailing in a late victory. With these results in tow, Fordham entered Sunday’s matchup against George Mason with something to prove.

In that game, Fordham proved that it is still capable of playing as well as anyone else in the A-10.

Fordham toppled George Mason 66-54 in a dominant road performance to move to 3-1 in A-10 play. Fordham’s offense was led by junior Bre Cavanaugh, who scored 29 points on 9-20 shooting. The other major key for Fordham was shutting down George Mason junior and defending A-10 Player of the Year Nicole Cardaño-Hillary, who shot just 4-15 (26.7%) from the field and scored 15 points.

“I thought we played some really good defense in stretches,” Fordham head coach Stephanie Gaitley said. “So, it’s a great road win.”

Cavanaugh was by far the best player on the floor on Sunday and emerged as the clear winner of the battle between her and Cardaño-Hillary as — arguably — the two best players in the Atlantic 10. With Sunday’s results, Cavanaugh is now the A-10’s leading scorer, with Cardaño-Hillary close behind.

“She’s been a great leader,” Gaitley said of Cavanaugh. “They (CBS Sports Network) asked me on TV today about Bre and her shooting, and I’m like, ‘I can’t get mad at her because she puts the time in…she’s earned the right to take those shots.’”

“Those shots” are the type that Cavanaugh and only a select few other players can make — floaters through contact near the basket, jump shots off the dribble, three-pointers around screens. Cavanaugh’s unique ability to get to the basket, get hot from the field and lead the Fordham offense were all on display on Sunday.

However, she was not the only player making serious contributions to Fordham. Sophomore Kaitlyn Downey had 15 points and seven rebounds to go along with excellent interior defense. Redshirt sophomore Vilisi Tavui played her best game of the season off the bench, scoring four points and yanking down six rebounds in just 13 minutes. Last but not least, junior Kendell Heremaia, as usual, did a little bit of everything, scoring eight points, grabbing five rebounds and dishing out seven assists.

Fordham led the game from wire-to-wire, as there were no lead changes. The Rams led 26-17 at halftime and pulled away in the third quarter, starting the second half on an 11-4 run. Fordham never allowed the Patriots to pull within single digits after the first two minutes of the second half.

With the win, Fordham has started Atlantic 10 play on a high note and the loss dropped George Mason to 1-4 in conference play. While Fordham has done its job early on in conference play, the hard part of the schedule now begins. Fordham will take on St. Louis, Dayton and VCU in its next three games in what will comprise its toughest test of the season.

Win all three and the Rams are in an excellent position to finish at or near the top of the conference. Lose all three and Fordham will fall below .500 and reach a crossroads in late January. Somewhere between those two outcomes lies the likeliest result, and the forthcoming gauntlet — against teams that are a combined 11-3 early on in the conference season — will give a good read on where Fordham stands after the first month of Atlantic 10 play.
If Fordham can play up to the level it did on Sunday, the Rams will give an extremely good accounting of themselves over the next few games.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in January 2020.

Like a five-year-old getting a little too close to the fireplace, the New York Mets have absent-mindedly stumbled into trouble once again.

Continuing the franchise’s linear tradition of incompetence, the orange and blue are in the recruiting process for their third manager in four months. First, Mickey Callaway — who claimed his closer was “electric” after he gave up a game-winning home run and once batted his lineup out of order — was let go in early October. A month-long search for a manager commenced, with the front office zeroing in on and hiring former Met Carlos Beltran, who had no coaching experience and retired from baseball in 2017. General manager Brodie Van Wagenen and others within the Mets’ braintrust cited Beltran’s baseball acumen and his presence on the championship-winning 2017 Houston Astros as an unofficial coach.

Unfortunately, he was a coach in more ways than one.

Just over a week after his hiring with the Mets, The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal and Evan Drellich first reported that the Astros electronically stole signs in 2017. Several more reports of this came out shortly thereafter and also swept up the 2018 Boston Red Sox. With these brazen rule violations in tow — the Astros dugout pathetically banged a trash can to signal offspeed pitches that year — both organizations were in deep, deep trouble. Houston was the first to act, letting go of general manager Jeff Luhnow and manager AJ Hinch, who could not save his job despite twice attempting to destroy a monitor behind the team’s dugout that was used to steal signs. It is still unclear if he tried to destroy the equipment or just lost control of the Wii remote. Either way, he is now unemployed.

