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    Yeshiva's Ryan Turell Leads College Basketball in Scoring

    Ryan Turell leads all N.C.A.A. basketball players in scoring and hopes to play in the N.B.A. But first, he plans to prove that Yeshiva, a small Jewish university, is as good as its record.They lined up for blocks along Amsterdam Avenue in December, standing in the cold for two hours, hoping to squeeze into the modest Max Stern Athletic Center for a glimpse at the hottest college basketball team in New York City.Inside, the Yeshiva men’s basketball team, led by Ryan Turell, the top scorer in the country with his bouncing blond curls and smooth, feathery touch, was preparing to tip off.About 500 people were turned away that night, unable to fit inside the 1,000-seat gym that has rocked and rolled over a three-year span in which the Maccabees compiled a 54-2 record, including 18-1 this year (11-0 in conference play). Turnout was similar for their next home game, against the Merchant Marine Academy on Feb. 1, when Turell dropped 31 points to become Yeshiva’s career leading scorer — with Leon Rose, the president of the Knicks, in the seats watching.Others could not get in, and some of them peered from a window as fans inside, many of them wearing yarmulkes, the traditional Jewish head covering, stood and chanted “M.V.P.” for their hero.“I came to Yeshiva from London and didn’t know anything about basketball,” said Michael Smolowitz, a second-year student and fan. “Once I got here, I was bombarded with it. It’s quite a big deal.”Turell can barely make it across campus without several admirers greeting him and wishing him luck.Ariele Goldman Hecht for The New York TimesCollege basketball has been in a decades-long slump in the New York area, a place that used to cherish the spectacle and passion of the college game. But at Yeshiva, a Jewish university tucked into Washington Heights — not much more than a long 3-pointer from the snarled traffic of the Cross Bronx Expressway — the game is thriving.The Maccabees are ranked sixth in the country, led by a Division III superstar who turned down offers from Division I schools so that he could be a “Jewish hero” at little Yeshiva, where the head coach works full time as a lawyer, the weight room is smaller than at many high schools and the training table pales compared to what student-athletes are served at Duke and Michigan.But at Yeshiva, with a student body of about 4,000, Turell has fulfilled his quest to be a hero. He is known there and around the world. He can barely make it across campus without several admirers greeting him and wishing him luck. Elliot Steinmetz, the head coach and a former Yeshiva player, says he receives emails from across the globe expressing support and admiration for the team, which has become a kind of torch bearer for Jewish athletic pride.“I got an email this morning from someone in Australia, who wanted to know where he could buy a Y.U. jersey,” Steinmetz said. “He wanted to wear it around the streets of Sydney. I get contacted by Jewish people in Alaska, England, South America. Pretty much everywhere.”Yeshiva owes a good deal of its success to Turell, the team’s transcendent star. On a recent morning, a group of students spotted him as he strolled to campus from his nearby apartment along Amsterdam Avenue. As word spread, they poured out of a local pizza joint, pointing their phone cameras toward him, shaking his hand and asking questions about his game that night.In Yeshiva’s 89-49 win over Mount Saint Mary College last month, Turell had 28 points, 7 rebounds, 3 assists and 3 steals.Ariele Goldman Hecht for The New York TimesA lithe, 6-foot-6 senior with lofty professional and spiritual aspirations, Turell is averaging 28.1 points per game, the most by any player in all three divisions of the National Collegiate Athletic Association, male or female. Turrell says he’s fine to lead the country in scoring, as long as it helps the team. But if the Maccabees don’t win a championship, it would be “pointless,” he said.Turell has scored at least 30 points six times this season and has surpassed 40 twice, including a school-record 51-point performance against Manhattanville in November.“I don’t care who it’s against, if you drop 50 on someone, that says something,” said Michael Sweetney, a Yeshiva assistant coach and former forward for the Knicks and Bulls in the N.B.A. “But the best part was, we really needed it that night.”As the season hurtles toward tournament play, Turell, who turned 22 on Feb. 3, is the leading candidate for Division III player of the year. It’s a nice feeling, sure, but Turell shrugs. All that matters to the player some have dubbed the Jewish Larry Bird is a chance at postseason play.“We didn’t get the chance before,” Turell said. “For a lot of people, it was a story without an ending.”The Division III tournaments the last two years were canceled because of the coronavirus pandemic. The 2020 tournament was especially heartbreaking for the Macs because it ended after they had reached the round of 16 and a highly anticipated matchup against No. 3 Randolph-Macon. Yeshiva had won 29 games in a row and yearned to prove itself against one of the elite programs in its division.The Maccabees are ranked sixth in the nation among Division III schools, though some have questioned their soft schedule. Ariele Goldman Hecht for The New York TimesThe next year it happened again, and all the Maccabees had to comfort themselves were a 7-0 record and a newly coined saying: “We picked a bad time to be good,” as Gabriel Leifer, the sturdy co-captain and the rock of the team, put it. This year’s tournament appears on track, but the recent coronavirus surge has left a tinge of uncertainty.“At first you’re so disappointed,” Leifer said, “but then you see the hospitalization rates and realize, it’s a good thing we didn’t put 1,000 people in a gym. But now, hopefully, it’s finally time for us and Ryan to show what we have.”Turell grew up in Sherman Oaks, Calif., outside Los Angeles, the son of Brad Turell, a former guard at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Ryan played basketball at both Valley Torah, a Jewish school, and for Earl Watson Elite, a top A.A.U. team. He had offers to play in Division I and was tempted, but ultimately felt it would be more authentic to embrace his faith. Plus, he knew Yeshiva because his older brother, Jack, played there, and he believed in Steinmetz and everything the coach promised.“I went to Jewish schools my whole life, I grew up religious, I keep kosher,” Turell said. “I was like, ‘What are we doing here? I want to go to Yeshiva.’ My parents were kind of shocked because my dream was to play Division I. But I told them, ‘I want to be a Jewish hero.’”Turell now plays with a yarmulke atop his floppy blond mane, but didn’t always. He didn’t wear one in A.A.U. games nor when he played in some fierce summer pickup games in L.A. alongside college — and occasional N.B.A. — players. He wasn’t comfortable with the attention, but he now regrets that choice and always wears it, highlighting his pride in his Judaism.“Just to show that Jews can hang,” he said with a smile, “that we can still play basketball.”When he was younger, Turell was reluctant to wear a yarmulke while playing. These days he would not play without it.Ariele Goldman Hecht for The New York TimesSometimes in pickup games he will hear lighthearted comments, like when he scores on an opposing player and then hears that player’s teammate comment, “He’s balling you up with a yarmulke on.”Those amuse him. But there can be an uglier side. Turell said he has heard antisemitic slurs, like “Jew boy,” on the court in high school and in college, including in a game this season. He wouldn’t identify the team or what was said, because the Maccabees chose to settle that score on the court.Turell told Steinmetz during a timeout, and the coach was prepared to march the Maccabees right off the court in protest. But Turell, insisting the slurs only fuel his desire to win, said it would be better to beat the team, which the Maccabees did. Steinmetz, who said such incidents are rare, was proud of how the entire team responded. The school is proud, too.“They aren’t just playing for a university,” Yeshiva President Ari Berman said on the court after a recent win. “They are playing for a people.”But as Yeshiva continues to win, some experts wonder if its record is inflated by playing in the Skyline conference, which is not the most competitive in Division III. When the Maccabees faced highly ranked Illinois Wesleyan in December, the game was seen as a litmus test of where Yeshiva stood. An unprecedented hype buzzed across Division III basketball. Fans lined up for hours to get in.Turell, who turned 22 on Thursday, is a leading candidate to be named Division III’s player of the year. He has his sights set on the N.B.A.Ariele Goldman Hecht for The New York TimesIllinois Wesleyan won, 73-59, snapping Yeshiva’s 50-game winning streak. But Ron Rose, the Titans coach, left Washington Heights impressed.“Turell is at the top of everyone’s scouting report, and he still gets his points,” Rose said. “Yeshiva is legit. I saw all the rhetoric about their strength of schedule. I don’t buy it. There is no question they can compete at the highest level.”For Turell, the highest level could also mean a professional career. He hopes to play in the N.B.A. and eventually in Israel. N.B.A. teams have sent scouts to Yeshiva’s games, and Turell assiduously practices from the N.B.A. 3-point line to increase his chances — he shoots until he makes at least 300 shots per day.It was on just such a long-range shot on Tuesday that Turell broke Yeshiva’s career record for most points scored (he now has 1,906). After the game, Steinmetz sent the young hero a message to say he was proud of him. Turell texted right back.“Everything you said we would do has come true,” Turell wrote. “Now, let’s go win a national championship.” More

