sutomcat
No recent Cali or Iggy awards; Mr Irrelevant
- Joined
- Aug 15, 2011
- Messages
- 26,687
- Like
- 116,368
All Souls' Day commemorates the souls of deceased Christians. It developed out of All Saints' Day, and is associated with that holiday and Halloween. There are a variation of beliefs and practices observed among different churches on the day.
For Catholics, the day is for praying for the souls of those who are dead and in purgatory. In the late tenth or early eleventh century, Saint Odilo of Cluny decided that All Souls' Day would take place after All Saints' Day. All Catholic monasteries that were dependent on the Abbey of Cluny were to observe the day. Monks were to make prayers, alms, and sacrifices for those in purgatory. From here, All Souls' Day spread to other Western churches.
SU News
Q&A with Mintz, SU’s young PG: ‘I don’t think it’s anything I can’t handle’ (PS; Ditota)
In Syracuse’s large, reputable 2022 class of high school basketball gems, Judah Mintz is the Orange diamond.
The wiry 6-foot-3 combo guard will play the point for SU this season. He is expected to start alongside Joe Girard, who will move to shooting guard in 2022-23.
There’s a lot riding on Mintz. At one point, he was a Pittsburgh commit, though he later reconsidered, welcomed new suitors into his recruiting orbit and settled on Syracuse and associate head coach Adrian Autry, who has strong recruiting ties to the D.C., Maryland, Virginia corridor. (Mintz is from Fort Washington, Maryland.)
Mintz sat down with Syracuse.com’s Donna Ditota to talk about the upcoming basketball season. Here is that conversation:
When I was talking with Symir, he mentioned you like to “heat up the ball” on defense. Can you describe what he means?
Mintz: I would describe it as a ball hawk. I like to make the offensive player uncomfortable because at the point of attack that often leads to good plays happening. If you can stop the man up top, you can disrupt the play. So I would call myself a ball hawk. I think that’s what he meant by that.
You and he guard each other during practices. What have those battles been like?
Mintz: Every day, it’s fun. I tell him every day, thanks just for pushing me. He presents a challenge to me every single day and I’m pretty sure I do for him. We battle every day. It’s competitive. But it’s fun.
...
Syracuse Orange guard Symir Torrence (10) with a steal and a breakaway. The Syracuse Orange vs Southern New Hampshire (exhibition) at the JMA Wireless Dome, Nov. 1, 2022. Dennis Nett | dnett@syracuse.com
Syracuse has played a lot of man-to-man defense in its exhibition games (PS; $; Ditota)
During the summer and the preseason, Joe Girard and Jesse Edwards were asked whether they thought their Syracuse basketball team would play man-to-man defense.
The Orange, of course, has long played exclusively zone. Benny Williams likes to tell people that when he played zone in elementary school, his coaches called the defense “Syracuse.”
So yes, Syracuse and zone defense has been something of a given.
With history as their guide, Girard and Edwards were hesitant to issue any kind of bold predictions about man defense this season. The SU freshmen kept saying Orange coaches were telling them they would play man this year. Girard and Edwards, two seniors, were healthy skeptics.
But after two exhibition basketball games in the Carrier Dome, Syracuse has played a lot of man-to-man defense. On Tuesday, in its 72-58 win over Division II Southern New Hampshire, Syracuse played the majority of the game’s minutes in man-to-man.
“I don’t think any decision has been made on that. It’s a work in progress, both defenses,” SU coach Jim Boeheim said. “The thing that will happen during the year is there might be some teams that man to man might be more effective against. There’s other teams that the zone will be more effective against. We’re going to use it as we see fit.”
...
Photo courtesy the Edwards family
Edwards got hooked on basketball watching videos. Then came an email that changed everything (PS; Waters)
In the neighborhood of Amsterdam where Jesse Edwards grew up, there’s a large mural of Dutch soccer legend Johan Cruyff.
The surrounding area is littered with soccer fields, tennis courts and tracks.
A basketball court is a bit harder to find.
Jesse Edwards and his two older brothers didn’t find the game of basketball on a playground or in a gym. They found it playing video games.
“I was 13 or 14 years old when I first started looking at LeBron James videos,’’ Kai, the middle brother, said. “I found NBA2K and I liked it. I had an ability where if I liked a sport, I could get Rens and Jesse to play with me.’’
The three Edwards boys were tall and athletic. Kai had previously gotten his brothers into soccer, cycling, track and tennis. Rens excelled at soccer. Jesse’s specialty was the high jump. Kai became a national level tennis player who visited with famed tennis coach Nick Bollettieri at the IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida.
But now, he fixated on basketball.
“Kai used to have a different thing every week,’’ Jesse, who is five years younger than Rens and two years shy of Kai, said. “Cycling. Tennis. Whatever. But basketball kind of stuck with all of us. That’s where we ended up.’’
