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The guest speaker for our upcoming meeting will be Bryan Kersey, Director of Basketball Officials for the ACC. For the past 30 years, Kersey has served as an NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Official, and has been a regular in both the ACC and NCAA Tournaments. Overall, he has officiated in 20 NCAA Tournaments, including six Regionals, three Regional Finals and the 2015 NCAA Final Four. He has officiated 27 years in the ACC and has worked 21 ACC Tournaments, including seven championship games, and four NIT Finals.

“I am pleased to have Bryan step into this role as he brings a wealth of on court experience, superb knowledge surrounding all aspects of officiating the college game, and excellent professional business and management experiences,” said ACC Commissioner John Swofford.

“Bryan has demonstrated throughout his career a caring and respectful attitude towards college basketball and its communities,” said Paul Brazeau, ACC Senior Associate Commissioner for Men’s Basketball. “His long-time love for the game, and officiating in particular, remains evident. The ACC and all those affiliated with college basketball will be strengthened through Bryan’s stewardship and dedication.”

In addition to the ACC, Kersey has officiated in the Big East, Big 12, American, Atlantic 10 and Colonial Conferences. From Carrollton, Virginia, he is the president of Kersey, Sealey, Clark & Associates in Newport News, Virginia.

Mark Your Calendars!

11/2/16 – Roy Williams, Head Men’s Basketball Coach, UNC
11/16/16 – Dan Brooks, Head Women’s Golf Coach, Duke
12/7/16 – Bill Mallon, Olympics Historian

The guest speaker for our upcoming meeting will be Nolan Smith, Special Assistant Men’s Basketball Coach at Duke.  The former Duke All-American joined the Blue Devils’ men’s basketball staff on Feb. 22, 2016, and is in his first full season as special assistant. In this role, his duties include assisting the coaching staff in developing game strategies, breaking down game film, planning practices and contributing in staff meetings.

A consensus first-team All-American and the ACC Player of the Year in 2011, Smith helped lead Duke to three consecutive ACC championships (2009-11) and the 2010 NCAA title during his tenure as a student-athlete.

In helping lead Duke to its fourth national championship in 2010, Smith was named Most Outstanding Player at the NCAA South Regional in Houston and earned a place on the All-Final Four Team after averaging 16.0 points and 5.0 assists to help the Blue Devils cut down the nets in Indianapolis.

The Upper Marlboro, Md., native currently ranks 17th on Duke’s career scoring chart, having amassed 1,911 points from 2008-11. He played in 121 victories in a Duke uniform to rank fifth in program history and sixth in ACC history, and his 143 games played are tied for the seventh-most in Duke annals. Smith also served as a team captain for the 2010-11 season.

During his tenure as a student-athlete in the program, Duke went 65-2 (.970) at Cameron Indoor Stadium to set program records for both home wins and winning percentage in a four-year period

Following his graduation from Duke in 2011, Smith was selected by Portland with the 21st overall pick in the 2011 NBA Draft.

thanks for the info, www.goduke.com!

Mark Your Calendars!

10/19/16 – Brian Kersey, Director of Basketball Officials, ACC
11/2/16 – Roy Williams, Head Men’s Basketball Coach, UNC
11/16/16 – Special Durham Sports Club Program

The guest speaker for our upcoming meeting will be Joanne P. McCallie, Head Women’s Basketball Coach at Duke. The ACC Coach of the Year in 2010, 2012 and 2013, McCallie enters her ninth season at the helm of the Blue Devils’ program.

In just eight years, “Coach P” has guided the program to a 225-53 overall record, a 100-22 mark in ACC action and eight NCAA Tournament selections, including a No. 1 seed in 2009 and four straight Elite Eight appearances from 2010-13. She led Duke to four consecutive ACC regular season titles in 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013 and three ACC Championships in 2010, 2011 and 2013. Her 82.0 winning percentage in ACC contests ranks first on the conference’s all-time coaching charts, while her winning percentage of 80.9 in all games is first among active coaches in the ACC.
Prior to coming to Duke, McCallie spent seven years at Michigan State University. While piloting the Spartans to a nationally elite level, McCallie, the 2005 Associated Press Coach of the Year, guided the Spartans to their first ever NCAA Final Four and national championship game appearance as well as their first ever NCAA Elite Eight and repeat Sweet Sixteen appearances, the programs’ second Big Ten regular season title and first ever Big Ten Tournament Championship in 2005.

The former Joanne Palombo played her collegiate basketball at Northwestern from 1984-87. She still ranks seventh in Wildcat history with 378 career assists. McCallie graduated from Northwestern in 1987 with a degree in political science and earned a master’s degree in business administration from Auburn in 1990.

The McCallie family includes husband John, daughter Madeline (Maddie – 21) and son John Wyatt (Jack – 15). Maddie will be a junior on the women’s basketball team at Elon in 2015-16, after transferring from the Miami of Ohio.

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Mark Your Calendars!

10/5/16 – Lee Pace, Sports Historian
10/19/16 – Brian Kersey, Director of Basketball Officials, ACC
11/2/16 – Roy Williams, Head Men’s Basketball Coach, UNC

The guest speaker for our upcoming meeting will be Joe Breschi, Head Men’s Lacrosse Coach at UNC. Breschi led the Tarheels to the 2016 NCAA National Championship with a victory over a great and spectacular University of Maryland team (Fear the Turtle).

Breschi, a 1990 Carolina alumnus and former assistant coach for the Tar Heels, became the 12th head lacrosse coach in Carolina history on June 18, 2008. Breschi came to Chapel Hill from Ohio State where he had served as the head coach for the previous 11 seasons. He hit the ground running and his first recruiting class, which enrolled in August 2010, was ranked No. 1 in the nation by Inside Lacrosse Magazine. His past four recruiting classes have been tabbed in the Top 5 nationally. Carolina has advanced to the NCAA Tournament in each of his eight years as the head coach.

Breschi was one of the finest lacrosse players in the history of the ACC while playing for UNC head coach Willie Scroggs from 1987-90. He was also a member of two U.S. National Teams (1994 and 1998). After graduating from Carolina in 1990, Breschi coached at his alma mater for two seasons before going to Brown University as the head assistant coach from 1993-97.

Breschi and his wife, Julie, have five children, the late Michael Breschi, as well as four daughters, Samantha, Abigail, Lucy, and Emily.

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Mark Your Calendars!

9/21/16 – Joanne P. McCallie, Head Women’s Basketball Coach, Duke University
10/5/16 – Lee Pace, Sports Historian
10/19/16 – Brian Kersey, Director of Basketball Officials, ACC

The guest speaker for our upcoming meeting will be Ryan McGee, Senior Writer for ESPN The Magazine. McGee is also a regular contributor to ESPN.com, SportsCenter and ESPNU. He is also the author of The Road To Omaha: Hits, Hopes and History at the College World Series and ESPN Ultimate NASCAR: 100 Defining Moments in Stock Car Racing History.

In addition to his reporting and writing, McGee also is co-host of the popular “Marty and McGee” program that airs on ESPN Radio on Saturday afternoons. McGee and co-host Marty Smith, ESPN bureau reporter, discuss NASCAR and other topics with a wide variety of guests ranging from NASCAR drivers to country music artists to stars from other sports.

He started with ESPN in 1994 working on the production staff of the show rpm2night, during which time he began contributing to the magazine. From 2001-03, he produced Totally NASCAR on FOX Sports Net and for five years served as editor in chief at NASCAR Media Group, winning two Sports Emmys and penning the script for the documentary film Dale. He has been named National Motorsports Press Association’s Writer of the Year five times. McGee is also a member of the Football Writers Association of America (FWAA) and National Collegiate Baseball Writers (NCBWA). He has also selected as the NMPA Writer of the Year in 2010 and 2014.

Mark Your Calendars!

9/7/16 – Joe Breschi, Head Men’s Lacrosse Coach, University of North Carolina
9/21/16 – Joanne P. McCallie, Head Women’s Basketball Coach, Duke University
10/5/16 – Lee Pace, Sports Historian

The guest speaker for our upcoming meeting will be Lewis Bowling, writer and educator. Currently, Lewis is an Assistant Professor on the Physical Education Faculty at North Carolina Central University and teaches part-time at Duke. Bowling’s passion, however, is writing. In addition to writing four books about Granville County history, he has written the following books and more:

• Alabama Football Tales: More Than a Century of Crimson Tide Glory
• Wallace Wade: Championship Years at Alabama and Duke
• Duke Basketball: A Pictorial History

In addition to the books, he writes a weekly fitness column for the Durham Herald-Sun and a history column for the Oxford Public Ledger called “Looking Back”.   He is a staff writer for Go Duke Magazine, and has published articles in Blue Devil Weekly, Bama Magazine, Reminisce Magazine, Personal Fitness Professional Magazine, Sport Supplement Journal, Alabama Encyclopedia Online, and Alabama Alumni Magazine.

Lewis earned his Bachelor of Science degree in Physical Education from Appalachian State University and his Master of Sport Science degree from the United States Sports Academy in Daphne, Alabama.