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    Bill Fitch, Who Coached Celtics to the ’81 Title, Is Dead at 89

    Hailed for reviving sagging teams, he was voted one of the top 10 coaches in the N.B.A.’s first half century and was twice named coach of the year.Bill Fitch, who gained a reputation for reviving the fortunes of dismal N.B.A. teams and took the Boston Celtics to the 1981 league championship in a pro coaching career spanning 25 seasons, died on Wednesday in Lake Conroe, Texas, north of Houston. He was 89.His death was announced by Rick Carlisle, the coach of the Indiana Pacers and president of the N.B.A. Coaches Association, who said he had been contacted by Fitch’s daughter Marcy Ann Coville. No other details were provided.A strong-willed figure who preached unselfish play, Fitch ran demanding workouts and did not spare the feelings of even his best players.“I believe in discipline and I think it’s the cornerstone of world championship teams,” Fitch once said.He was an innovator in taping games and practices to analyze his players and their opponents, shrugging off a nickname circulating around the league in its pre-high-tech years: Captain Video.Fitch was a two-time N.B.A. coach of the year and chosen as one of the top 10 coaches in league history in 1996-97 balloting that marked the N.B.A.’s 50th anniversary.He received in 2013 the National Basketball Coaches Association’s Chuck Daly Lifetime Achievement Award, named for the coach who won two league championships with the Detroit Pistons.When Kevin McHale coached the Houston Rockets in 2012, he recalled the lessons he had absorbed as a Celtic rookie during Fitch’s sometimes intimidating reign.“Coming out of college, I had never been around a coach that talked the way Bill did to you,’’ McHale told The Houston Chronicle, “but he really pushed you hard, and I thought Bill did a great job.”Fitch on the Celtics bench during a game in Philadelphia in December 1982. From left were the forward Larry Bird and the center Rick Robey. Fitch resigned after four seasons with Boston. Peter Morgan/Associated PressLarry Bird, who joined with McHale and Robert Parish on Fitch’s championship Celtic team, told Sports Illustrated in 1997 that Fitch “was the best in terms of motivation, getting you to really lay it on the line for each other.”Bird thought, however, that Fitch, who resigned as the Celtic coach after four seasons, moved on to other teams so often because “he really got under the skin of some guys after a while.”Fitch made his N.B.A. coaching debut in Cleveland, watching his 1970 expansion-team Cavaliers lose their first 15 games.But in his sixth season, the Cavaliers won the Central Division title, going 49-33, and made it to the second round of the playoffs, bringing Fitch his first Coach of the Year Award.Fitch was hired as the Celtics’ coach in 1979 after they had missed the playoffs for two consecutive seasons. He received his second Coach of the Year Award in 1980, when the Celtics, in Bird’s rookie season, went 61-21 and reached the playoffs’ second round.Fitch’s Celtics won the N.B.A. title the following season, defeating the Houston Rockets in a six-game playoff final, the deciding victory coming in Houston. It was Boston’s 14th National Basketball Association championship and their first since 1976.Taking the Rockets’ coaching post in 1983 after they had fallen on hard times, Fitch developed the Twin Towers, Hakeem Olajuwon and Ralph Sampson, as the core of a team that he coached to the 1986 N.B.A. finals, where the Rockets lost to the Celtics in six games.Fitch got the New Jersey Nets’ coaching post in August 1989, succeeding Willis Reed, who became a team vice president after a 26-56 season.The Nets won only 43 games in Fitch’s first two seasons in New Jersey, but he coached them to the 1992 playoffs, their first postseason appearance in six years, though they were eliminated in the first round.Fitch had nearly failed to survive that season. A Nets minority owner wanted to hire Jim Valvano, the former North Carolina State coach, in December 1991. Though it didn’t happen, Fitch had other problems, having clashed with several of his players.He resigned after that season, then became coach of the floundering Los Angeles Clippers in 1994. He never produced a winning team with the Clippers but got them to the playoffs in his third season with them.Fitch was born on May 19, 1932, in Davenport, Iowa, and grew up in Cedar Rapids. His father, a former Marine drill sergeant, was a disciplinarian, shaping a trait his son would bring to the basketball court.“I was 14 years old before I found out I wasn’t in the Marine Corps because I lived like a Marine,” Fitch told The Los Angeles Times in 1994. “I had nobody to share that razor strap with. I was an only child.”Fitch played basketball at Coe College in Cedar Rapids and got his first head-coaching post there in 1958. He later coached at North Dakota, where Phil Jackson was one of his players, and then at Bowling Green and Minnesota before getting the Cavaliers’ head-coaching post.He retired from pro coaching after the 1997-98 season with 944 victories and 1,106 losses. He was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass., in 2019.Fitch during his enshrinement in the Basketball Hall of Fame in September 2019. Annette Grant/NBAE via Getty ImagesIn addition to his daughter Marcy Ann, his survivors include two other daughters, Tammy Fitch and Lisa Fitch.Fitch retained his zest for basketball gamesmanship long after he retired from coaching.“I never really thought being known as Captain Video was a bad deal,” he told the N.B.A.’s website in 2013. “Other people could laugh and tease all they wanted. The truth is I was glad that nobody else was doing it because I thought it always gave our teams a big advantage.”“If you could see my closet today,” he said, “it’s crammed full from floor to ceiling with old tapes and now with DVDs, and I’m still doing film for different people. I still love the competition and the strategy.” More

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    W.N.B.A. Raises $75 Million With Hopes of Business Model Revamp

    Cathy Engelbert, the league’s commissioner, said the investment could help fund marketing, improve digital products and fan outreach to increase revenue.The W.N.B.A. has raised $75 million from more than two dozen investors in a bid to revamp its business model as players call for expansion, higher salaries and better benefits.The funding includes investments from Nike, Condoleezza Rice, Laurene Powell Jobs, Pau Gasol, N.B.A. and W.N.B.A. team owners, and other sports and business figures.“We’re going to take a huge step forward in transforming the league and getting us an economic model that is worthy of players on the court,” W.N.B.A. Commissioner Cathy Engelbert said in an interview.This was the first time that the W.N.B.A. raised money from investors. The league, which was founded by the N.B.A. in 1996, held its first season in 1997. Financial struggles have been a constant, and stark disparities in revenue, media attention and player pay distinguish the women’s league from the N.B.A. The W.N.B.A. is betting that with the right investments it can generate enough interest in its players to create a sustainable business model.“Part of it is exposure,” Engelbert said. “It’s like pushing a boulder up a hill.”The W.N.B.A. is currently owned half by the 30 N.B.A. teams, and half by the 12 W.N.B.A. teams. Ownership on both sides will be diluted as part of the deal. Engelbert declined to disclose the size of the stake the new investors are taking in the company, the valuation of the deal or the league’s annual revenue.The league has no current plans to raise further money but would consider doing so if it is “successful with deploying this capital for sustainable growth in a few years,” Engelbert said.The league is open to ideas from the players’ union about how to use the new money, she added, but it plans to prioritize marketing and improving its digital products, including its website, app and league pass, which allows fans to watch games that are out of market and not on national television.Revenue from these efforts could then be used to fund key requests from players, such as chartered flights, Engelbert said. Unlike in the N.B.A., where team members travel on private flights, W.N.B.A. players fly commercially. It’s long been a sore issue for players; on Tuesday, Elizabeth Cambage, a four-time All-Star, wrote on Twitter about having to pay “out of my own pocket” to upgrade her seats on flights to games.When asked about Cambage’s Twitter post, Engelbert said: “People get emotional. People tweet things. We all want the best travel conditions for our players. But the reason why it’s there for the men’s league is because they get these big valuations. They get media rights of their assets.”The W.N.B.A. began to raise money in January 2020, after it signed a new collective bargaining agreement with its players, though the latest fund-raising had been sidelined by the coronavirus pandemic. (The goal shifted to “let’s make sure we survive,” Engelbert said.) As the year edged closer to 2021, the league began to see “some growth” in sponsorship revenue and social media engagement — and began to try again.Investors, flush with capital, have increasingly parked their money in sports teams and leagues, which have in turn looked to outside funds to stem the losses from the pandemic. Streaming wars have created new appetite for sports rights as services look for distinguishing ways to fight for eyeballs. A wave in state legalization of sports betting has created a multibillion-dollar industry.The W.N.B.A.’s new backing could pave the way for any number of investments, spanning sports betting and online virtual experiences, Engelbert said. Top of the list of priorities: “We need more fans,” she said.Engelbert, center, said the capital investment could help the league generate enough revenue to pay for players’ requests, like chartered flights.Norm Hall/Getty ImagesEngelbert said the fan base skews young and female, but the league’s digital strategy to connect with that group has been underfunded. Last year, the W.N.B.A. struck a multiyear deal with Google, which helped sponsor the airing of 25 regular-season games on ABC and ESPN. It also signed a multiyear streaming deal with Amazon Prime and has streamed games on Twitter over the past five seasons. But the league, which holds its season over the summer, is competing with other sports that have more and more prominent TV exposure, such as the N.B.A. playoffs and Major League Baseball.Engelbert said she wanted to “market players into household names” both in the United States and abroad. That could help generate revenue to increase player salaries, which, like chartered flights, have long been a source of friction.The minimum player salary for the 2022 season is about $60,000, and the maximum is $228,094, with a team salary cap of just under $1.4 million. With just 12 roster spots on each of the league’s 12 teams, it can be difficult for even talented players to find a place in the league. But as players call for expansion, with fans eyeing Oakland, Calif., and Toronto for new teams, Engelbert has maintained that the league must increase revenue before it could expand.Other investors include Michael Dell, the founder of Dell Inc., and his wife, Susan; Joe and Clara Tsai, who own the W.N.B.A.’s Liberty and the N.B.A.’s Nets; and Swin Cash, the vice president of basketball operations for the N.B.A.’s New Orleans Pelicans. More

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    New Friends and Secret Keepers: They Make N.B.A. Families Feel Welcome

    A network of N.B.A. staffers helps players and their families find homes, hairstylists and everything else when they move to new cities.Desireé LeSassier’s phone wouldn’t stop chiming. She had landed in Minneapolis about an hour before, on the Los Angeles Lakers’ plane, and people needed things.She apologized as she returned text messages and emails. A player called to ask if she could reserve him some time on the court so he could shoot the night before the game.“This is literally …” LeSassier said, before trailing off to answer another message. “It’s definitely nonstop.”LeSassier, the Lakers’ manager of player services, helps players with anything they need, off-court and nonmedical. Except when she reserves court time for them. And when she reminds them of appointment times for coronavirus testing.She arranges tickets for players’ guests at home and on the road. She helps them get acclimated to Los Angeles. Also, she —Her phone rang again and she answered it without waiting for a greeting.“Hey, you’re confirmed,” LeSassier said. “I told them 7:30, but they’re ready for you. I’ll see what time I’m finished here.”She paused.“Why, you want me to rebound for you or something?” she laughed. “All right, I’ll think about it.”Desireé LeSassier juggles a bevy of requests from Lakers players and their families.Los Angeles LakersLeSassier and her colleagues around the N.B.A. don’t have uniform titles or backgrounds, but they have a knack for making players and their loved ones feel cared for and special. As players and their families bounce around different cities where they might not know anyone, people like LeSassier become crucial to their comfort and mental health. They help players focus on basketball without worrying too much about handling everything else. They can become part of a team’s competitive edge.“If you talk to guys on different teams, they can always tell you that person,” said Ayana Lawson, the Oklahoma City Thunder’s vice president of community and lifestyle services. “There’s a genuine sense of: ‘Man, this person looked after me. This person took care of me.’ ‘Hey, can I call them when I’m in trouble?’ And trouble can just mean: ‘Hey, I’m having a bad day. Can I talk to you?’ Or, ‘Hey, I’m having Thanksgiving by myself.’”Before teams began hiring people to do this job, there were those who filled the unspoken need.One was Kathy Jordan, who worked for the Indiana Pacers for 25 years starting in 1983. Jordan, whom Lawson called the “godmother of player development,” had married a man who eventually played in the N.B.A. She knew how hard it could be for families to adjust to life in the league. When a player and his wife moved to Indianapolis from New York, she offered help navigating the new city, even though it wasn’t part of her work as a promotions assistant. She didn’t tell her bosses what she was doing.“The front office staff, we weren’t supposed to be commingling with the team — especially females,” Jordan said.She helped players and their families find homes, schools for their children, doctors and hair stylists.“Being African American in Indianapolis, we weren’t the most diverse city at that time,” Jordan said. “There were just a few places that did African American hair.”The Pacers eventually made her work with players more official. Then, in the late 1980s, then-N.B.A. Commissioner David Stern called on her for more information about her efforts. Now most teams have someone like Jordan, and many have departments with multiple employees dedicated to helping players and their families acclimate.In Philadelphia, there is Allen Lumpkin, the 76ers’ senior director of logistics and team relations. He began working for the 76ers in 1977 as a teenage ball boy, a position now referred to as team attendant.One day while Lumpkin was working the opposing bench, a Washington Bullets player named Rick Mahorn sat down next to him and said he planned to foul Julius Erving as hard as he could. Years later, when Mahorn was traded to the 76ers, he asked Lumpkin, a familiar face, where to live.In the old days, Lumpkin would go out on the town with Mahorn, Charles Barkley and Manute Bol. “We did everything together,” he said. He is still close with current and former Sixers and their families. Markelle Fultz FaceTimed him recently. Allen Iverson calls him regularly. Mahorn and his wife are godparents to one of Lumpkin’s children.“You’re entrusting your loved ones to a team,” Lumpkin, 60, said. “They want to make sure, as any parent would, that their child is taken care of. If the players have families with kids, they want to make sure they’re taken care of.”Lumpkin began officially leading player development for the 76ers in 2000, around the time the N.B.A. began prioritizing it.Allen Lumpkin began working for the 76ers as a ball boy in 1977.Hannah Yoon for The New York TimesNow the league office has a staff of 13 people dedicated to helping players with off-court interests. Leah Wilcox, the league’s player family liaison, is well known for her work with families. That group provides resources for players’ financial literacy, education and social justice initiatives.Together with team employees, they form a network that shares information when players change teams. When Kentavious Caldwell-Pope signed with the Lakers, his wife, Mackenzie Caldwell-Pope, and LeSassier became close.“She had a friend that knew L.A. and worked for the team,” Kentavious Caldwell-Pope said. “It was helpful.”In Dallas, Kristy Laue became such a part of the fabric of the Mavericks in her development role that when she became pregnant with twins, Rick Carlisle, then the coach, announced it during practice.That season the Mavericks won the N.B.A. championship. During the playoffs, as players ran out onto the court before the game, some would stop to mime high fives toward her belly.“I feel like a lot of them are family,” Laue said.Sashia Jones, the vice president of player development and social engagement at Monumental Sports Group, which owns the Washington Wizards, just began officially working with families this year. She’s been offering that support to players for 18 years.“She’s just an amazing person, amazing human being,” said Otto Porter Jr., who spent five and a half seasons with the Wizards.Jones helped Porter organize a Thanksgiving breakfast for people without homes. When his uncle wanted to bring a high school basketball team from Australia to a game, Jones arranged their visit.Her relationship with players doesn’t mean always saying yes. It can mean telling players things they don’t want to hear — like that she can’t get involved in certain personal matters.“Sometimes you’ve just got to stay out of it,” she said.Lawson, with the Thunder, has grown more comfortable with delivering unwelcome news over the years, and players, like Serge Ibaka, respect her for it.Ibaka was 19 when he joined the Thunder and had never lived in the United States.“She was taking me like I was her little brother,” said Ibaka, who is from the Republic of Congo and a naturalized citizen of Spain. “She was making sure I was right, even learning my English. I remember we used to argue because she used to force me to do English classes early on a game day. I used to be like, ‘We have game!’ She said, ‘No, you have to do it.’”Thirteen years later, he still calls her his big sister.Players trust that she won’t tell their secrets, and Thunder General Manager Sam Presti trusts that she’s helping even when she can’t say with what exactly.“It’s hard to go to your G.M. and be like, ‘Hey, I kind of need this unlimited budget for this project that I can’t really tell you about,’” Lawson said.One of her proudest moments was when she helped Deonte Burton buy a house. A two-way player for the Thunder who didn’t have much money growing up, he was the first of his siblings to be able to own a home, she said.The coronavirus pandemic has changed the way teams approach player services. It’s meant less in-person interaction. The Toronto Raptors had the additional challenge of international travel restrictions, so they spent the 2020-21 season in Tampa, Fla.“We basically started from scratch and built a network in Tampa,” said Teresa Resch, the Raptors’ vice president of basketball operations, who oversees the Raptors’ player services staff.The Raptors had also spent the end of the 2019-20 season in Florida, when the N.B.A. finished its season at a restricted-access site at Walt Disney World near Orlando because of the pandemic.Danny Green and Blair Bashen Green invited LeSassier to their wedding in 2021.Hannah Yoon for The New York TimesFor the Lakers’ large family contingent in Florida that year, LeSassier organized an outdoor movie night, a karaoke night and a pizza party. The adults did wine tastings. They made tie-dye shirts with the children. Blair Bashen Green, then the fiancée of guard Danny Green, was part of the group.“Obviously, we were stuck there and couldn’t go anywhere,” said Bashen Green, who married Green in 2021 and invited LeSassier to the wedding. “She just made the whole bubble experience — it was almost like a vacation for us.”Poolside yoga classes gave LeSassier a mental break, too.“As you can see, my phone goes off constantly,” LeSassier said. “So that moment of yoga — I was there with the families, but it was also time for me to just have an hour to myself.”Bashen Green remembered attending her first Laker game after Green signed with the team in 2019. She felt like a student at a new school, unsure whether anyone in the room for players’ families would talk to her.“You always have a little bit of anxiety,” Bashen Green said. “Will people be nice? Do they introduce themselves? Do you introduce yourself?”LeSassier, as usual, was there to help. More

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    On a Smaller Stage, Rick Pitino Is Still ‘Demanding’ and Winning

    At Iona, Pitino doesn’t have the “bells and whistles” of Louisville, which he left amid scandal. But he has a team undefeated in conference play and looking to return to the N.C.A.A. tournament.NEW ROCHELLE, N.Y. — Sunday was not unfolding as planned for the Iona College men’s basketball team. Visiting St. Peter’s was playing rough-and-tumble ball, which had landed Iona in foul trouble and out of sorts. The frustration was evident when Nelly Junior Joseph, a sophomore center for Iona, tussled fiercely enough over a held ball with St. Peter’s Hassan Drame that both players drew technical fouls in an incident that nearly precipitated a brawl.And when Jaylen Murray banked in a long 3-pointer just before the halftime buzzer to put St. Peter’s ahead, it would have been easy for the Gaels to think — as they retreated to the locker room — that maybe it was not their day.But moments of frustration, or resignation, did not linger. Iona cranked up its defense, sped up its offense and raced off with a comfortable 85-77 victory, ensuring that the only remaining drama in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference would be whether Iona (18-3, 10-0) could become the first team to finish unbeaten in league play since La Salle did it 32 years ago.As the game ended, Iona Coach Rick Pitino was awarded the game ball for his 800th career college victory, though that total incorporates the 123 victories — including the 2012-13 season’s national championship — at Louisville that were wiped out by the N.C.A.A. after a scandal that centered on players and recruits being provided strippers and prostitutes.He was then doused with water by his players in the Iona locker room.In a serendipitous twist, Pitino’s milestone, albeit unofficial, came amid Louisville’s continuing dysfunction, which did not end with his firing in 2017. After one season with an interim coach, Louisville hired Chris Mack as Pitino’s replacement. Mack was suspended for six games at the start of the 2021-22 season when potential N.C.A.A. violations came to light from his recording of a conversation with a former assistant later accused of extorting the school. Mack left the program last week with a $4.8 million settlement.“I have no animosity toward Louisville because all the people that got Tom Jurich left,” Pitino said, referring to his former athletic director who was pushed out with him. “One guy lost his company,” Pitino added, referring to John Schnatter, the Papa John’s founder who resigned as chairman and from the University of Louisville board of trustees after using a racial slur. “The other guy … ”He quickly shifted gears, adding that he hoped Louisville would hire Kenny Payne, the former Louisville player and Kentucky assistant who is now on the Knicks’ coaching staff.“I’m just hoping,” Pitino said. “I’m not endorsing him because that would probably be the killer for him.”It was a little more than four years ago that Pitino was fired ignominiously, becoming the one head coach to lose his job in a federal corruption investigation that has otherwise cost only assistants their careers. The N.C.A.A. still has not resolved Louisville’s case from the Pitino era, but after being exiled to Greece — he coached parts of two seasons at Panathinaikos — Pitino returned just days after the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus a pandemic to accept the job at Iona.Iona’s quaint campus in New Rochelle, N.Y., with its small brick buildings 20 miles north of Pitino’s home in Manhattan, is the type of place that coaching lifers imagine themselves landing in their final days. Rick Majerus often mused about ending his career at St. Mary’s, where he could coach in near seclusion — and yet not be too far from San Francisco’s restaurants and Napa’s vineyards.Nelly Junior Joseph had 15 points and 11 rebounds against Alabama in November, helping Iona gain one of its marquee wins of the season.Jacob M. Langston/Associated Press“It doesn’t have the bells and whistles I had at Louisville and Kentucky, but none of that bothers me,” said Pitino, 69, adding that as long as a supportive administration remains in place, he will be content at Iona. He enjoys the bus rides to games — he’ll take his first flight to a conference game this weekend against Canisius and Niagara — and cherishes working with players and developing a team ethic.“It’s an easy lifestyle — to coach kids that really care,” Pitino said. “We’re not worried about ‘Let’s get a N.I.L. [name, image and likeness] for $150,000.’ Nobody worries about that; you just worry about playing ball, getting better.”That has always been a core tenet of Pitino’s teams.They have rarely been populated by rafts of future N.B.A. stars — the Utah Jazz guard Donovan Mitchell was among the few exceptions at Louisville, with a few more at Kentucky. Rather, Pitino looks for high-upside prospects who have the desire to work at their craft.This is what drew three transfers who are starters — the graduate guards Tyson Jolly (Southern Methodist) and Elijah Joiner (Tulsa) and junior forward Quinn Slazinski (Louisville) — to Iona after last season.“I’d say it’s been a process,” Jolly, who started his college career at Baylor and is now at his fourth school, said with a smile. Pitino would get on him for picking up his dribble and making a pass after beating his man off the dribble. He was worried about dribbling into trouble, but Pitino wanted him to put further stress on the defense.“I was fighting him — we were fighting him — early on when we got here because he was demanding so much and we don’t understand exactly what he wants,” said Jolly, who like his teammates cannot have his phone with him during team meals and other group activities, a rule that applied to the team’s summer trip to Greece. “But he’s coaching us to make us figure it out and then, once we get it, he’s going to be proud of us.”Pitino will be proud of Dylan Van Eyck, a 6-foot-8 graduate student from the Netherlands, when he stops cheerleading and picks up his man on defense. (There is little else to quibble about with Van Eyck, a sixth man who adds whatever the Gaels need — rebounding, scoring, passing and shot blocking.)Or Walter Clayton Jr., when he becomes a sophomore and learns the intricacies of a defensive scouting report. (Clayton, a freshman guard who was offered scholarships to play football at Florida, Nebraska and Tennessee, provides a physical presence off the bench.)Or Osborn Shema, a 7-foot junior backup center, when he puts on another 20 pounds and stops being pushed around underneath the basket. (Shema provided 5 points, five rebounds, three assists, two blocks and a steal against St. Peter’s.)Dylan Van Eyck offers rebounding, scoring, passing and shot blocking as Iona’s sixth man.Seth Harrison/The Journal News, via USA TODAY NETWORKBut nothing will please Pitino more than when Joseph, a 6-foot-9 sophomore with impossibly long arms, realizes that among the many attributes he brings to the Gaels, running point is not one of them. On Sunday, Joseph found himself seated next to Pitino after dribbling against the St. Peter’s press and losing the ball right in front of the Iona bench.It was, apparently, a repeat violation.“I said, ‘OK, I’m either going to learn to speak Nigerian or you’re going to learn better English,’” Pitino said.Joseph protested that nobody was open.“OK, I’ll look at the film,” Pitino said he told him. “If it’s open, God forbid you. And he started laughing. I said, ‘No, it’s not funny.’”But Pitino was smiling.It was the gesture of a coach who expects that Joseph’s dribbling indiscretions, along with more of his team’s shortcomings, will be cleaned up in the next six weeks, by which time his teams are typically playing at their best.As it is, the Gaels have built a sturdy foundation: Knocking off Alabama in November — they nearly upset the Crimson Tide in the N.C.A.A. tournament last March — and beating Liberty, which leads its division in the ASUN Conference, and Appalachian State, which leads the Sun Belt Conference. Their three defeats have been to Kansas, Belmont and Saint Louis.But this is a group that seems to determined to do more than garner an invitation to the N.C.A.A. tournament. It is a team that — like its once peripatetic coach — insists it will be around for a while. More