Basketball suited the Edwards brothers. Rens is 6-foot-6. Kai is 6-9 and Jesse is just shy of 7-foot. They get their height from both their father and mother. David, a native of London who played cricket at a high level, is 6-foot-7. Simone, who grew up in Amsterdam, is 6-foot.
The three brothers found a basketball court and, for up to three hours a day, they would go there and mimic the highlights from the NBA videos.
Jesse Edwards is now a 6-foot-11 senior center at Syracuse University, but back then, his two older brothers were both bigger and taller.
“He had to learn how to play guard and defend someone taller,’’ his father, David, said. “They’re brothers and competitive, right? They didn’t go easy on him.’’
Rens, the oldest of the three brothers, seemed to be able to pick up any sport quickly and play it well. But he suffered two injuries, a torn ACL playing soccer and a ruptured Achilles on the basketball court, that curtailed his ability to play at a high level.
Kai, ever the adventurous one of the three, decided to forgo his budding tennis career in favor of basketball. He sought to join Amsterdam’s Apollo athletic club – and got his first lesson in basketball.
“I went to sign up and the person there told me, ‘I’m sorry, but we already had summer tryouts,’ ” Kai said. “I didn’t even know there were tryouts. I thought I could just go and join. I had to wait six months for the next tryout.’’
Kai eventually tried out and made the Apollo Amsterdam club team. Jesse, of course, followed his older brother. The learning curve was steep. He had no concept of help defense. Screening was something he had never done in his recreation of NBA videos with his brothers.
“Jesse learned everything from scratch,’’ his mom, Simone, said.
Now hooked on the game, the brothers would stay up to 2 a.m. to watch NBA games.
Their fun pickup games began to change.
“As soon as he started growing,’’ Rens said, “we couldn’t stop him anymore.’’
Kai, a 6-foot-9 power forward, possessed raw skills. He took an opportunity to go play at the renowned Canarias Basketball Academy, a school located in the Canary Islands. Former Syracuse center Bourama Sidibe is among the dozens of international players who made their way to colleges in the United States through the Canarias Academy.
Kai wound up at Northern Colorado. Jesse remained in Amsterdam, playing basketball.
Around Christmas of Kai’s sophomore year, Jesse, his mom and an uncle visited Kai in Northern Colorado.
Jesse was blown away with the college atmosphere.
“Jesse looked at me and said, ‘Mom, this is what I want,’ ” Simone recalled. “If I got the chance to do this, I would love that.’’
Kai said the Northern Colorado coaches made his family feel welcome and offered encouragement to Jesse, who stood about 6-feet, 6-inches at the time.
Keep working, they told him. Maybe one day he could make it.
Two years later, Jesse had grown 5 inches to 6-foot-11. But, he remained well off the radar of college coaches in the United States.
His coach at Apollo, Wierd Goedee, was hoping Edwards would remain in Holland and continue working with the country’s junior national team.
Then, out of the blue, Edwards received an email from Jason Smith, the basketball coach at Brewster Academy in Wolfeboro, New Hampshire. Smith had heard of an athletic but unrefined center in Amsterdam from coaches at Drake and Georgia Tech who had visited the Netherlands.
“I wasn’t looking at America at that point,’’ Edwards said, “I was looking to play with youth teams in Europe. Then that email came.’’
Edwards and his parents checked out Brewster’s credentials. The school had sent dozens of players on to college and many to the pros.
“I was talking to Jason about Kai Jones or Kadary Richmond or some other player at Brewster,’’ Syracuse assistant coach Allen Griffin said. “Jason was saying he had another kid coming from the Netherlands that we should check out.’’
...
Other
The Tiki Bar in Baldwinsville caught fire on Tuesday, Nov 1., 2022. (Anne Hayes | Ahayes@syracuse.com)
Tiki Bar at Cold Springs Harbor catches fire, building a loss, firefighters say (PS; Hayes)
The Tiki Bar at Cold Springs Harbor caught fire Tuesday, causing so much damage the building is a loss, firefighters said.
At 10:46 a.m. first responders received a call that the bar on Hayes Road inside a marina on the banks of Seneca River was on fire, according to dispatches from the Onondaga County 911 Center.
Firefighters responded and extinguished the fire, but the building is a loss, said Chief Charles Eastman, with the Seneca River Fire Department.
When firefighters arrived there was heavy smoke and flames on the first floor that was quickly spreading to the second floor, Eastman said. The fire burned through the ceiling, he said.
The bar owner’s mother was the only one inside the building when the fire began, Eastman said. She lives on the second floor, he said.
She was distressed after getting out of the building and was evaluated by paramedics, he said. No one was injured in the fire, he said.
Eastman said that they believe an ice machine compressor started the fire on the first floor. The heaviest smoke and fire were concentrated around the machine, he said.
...
Last edited:
