sutomcat
No recent Cali or Iggy awards; Mr Irrelevant
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Welcome to World Giraffe Day!
The world's tallest animal is celebrated today, on this longest day or night (depending on the hemisphere) of the year. World Giraffe Day also raises support, creates awareness, and sheds light on the challenges that wild giraffes face. Giraffes encounter a number of threats: habitat loss, habitat fragmentation, habitat degradation, poaching, disease, human population growth, and ramifications from war and civil unrest. They are forced to compete with humans and livestock for resources. As of 2021, there were about 117,000 giraffes in the wild in Africa. People can help save them by participating in the day. World Giraffe Day events are hosted by zoos, schools, governments, non-governmental organizations, institutions, conservation organizations, and companies.
According to the Giraffe Conservation Foundation (GCF), the architects of World Giraffe Day, there are four species of giraffes: Northern giraffe, Southern giraffe, Reticulated giraffe, and Masai giraffe. The GCF recognizes five subspecies: the Angolan giraffe and South African giraffe, which are Southern giraffes, and the Nubian giraffe, Kordofan giraffe, and West African giraffe, which are Northern giraffes. The giraffes live in different geographic areas of Africa. Along with the okapi, giraffes make up the Giraffidae family. At the time of writing, the GCF classification differs from that of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), which lists one giraffe species and nine subspecies.
SU News
Donovan Clingan Discusses Syracuse Official Visit (SI; McAllister)
Syracuse basketball hosted one of its top targets in the 2022 class in elite 7-1 center prospect Donovan Clingan. Clingan was on the Syracuse campus for an official visit to get a closer look at the program over the weekend.
"The visit was great!" Clingan said via text message. "Had a lot of fun and saw a lot of Coll things. It's a great campus and (has) great facilities. I watched a workout, talked a lot with the staff, toured campus, hung out with the team. Great group and got a feel of campus."
One of the highlights of the trip was speaking with the Syracuse coaching staff. They had extensive conversations about how Clingan would be used within the Orange's system on both ends of the floor.
"They were good," Clingan said. "Their message was that they see me fitting in well in their offense and in the zone on defense."
Clingan added that he enjoyed spending time with the players during his visit.
"Pretty much the whole team," Clingan said. "They were cool. Got along well. They just were saying how much they loved it and what Syracuse has done for them."
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Syracuse basketball ‘really, really good offensive team,’ Jim Boeheim says (itlh; Adler)
Syracuse basketball head coach Jim Boeheim has said a couple of times in recent interviews that he’s pumped about the upcoming season for his boys in Orange.
Coming off a Sweet 16 run in the 2021 NCAA Tournament, the ‘Cuse has undergone a sizable roster make-over, much like many other teams amid the NCAA’s new transfer policy and the sport’s free-agency explosion.
In looking ahead to the 2021-22 campaign, Syracuse basketball is likely to have 11 scholarship players, numerous veterans, several incoming transfers, and a five-star freshman in forward Benny Williams out of the IMG Academy in Bradenton, Fla.
Boeheim thinks that this coming year’s team can amount to a better offensive unit than a season ago, and the Orange was pretty darn good at scoring the ball during the 2020-21 term.
Syracuse basketball boss Jim Boeheim is optimistic about 2021-22.
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Axe: Is Syracuse ready to navigate the major sea change in recruiting? (PS; $; Axe)
It’s starting to feel normal again in the world of college sports recruiting.
Prospective student-athletes are exploring the Syracuse University campus in-person, following a long break due to Covid protocols.
They are getting the standard tours, visiting with coaches, posing for photos in Syracuse gear then posting about the experience on social media.
I’m on the way@CuseFootball pic.twitter.com/6A9YY6X06Y
— Davin Jackson (@DavinJackson12) June 18, 2021
Syracuse Basketball: Gavin Griffiths, poised for rankings, a scoring beast (itlh; Adler)
Syracuse basketball 2023 target Gavin Griffiths is an elite bucket-getter.
The ‘Cuse coaching staff offered Griffiths last October. He has additional offers from teams such as UMass, Siena, Bryant and Fairfield, per his Twitter page.
Several recruiting analysts have said of late that Syracuse basketball 2023 prospect Gavin Griffiths is excelling on the AAU circuit and should see his recruitment blow up in the near future.
The under-rated Griffiths, a talented 6-foot-7 wing, is a sophomore who attends the Kingswood Oxford School in West Hartford, Conn., and he runs with the Boston-based Expressions Elite Basketball in AAU events.
Jamie Shaw, a national analyst with , said in a recent piece that he anticipated Griffiths to be included in the next rankings update of that recruiting service’s top-100 prospects in the 2023 cycle. In fact, when recently updated its national rankings for this cycle, Griffiths checked in at No. 71.
From what I’ve read about Griffiths in recent months, I would expect him to get placed in the top-100 players overall within the 2023 class, if not higher.
Griffiths is one of numerous guys in this cycle who have received an offer from ‘Cuse coaches, and that list will definitely grow as college coaches are able to initiate direct communication with 2023 high-school prospects.
Recently, Griffiths said on his Twitter page that he received a scholarship offer from Big Ten Conference member Rutgers, a team that defeated the Orange in the non-conference portion of the 2020-21 campaign.
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Syracuse basketball prospects who spurned SU for Mike Krzyzewski, Duke (itlh; Adler)
With the recent development that Duke legendary head coach Mike Krzyzewski will retire after the 2021-22 campaign, we’re taking a look at former Syracuse basketball prospects who ultimately opted for the Blue Devils in recent years.
We relied on information from the 247Sports Web site for this column. According to 247Sports, the high-school prospects whom we will discuss had scholarship offers from the Orange, but they chose Duke instead.
Now, not all of these players necessarily had the ‘Cuse among their shortlists of finalists, but it’s still an interesting exercise to examine which guys decided to play for Coach K over Syracuse basketball head coach Jim Boeheim and other high-major squads.
One recent name that comes to mind first is Jordan Tucker. The 2017 four-star wing, a native of White Plains, N.Y., had narrowed down his finalists to the Orange and Georgia Tech.
But then the Blue Devils offered Tucker late in his recruiting process, and the shooting guard/small forward out of Wheeler High School in Marietta, Ga., picked Duke.
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Update: Countering the B1G in the Northeast (RX; HM)
Update: Countering the B1G in the Northeast
In June of 2013, I posted an article called "Big Ten is offensive", which outlined the aggressive moves the Big Ten had made to capture more of the Northeastern college football market. In that article, I suggested seven moves the ACC could make to counteract Big Ten aggression in the Northeast. How is the ACC doing on those seven points? Let's take a look...Rx - short term.
These are steps I felt the ACC needed to take immediately.1) Move the ACC Men's Basketball Tournament to New York City.
Update: How has that worked out so far?The old ACC teams still struggle to shake their addiction to Greensboro, but there are five hopeful signs in that list.
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Other
Gypsy moth caterpillars in Upstate NY strip trees, rain poop: ‘the stuff that nightmares are made of’ (PS; $; Coin)
A plague of gypsy moth caterpillars is munching its way across Upstate New York, turning verdant shade trees into brown skeletons, coating decks and picnic tables with feces, swarming over houses and cars, causing uncomfortable rashes and just generally freaking people out.
On her five acres in Schuyler County, Shannan Warwick said the caterpillars have stripped the oaks clean of leaves, are halfway to defoliating the apple trees, and have started in on the pines. The voracious bugs are so dense in the backyard trees that Warwick had to move the firepit and picnic tables away from the constant dropping of caterpillar excrement.
“It sounds like it’s raining in the back yard,” she said. “It’s really disgusting.”
The very hungry caterpillars are gorging themselves on leaves and needles from Western New York to the Adirondacks. In the town of Cape Vincent, in Jefferson County, Vicki Booser-Coughlin has seen the caterpillars denude her backyard oak, mountain ash and “stunning” crabapple.
“This year it started to bloom and then all of a sudden it looked terrible and now it’s naked,” she told Syracuse.com. “The robins that have nested there for years abandoned their nest this spring.”
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