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    ‘I’m Not for Everybody’: Jimmy Butler on Evolving With the Miami Heat

    As Butler leads the Heat to the No. 1 seed in the N.B.A.’s Eastern Conference, he said he increasingly sees his role as allowing others to shine.The N.B.A.’s Eastern Conference is up for grabs, and a well-caffeinated Jimmy Butler has the Miami Heat primed to secure a premier seeding down the season’s stretch run. Miami reconstructed its roster in the off-season, most notably through the addition of point guard Kyle Lowry, and has pushed through a rash of injuries, to players including Butler and Bam Adebayo, to sit atop the conference standings.Butler seems to have found a long-term home with the Heat after memorable stints and high-profile exits in Chicago, Minnesota and Philadelphia. In Miami, his characteristic blend of brashness and playfulness has been met with appreciation by a young roster sprinkled with a few battle-tested veterans.Butler leads Miami in scoring, at 22 points per game, but describes himself as a nonscorer who does a lot of everything. He will probably be selected for his sixth All-Star team, but he lists nearly every other teammate as more deserving of a slot.Butler recently spoke to The New York Times about the Heat’s season, how his game and leadership have evolved and his deep coffee appreciation.This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.Miami currently sits atop the Eastern Conference. What is it about this team that people didn’t see heading into the season?I don’t think anybody could predict the amount of injuries we’ve had or the amount of readiness/preparedness that everybody would have if those injuries were to come to light like they did, but I just feel like everybody’s comfortable. Everybody believes in their talent and what they can do while they’re out there on the floor.And then on top of everything else, everybody’s always looking to put each other in the best position, whether you’re a slasher, shooter, passer. I think we just got a nice group of guys that complement each other well.How have you seen your own leadership approach evolve this season?Just knowing how my role may change from game to game — for sure if Kyle’s not out there, because he is the primary ballhandler. But even knowing when you really got to get Duncan [Robinson] going or if Tyler [Herro]’s got it going, you continually feed him, and you just watch these young guys grow. I feel like I’ve made my name, quote unquote, in this league and now it is my job to help others become comfortable enough to make theirs.You recently secured your 10th triple-double in Miami, breaking LeBron James’s franchise record. How has your overall game evolved in Miami these last couple seasons?I think it speaks more to the individuals that I get to pass the ball to, because those are the guys that give me my assists — the guys that pitch the ball ahead for me, or give me open looks or set a great screen for me to attack downhill. That’s where a lot of my points come from, and then crashing the glass, getting on the offensive boards, my bigs boxing out. Whenever they’re down there battling, I get to come over to the top and get the rebound.So, all of these triple-doubles, they definitely come from my teammates, them allowing me to do it. But more than anything, as long as they’re geared toward winning, I can care less if I pass [James’s record] or not. There’s one thing that I haven’t passed him in yet, and that’s the amount of championships he brought to this organization.You’d rather have a game-winning assist than a game-winning shot, correct?Yeah. I’m not a scorer anymore. I’m more of a facilitating guard, and I like it that way. I love it that way, because we got a lot of guys that can put the ball in the basket, so I let them shine, and I just rack up assists.At what moment does a teammate earn that trust, that in your head you know that you can give him the ball when it matters most?I think it is built over time, but you see how many extra passes we make, not just from me to somebody else, but from somebody else to somebody else, to somebody else that they know, if you’re open, you’re going to get the ball. So it’s trust all the way around the board, all the way around the locker room, all the way around the floor — knowing if you’re open, somehow, some way, the ball will find its way to you.Butler credits his teammates for his record-setting number of triple-doubles. “It speaks more to the individuals that I get to pass the ball to, because those are the guys that give me my assists,” he said.Ezra Shaw/Getty ImagesYou, Kyle Lowry, Bam Adebayo and P.J. Tucker make a strong defensive lineup. Have you thought about what that unit could do in a playoff series?Honestly, I haven’t, just because I stay trying to be locked in on the time right now and because a lot of things have to fall into place for that to even happen. Knock on wood. Everybody has to be healthy, and I hope that that is the case, that nobody’s injured, but ain’t no telling if we make the playoffs if we look too far ahead. You need to focus in on each day at a time, each practice, and then when the games get here, each game home and away. But we never want to look too far ahead. Not in this league.Your devotion to coffee became a story line during the N.B.A. bubble in 2020. Why did you decide to recently start Bigface, your own coffee brand?Because I get to do things my way, obviously with the input and help of the individuals that are helping me run this thing, but this brand is a reflection of myself and the people I’m around. If you don’t like it, that’s fine. We’re not harming anybody.I’m not for everybody on the floor, sometimes off the floor, and maybe this isn’t for everybody either. I hope that it is.How many cups of coffee do you drink on a game day?Game day or not, it’s easily seven to 10 cups of coffee per day, just because it gives me time to sit down and think. I really do enjoy making all different types of coffee, and I get a lot done whenever I’m drinking coffee — whether I’m reading a book, whether I’m competing at a domino table or over some cards, just reminiscing about life as a whole or just talking about things that we would like to have accomplished in the future — that being with basketball, that being with Bigface Coffee or that being with any other thing that comes to my mind.How do you sleep at night?I sleep just fine. I get my nine hours per night. I’ve trained my body to be able to do that. If I don’t sleep nine hours, I’m definitely not worth a damn, so with all that coffee being said, I think I’m pretty used to lots of coffee and lots of sleep at the same time. More