The Red Sox took action the next day, mutually parting ways with manager Alex Cora, who is facing a long suspension (Hinch and Luhnow are each suspended through the 2020 season). Boston’s general manager at the time, Dave Dombrowski, is no longer with the organization, so Boston’s action was done there.

In comparison to these decisive actions, the Mets acted like a kid on a swing set with a house burning in the background.

New York ultimately arrived at its decision on Thursday, saying that it agreed to mutually part ways with Beltran and file for divorce after a marriage that lasted just four days longer than that of Kim Kardashian and Kris Humphries. The team said it would be extremely difficult for Beltran to manage the Mets under these circumstances, and although you can argue with how it arrived at this decision, the organization probably made the right call.

The problem here is not necessarily the handling of this isolated and extraordinarily absurd matter. The issue is, in and of itself, the New York Mets.

You see, some teams in sports are just snakebitten: the Mets, the Jets, the Knicks, the entire city of Cleveland. Some organizations just can’t get out of their own way. The Mets are one of them.

When Major League Baseball announced the findings of its investigation into the Astros and Red Sox on Monday, Beltran was the only player on the 2017 Astros named in the report. This was extremely questionable, as he likely was not the only player involved in the scheme. Even before November, there were rumblings around the sport of the Astros’ mischievous ways, and despite interviewing him for eight hours — which sounds like hell — in their managerial search, the Mets never asked Beltran about this potential issue. When reports made news in November and December, and in the two months between the first reports and the announcement of MLB’s findings, the Mets still never asked Beltran anything other than to cooperate with the league’s investigation (which shouldn’t have to be said out loud).

That is not the mark of an organization that has its ducks in a row. And who can blame them? The team may be in the middle of a sale to hedge fund manager Steve Cohen, and fans practically rejoiced when it was announced that Cohen was planning to buy the team from Jeff and Fred Wilpon, who were infamously caught in the middle of the biggest Ponzi scheme in U.S. history not so long ago. It was true then and is true now; the Mets just can’t stay out of their own way.

Finally, the worst part for Mets fans is that, unlike Boston and Houston, the team received no benefit from the dugout tomfoolery. The Astros and Red Sox won titles in 2017 and 2018 while the Mets — completely abiding by the rules — stumbled to 70 and 77 wins in those two seasons. If that doesn’t tell you what you need to know, then I can’t help you.

The Mets received no benefit from the biggest baseball scandal in 100 years, and yet somehow, despite every known law of the universe, they wound up right in the middle of it.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in January 2020.

Fordham Men’s Tennis is trying to live up to the lofty standard it created last season. The Rams went 17-6 in the 2018-19 season, which, despite a loss to Saint Louis in the Atlantic 10 Tournament in April, could be considered a rousing success.

This year’s Rams tried to carry the torch and continue their run of success. This past weekend, the team took a season-opening step towards doing just that.

Fordham opened its spring season with a commanding 6-1 victory over Bucknell University at their home in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. Fordham was dominant in victory, taking five of the six singles matches and winning the doubles point, as well.

Fordham set the tone for the Sunday afternoon match by pulling out a competitive doubles slate. The tandem of senior Fabian Mauritzson and junior Lutwin de Macar beat Bucknell’s Michael Owen and Guillermo Torres 6-4. The Rams, then, lost the next doubles match 6-3, leading to a winner-take-all third doubles match between Fordham junior Max Green and sophomore Jofre Segarra and Bucknell’s Marwan Abaza and Chunyu Chen. Segarra and Green earned Fordham a much-needed doubles point by taking down their opponents 6-4.

After the opening doubles victory, the Rams never looked back. Segarra, Green and sophomore Finn Kemper won the next three singles matches to seal the victory for Fordham. Bucknell earned its only point when Abaza defeated Mauritzson in the next match after the overall outcome had already been decided. Junior Alex Makatsaria and de Macar won the final two singles matches of the day to hand Fordham a 6-1 victory.

Fordham is off to a great start in the spring of 2020, and the team will look to carry this momentum forward into the rest of the season. The Rams’ next match is this Saturday in Harrison, New York, as Fordham hosts Davidson College. The match starts at 7 p.m.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in January 2020.

Entering Sunday’s matchup against George Washington at 1–1 in A-10 play, Fordham Women’s Basketball would have taken a victory by any means necessary. In Sunday’s game, the Rams had to survive for a win by almost every necessary means.

Fordham defeated GW 53–47 in the Bronx in what would best be described as a rock fight between the last two Atlantic 10 champions.

“I was proud of the kids when it came down to a defensive stop,” Fordham head coach Stephanie Gaitley said. 

The Rams were up by two with under a minute to go when the visiting Colonials got possession with 33 seconds left. With a chance to tie or take the lead, GW instead turned it over, as a brilliant disguise by the Fordham defense caused a giveaway and a foul near half court. Fordham sophomore Kaitlyn Downey fell on the ball and drew a foul on George Washington freshman Tori Hyduke. After several GW fouls, two clutch free throws each by juniors Kendell Heremaia and Bre Cavanaugh helped ice the game and give Fordham a much-needed win to move to 2–1 early in the A-10 season.

“I think it’s huge because we haven’t had close games,” Gaitley said. “I mean, we were beaten pretty handily by Davidson, in our Christmas tournament, we weren’t challenged… it came down to a stop, so you couldn’t have scripted that any better.”

The Fordham Women’s Basketball program has long been hailed for its defensive prowess, and the Rams needed to lean on that lockdown defense on Sunday. Fordham’s offense struggled to score all day, and the team finished the game shooting just 37% from the field and 8–26 from three-point range. That being said, Fordham always feels like it is in the game if it can play quality defense, and this theory was affirmed over 40 minutes on Sunday.

Individually, most of the usual suspects led the Fordham attack. Freshman Anna DeWolfe dropped 10 points on 4–10 shooting. Cavanaugh had 12 points including a quick eight out of the gates in the first quarter. Heremaia, the A-10’s leading rebounder entering Sunday’s action, affected the game in several different ways, with 12 points, five rebounds and four early steals. Last but not least, Downey played one of her best games as a Ram, scoring 12 points and playing excellent defense down low. 

Fordham got everything it could handle from a George Washington team that is much improved off of last year’s 10–20 showing. Fordham had a 10-point lead at the halftime break, but a cold shooting performance in the second half meant that the Rams needed to lean on their defense and toughness to pull through with a win. In the end, Fordham was able to do just that.

After Sunday’s win, Fordham will have some time off. The team’s next game isn’t until this Sunday at George Mason, with tip-off from Fairfax coming at 4 p.m. The home side will boast the defending Atlantic 10 Player of the Year in junior Nicole Cardaño-Hillary. The matchup should be an exciting battle between her and two of the A-10’s best players so far this season in Fordham’s Cavanaugh and Heremaia.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in January 2020.

The soon-to-be Las Vegas Raiders are bringing back a familiar face.

The team has inked defensive back Dylan Mabin to a reserve/futures contract following the season’s end. Mabin played at Fordham from 2015 to 2018 and earned back-to-back, all-Patriot League, first-team selections in his final two Fordham seasons. Mabin also played on the 2015 squad that won the Patriot League and participated in the NCAA Tournament.

Mabin went undrafted after his senior season at Fordham and signed with the Raiders shortly after the 2019 NFL Draft. Mabin competed with the team in the preseason but was beaten out by other defensive backs for a spot on the 53-man roster. Mabin will now get a second chance to crack an NFL roster, and he’ll be part of the team’s foray into Las Vegas this coming season.

The former Ram had an illustrious career in maroon and white. In addition to his aforementioned accolades, Mabin played in 42 games over the course of his four years in the Bronx and recorded 149 total tackles. He was also active in special teams, serving as a lead kick returner his final two years with the Rams. Mabin was a stabilizing presence for the team through three head coaches — Joe Moorhead, Andrew Breiner, Joe Conlin — in four years.

Now, he’ll get a second chance in the NFL and will try to become the latest Ram to join the professional ranks.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in January 2020.

Fordham Women’s Basketball entered the team’s annual Holiday Classic on a roll. The Rams entered the Holidays having won four straight games and six of their last seven, and head coach Stephanie Gaitley’s team had won the previous two Holiday Classics.

This past week, both of those streaks continued.

Fordham defeated Samford 68–37 on Sunday and Houston 63–54 on Monday to claim its third straight Holiday Classic and complete out-of-conference play at 8–5. The action started on Sunday afternoon, with a matchup against a Samford team that entered play at 4–9 having played several renowned opponents. However, the Bulldogs were no match for the Rams.

Samford junior Natalie Armstrong made a jump shot 14 seconds into the game to put Samford a 2–0 lead. It would be the only lead the Bulldogs held all game, as Fordham rode a suffocating defense and hot three-point shooting to a 15–0 run to close out the quarter. The Rams continued that momentum into the second frame, as the team’s solid three-point shooting continued and the defense continued to hold Samford in check. Fordham entered the halftime break with a 29–12 lead behind nine points each from sophomore Kaitlin Downey and junior Kendell Heremaia.

That momentum continued into the second half, as the game became more and more lopsided. In addition to Fordham’s stifling defense, the story of the day became Heremaia’s play. The junior from New Zealand continued her strong play in the first part of the season, notching a career-high eight assists to go along with 21 points and 11 rebounds for her second double-double of the season. Heremaia took a brief run at the first Fordham triple-double since Erin Rooney did so against Virginia Commonwealth University in January 2014.

“She’s a terrific kid but I also think she’s a terrific player and I’m gonna continue to try to help her be the best she can be,” Gaitley said.

Fordham would face the winner of Hofstra and Houston in the Holiday Classic final on Monday. Its opponent wound up being Houston, who beat Hofstra 54–44 behind a 26–0 performance in the second quarter.

The Rams came out firing in Monday’s contest. Fordham held a six-point lead after the first quarter and outscored the visiting Cougars 19–9 in the second to take a 36–20 lead into the halftime break. Freshman guard Anna DeWolfe led the way offensively with 11 points, and Heremaia once again inspired triple-double talk, with eight points, four rebounds and four assists in the first half.

Fordham was able to keep Houston at bay in the second half despite the Cougars’ best efforts.

The Rams scored the first four points of the fourth quarter to jump up 40–20 just 30 seconds into the second half. But Houston chipped away at the deficit from there, cutting the lead to as little as 10 near the end of the third quarter. Throughout the fourth, Fordham thwarted multiple Houston attempts to get the lead within single digits, with timely baskets coming from the likes of junior Bre Cavanaugh, DeWolfe and freshman Sarah Karpell, who is normally on the floor for her excellent defense. Karpell’s late three put Fordham up 63–47, and despite a late 7–0 Houston run to make the score more competitive than the game, Fordham prevailed by a final of 63–54. Cavanaugh led the Rams with 19 points while DeWolfe finished with 17. There would be no triple-double for Heremaia, who finished with 12 points, seven rebounds and six assists, affecting the game in many key areas.

“Defensively, I thought the first half, we were outstanding,” Gaitley told WFUV. “We really frustrated them, we took them out of everything they wanted to do. Then we had some lapses. … We got a little sloppy, but we responded well.”

The two games showed Fordham’s overall depth and displayed the team’s fundamental qualities. Fordham got excellent performances in one or both games from Cavanaugh, Heremaia and DeWolfe and also got solid minutes from other players, as well. Most importantly, Fordham played excellent defense over the two games en route to both wins.

The Rams have wrapped up out-of-conference play at 8–5, almost the same record they had at this time last year. Fordham has been outstanding since its 0–4 start to the season, and the Rams have all of the momentum entering Atlantic 10 Conference play, where Fordham is expected to be one of the favorites to prevail in the conference.

The Rams’ first A-10 game is against St. Bonaventure this Saturday at the Rose Hill Gym. Tip-off is at 2 p.m. Fordham is ready to defend its title, and the team’s finish to out-of-conference play makes that extremely clear.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in December 2019.

Fordham Squash entered a weekend home series in late-November with one goal in mind: to maintain its early-season momentum. Fordham entered at 9–3 with some impressive wins early on.

Fordham was able to keep that momentum rolling, winning two of its three matches on the Lombardi Squash Courts on Nov. 23 and 24.

The Rams started with two matches on Friday, Nov. 23 against Washington University of St. Louis and Bard College. The first match, against Washington, started bright and early at 9 a.m., but Fordham avoided the early-morning doldrums. Junior Griffin Fitzgerald kicked off the proceedings with a four-set victory over Washington’s Russell Scharf and the Rams followed his lead. Fordham’s only loss over two matches on the day was junior Tommy White’s loss to Washington’s Ryan Wiersbitzky in five sets. Besides that, Fordham made quick work of Washington, as sophomore Patrick Rodden, junior Justin Deckoff, sophomore Dylan Panichello and freshman Caleb Schumacher all cruised to straight-set victories en route to Fordham’s 8–1 victory over Washington.

The Rams clamped down even more in the second match of the day against Bard. Fitzgerald, Rodden and White all swept their opponents in three sets to open the match and, once more, set the tone. Sophomore Jack Reed beat Bard’s Martin Graham in four sets, and freshman Justin George clinched the victory with a win over Connor Browder in five sets. Fordham didn’t concede any of its individual matches against Bard en route to a 9–0 win that pushed the Rams to 11–4 on the season. Awaiting Fordham on Sunday was its toughest test of the weekend: New York University.

The match did not look to be an easy task for Fordham coming in, and it lived up to that throughout. Unfortunately for the Rams, they started the match by digging themselves into a hole that turned out to be insurmountable. After Fitzgerald’s match-opening victory over Hamaad Jafry, the combination of Rodden, White and Reed failed to win any of its individual contests and Fordham was down 3–1. George won a thrilling come-from-behind match with Kenneth Nakamura in five sets, but Fordham could never quite draw even with the Violets. The teams traded individual triumphs for the rest of the match, and NYU came away with the victory.

With the defeat, the Rams were unable to claim a weekend sweep, but the most recent outcomes have pushed Fordham to an impressive 11–5 record to start the season. Fordham and head coach Sahel Anwar will take that, and more than anything, the early-season performance has also shown that Fordham is capable of the same season-long consistency it displayed all of last season en route to a Chaffee Cup title.

The Rams are in action this Saturday with a vigorous tripleheader against Denison, Boston College and Swarthmore. Saturday’s three home matches are Fordham’s last of the calendar year, as the team will not compete again until Jan. 17, 2020.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in December 2019.

On Saturday, Nov. 23, Fordham’s Cross Country teams competed in the ECAC/IC4A Championships at Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx, N.Y., while their best runner, senior Ryan Kutch, participated in the NCAA Cross Country Championship in Terre Haute, Ind.

For his second straight individual competition, Kutch was forced to deal with inclement weather in the midwest. The area was struck with 35-degree temperatures and driving rain on the day of the event, but Kutch and his competitors pushed through those conditions throughout the day. Kutch ultimately finished 241st in the event to cap off an extraordinary four-year cross country career for the Rams. Despite the rain and generally miserable conditions, he did so in 34:48.2.

Moving over to the team, it competed in the ECAC/IC4A Championships at nearly the same time as Kutch’s race. The day began with the coaches’ races for both teams, and Fordham sent several competitors to the men’s competition. Junior William Whelan pulled out a victory in the race with a time of 26:40. Other Fordham finishers included junior Patrick Norako (ninth – 27:14), sophomore Patrick Tuohy (22nd – 27:41) and junior Dylan Serino (41st – 28:38). The Rams did not field any competitors in the women’s race.

The next event was a team competition in the women’s ECAC Championship race. In the event, Fordham finished seventh out of 18 teams in the field, just two points behind George Mason for sixth place. Fordham’s top finisher was freshman Alexandra Thomas, who crossed the finish line with a 13th-place finish of 18:38. Senior Sydney Snow was right behind Thomas with a time of 18:59. Other Fordham competitors included freshman Taylor Mascetta (57th – 19:33), sophomore Bridget Alex (58th – 19:34), senior Kataryna Krzyzanowski (63rd – 19:41), juniors Julia Herms (116th – 21:03), Maeve O’Connor (123rd – 21:14), Bridget White (125th – 21:20) and freshman Bridget Tan (144th – 23:57). Providence College won the team title and fielded each of the top three finishers.

The day’s final event was the men’s IC4A Championship, which had a total of 16 teams competing for a championship. The men’s team fared similarly to the women’s, finishing in sixth place out of 16 teams. Without Kutch, the Rams competed admirably, and senior Nicholas Raefski led the team with a 21st-place finish and a time of 25:54. Sophomore Brandon Hall finished right behind him with a 28th-place time of 26:03 and freshman John McGovern ran the course in 26:07.4, good for 32nd. Fordham’s other finishers were freshman Colin Flood (41st – 26:19), junior Christopher Strzelinski (56th – 26:38), freshmen Jack Craven (94th – 27:34) and Ryan Fahey (109th – 27:51).

Now, the Fordham program will transition into preparing for the indoor track season, which begins this Friday in the Fordham Season Opener at the Lombardi Fieldhouse. Fordham’s cross country season was noteworthy and impressive, and the Rams will look to carry that same success into the winter.