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    Nets Turn to Rookies as Starters, and Not Just When They Have to

    The Nets, in a move unusual for a championship contender, have turned to their rookies as starters and key contributors — and not just when there were no other options.When a veteran on the Nets asks Day’Ron Sharpe to do something, most of the time he has to say yes. That might mean making a plate of food for James Harden after a game or getting doughnuts beforehand. Other times, he has to turn the showers on in the locker room or carry the veterans’ bags.“The rookie dudes, we’re getting nothing compared to what they had to do,” Sharpe, 20, said.He added, “Just because you’re starting doesn’t mean they stop.”When Sharpe came to training camp, he expected to sit on the sidelines for much of the season. He was a late first-round pick coming to a team that was, at least on paper, one of the best in N.B.A. history. It was filled with veterans and top stars and favored to win the championship. Instead, Sharpe, a bulky center most comfortable absorbing hits in the paint, is a crucial player for the Nets more than halfway through the season. He was moved into the starting lineup a few weeks ago and is averaging 9.3 points and 6.8 rebounds on 58.8 percent shooting in January.“It’s crazy for me to be able to contribute,” Sharpe said.It’s not just Sharpe. Cam Thomas (another late first-round draft pick), Kessler Edwards (second-rounder) and David Duke Jr. (undrafted) have also received significant playing time. All four have spent part of the year with the Nets’ G League affiliate, the Long Island Nets. It is unusual for a championship contender to give such prominent roles in the rotation to this many first-year players, especially ones who weren’t highly touted. The Nets are one of two teams to have four rookies who average at least 10 minutes per game and have appeared in more than 10 games. The other is the Oklahoma City Thunder — a rebuilding franchise ranked near the bottom of the league.Rookies have performed remarkably en route to a championship, such as Magic Johnson, who led the Los Angeles Lakers to a title in 1980, and Bill Russell, who did the same for the Boston Celtics in 1957. But Johnson, who was drafted first overall, and Russell (No. 2) were top-tier draft picks who immediately became the faces of their teams.Guard Cam Thomas was a late first-round draft pick.Dennis Schneidler/USA Today Sports, via ReutersThe Nets have successfully relied on rookies before. During the 2001-2 season, they leaned on four: Richard Jefferson, Jason Collins, Brandon Armstrong and Brian Scalabrine. Jefferson and Collins each started nine times and took the floor almost every game, while Armstrong (35 games) and Scalabrine (28) were important contributors as well. The team made the finals.This year’s Nets are hoping to repeat, and surpass, that success using players who typically would be called upon this much only in a “break glass in case of emergency” situation.The glass broke. Between Covid-related absences, including Kyrie Irving’s, and injuries to key players like Kevin Durant, the Nets have needed bodies — at times, almost anybody — to take the floor. Irving has not been eligible to play in home games because he refuses to get vaccinated against the coronavirus, and for much of the season the team barred him from road games as well.But Coach Steve Nash has turned to the rookies even when it wasn’t an emergency. He has experimented with lineups at close to full strength. Duke, 22, has started seven games, some of them alongside Harden and Durant. On Jan. 12 against the Chicago Bulls, the Nets started Edwards, Sharpe, Harden, Durant and Irving.Before a recent road game against the Washington Wizards, Nash said that the lineup tinkering was a result of wanting to “look at all the new guys.” The Nets rarely practice, which is common for veteran teams. As of Thursday, the Nets had used 24 starting lineups, tied with the Philadelphia 76ers for most in the N.B.A. But Nash also said that the shuffling had been a matter of “necessity.”“How many guys are available? When we land on a stretch where there are many guys available, what stretch did we just come out of?” Nash said. “Who is playing well? Who fits? So a lot of it is to try and make common sense. And if it doesn’t seem like there’s common sense from the outside, there’s probably something from the inside that leads us to make these decisions that is a private matter.”Nets forward Kessler Edwards guarded Evan Mobley of the Cavaliers in a recent game.Ken Blaze/USA Today Sports, via ReutersThe Nets rookies have received playing time at the expense of veterans. Blake Griffin, a six-time All-Star who seemed to be slated for a core rotation spot, was removed from the lineup early on, resurfacing there only when the Nets were otherwise depleted. He’s playing a career-low 18.1 minutes a game and has performed poorly overall, shooting only 38 percent from the field. Paul Millsap, a four-time All-Star, was signed in free agency to be a backup, an addition thought to be a coup at the time. But the 36-year-old couldn’t find his footing, and Nash told reporters this month that the team was looking to find a new home for him.“You add it all up, and there’s just not enough space for everybody,” Nash said.Thomas, a 20-year-old who spent one year at Louisiana State University, has been the most impactful rookie of the four, receiving consistent minutes off the bench as a skilled scorer. He hit a game-winning floater against the San Antonio Spurs earlier this month. Thomas said in an interview that the best advice he’d received had come from Rajon Rondo, the Cleveland Cavaliers point guard who won a championship as a starter for the Celtics in only his second year.“He said, ‘However you came up, through high school, college and all that, keep doing that, because that’s how you got here,’” Thomas said.For a team like the Nets, finding steals at the end of drafts (or in the case of Duke, past the draft) is a must, said General Manager Sean Marks. The Nets have minimal cap space, since much of it is tied up in Harden, Irving and Durant. Getting free agents to take pay cuts and finding overlooked talents result in less expensive contracts. And there’s an added benefit to feeding rookies playing time: Showcasing them can increase their trade value and give the Nets another route to add better players.“We’ve had to adjust how we build a team starting six years ago from now, right?” Marks said, adding, “It’s fun when you’re in a war room, when you’re on a draft day and the room erupts because of who you drafted in the 30s and 40s and 50s.”But there are drawbacks, too, when you have constantly shifting lineups.“It does make it a little bit more challenging, I think, but that’s the way that it’s been with everything that we’ve been through,” Patty Mills, a 33-year-old guard for the Nets, told reporters. “But to be a professional, especially in this league, you need to learn how to adjust on the fly.”And as might be typical for young players thrust into unexpected roles, the four rookies have been inconsistent. Duke is back out of the rotation. The Nets are 6-9 in January and just the fourth seed of the Eastern Conference, well below preseason expectations. Much of the offensive load has fallen on Harden, given a knee injury to Durant that will keep him out for several weeks and Irving’s scattered unavailability. Sharpe and Edwards, now starting, aren’t playmakers — although Edwards is a reliable shooter (39 percent from 3). This puts more of an onus on Harden to do more to keep the Nets afloat.Guard David Duke Jr. has seen significant playing time, despite being undrafted.Adam Hunger/Associated PressThat’s likely unsustainable. Nash will probably have to keep changing rotations, giving larger roles to Mills, Griffin and the veteran center LaMarcus Aldridge as the playoffs approach. But with Nash’s Nets, nothing ever goes according to plan, and these rookies have shown that they’re not simply understudies on a Broadway production.Asked what he would have said in the fall if he were told he’d be starting at midseason, Sharpe said: “Man, I don’t even know. Because at training camp, that was my first time being with the guys and all that. I’m seeing how they’re hooping and stuff, thinking ‘I’m probably not even touching the court this year.’” More

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    Kansas State’s Ayoka Lee Sets Division I Women’s Single-Game Scoring Record

    Her 61 points propelled the Wildcats to a 94-65 thrashing of No. 14 Oklahoma on Sunday.Kansas State center Ayoka Lee broke a 35-year-old record on Sunday, scoring 61 points, the most in a Division I women’s college basketball game, while leading her team to a 94-65 victory over No. 14 Oklahoma in Manhattan, Kan. She was 5 points short of scoring more than the opposing team.“It’s crazy,” Lee, a 6-foot-6 redshirt junior, told ESPN after the game. “I thought it was just going to be another Sunday.”The N.C.A.A. Division I single-game scoring record had been 60 points, set by Cindy Brown at Long Beach State in 1987 and tied in 2016 by the University of Minnesota’s Rachel Banham, who now plays in the W.N.B.A. for the Minnesota Lynx.Lee broke the record by going 23 of 30 from the field (76.7 percent), and without attempting a single 3-point basket. She was also 15 of 17 from the free-throw line and notched 12 rebounds and three blocks.“I don’t think anyone thinks, ‘Oh yeah, we’re just going to set a record today,’” Lee told reporters after the game. “You knew it wasn’t going to be easy. But we just executed so well.”Oklahoma has the second-highest scoring offense in Division I women’s basketball and is averaging 87.1 points per game, according to Her Hoop Stats.“We wanted to keep our foot on the gas,” Kansas State Coach Jeff Mittie said after the game.Mittie said the only time he considered taking Lee out of the game was when there were just two and a half minutes left.“We wanted to keep feeding her,” he said. “I was not aware of the record. I did not look at the scoreboard all day to see how many points she had.”Considering how productive Lee has been — she is averaging 25.5 points a game this season — her coach’s nonchalance made sense. She is averaging a double-double with points and rebounds (10.9 a game), as well as 3.5 blocks per game.“You play with her for so long that you’re like, ‘That’s just what she does,’” Jaelyn Glenn, a freshman guard for Kansas State, said after the game. “Getting the ball inside is always a goal for us, because Yokie is just supertalented.”Lee, who goes by Yokie, is originally from Byron, Minn., a small town in the southeastern part of the state. Her dominance at Kansas State has slowly begun to attract national interest; she was recently named to the John R. Wooden Award top 25 watch list for the second consecutive year.Her national profile has been hindered by the fact that despite being a redshirt junior, she has never played in the N.C.A.A. tournament. The last time the Wildcats qualified was in Lee’s freshman year, which she missed entirely after tearing an anterior cruciate ligament.This season, that is likely to change. Kansas State’s record is 15-4, and it is one game out of the top spot in the Big 12. Lee’s contributions on the offensive and defensive ends of the floor are largely responsible for that shift — one that is especially monumental for a team that last appeared in the national tournament’s round of 16 20 years ago.“There’s so much more to her than the 61 points and the 12 rebounds,” Mittie said. “But I sure like that part.” More