Lewis is married to Beth Harward Bowling, and they reside in Durham.

Mark Your Calendars!

8/17/16 – Ryan McGee, Writer, ESPN The Magazine
9/7/16 – Joe Breschi, Head Men’s Lacrosse Coach, University of North Carolina
9/21/16 – Joanne P. McCallie, Head Women’s Basketball Coach, Duke University

The guest speaker for our upcoming meeting will be Brad Allen, NFL Football referee. A native of Lumberton, North Carolina (and a graduate of UNC-Pembroke), Allen began officiating football games at the high school, and later, ACC, levels. When he made his NFL officiating debut in 2014, he was originally going to be an umpire, but when long-time referee Mike Carey announced his retirement on June 24, 2014, Allen was given the referee position instead; this was the first time since 1962 that an NFL official in his first year of officiating was given that honor (Tommy Bell was the last NFL official to do so).

Allen’s 2015 NFL officiating crew consisted of umpire Fred Bryan, head linesman Jim Mello, line judge Tom Symonette, field judge Doug Rosenbaum, side judge Tom Hill, and back judge Shawn Hochuli, son of senior NFL referee Ed Hochuli.

Outside of officiating NFL games, Allen is the President and Executive Director of the North Carolina Senior Games.

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Mark Your Calendars

8/3/16 – Joe Breschi, Head Men’s Lacrosse Coach, UNC
8/17/16 – Special Guest Speaker
9/7/16 – Special Guest Speaker

The guest speaker for our upcoming meeting will be Jared Sandberg, Manager of the Durham Bulls. Sandberg is in his second season with the Bulls, after spending the previous seven seasons as a coach and manager at four different levels of the Rays’ organization. He is just the fourth manager in the triple-A history of the Bulls.

The 37-year-old Sandberg managed the Advanced-A Charlotte Stone Crabs prior to coming to the Bulls. He managed Single-A Bowling Green the year before after spending three seasons at short-season Class A Hudson Valley. He made his managerial debut with the rookie-level Princeton Rays in 2009 after one year as a coach at Hudson Valley in 2008.

Prior to his time on the bench, Sandberg spent parts of three seasons from 2001-03 primarily as a third baseman for the Tampa Bay Devil Rays hitting .221 with 25 home runs in 196 games. He played parts of five seasons with the Bulls (2000-04).

Sandberg, the nephew of Hall of Famer and current Philadelphia Phillies manager Ryne Sandberg, was selected by Tampa Bay in the 16th round of the 1996 draft. He is still the franchise’s all-time minor-league leader in home runs (113), RBI (473 and runs (417).

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Mark Your Calendars

7/20/16 – Brad Allen, NFL Referee
8/3/16 – Special Guest Speaker
8/17/16 – Special Guest Speaker

The guest speaker for our upcoming meeting will be Billy Lee, Special Assistant to the Head Coach/Director of Video Services/Scouting for UNC Women’s Basketball.

A 1969 graduate of Mount Olive College, Lee was an assistant coach at East Carolina for two seasons before taking the head job at Pembroke State (now UNC Pembroke) in 1978. During his time in Lumberton, Lee won three conference titles, advanced to the NAIA National Tournament and posted back-to-back 20-win seasons.

In 1985, Lee took over as the Head Men’s Basketball Coach at Campbell University, where he led the Camels for 18 seasons. A five-time conference coach of the year, Lee guided Campbell to the 1992 Big South Conference title and a bid to the NCAA Tournament, where his team faced eventual national champion Duke. In addition to winning over 400 games in his career, Lee was the director the Campbell University Basketball School, considered to be the largest and oldest of its kind in the United States.

In addition to his work on the sidelines, Lee has authored two books on basketball strategy. Lee has also been part of a number of organizations including the USA Basketball committee, the Board of Directors for the North Carolina Amateur Sports Association, the National Association of Basketball Coaches, the Board of Advisors for the NC High School Athletic Association and the National Speakers Association. In 2009, Lee was inducted into the Mount Olive College Athletics Hall of Fame.

MARK YOUR CALENDARS!

6/1/16 – “Scholar-Athlete Awards Night” (5:30pm start time) – Scottie Montgomery, Head Football Coach, East Carolina University will be keynote speaker
6/15/16 – “Blunt-Bradshaw Legends Award” Presentation
7/6/16 – Jared Sandberg, Manager, Durham Bulls

The guest speaker for our upcoming meeting will be Jim Koerner, Head Baseball Coach at North Carolina Central University. Koerner came to NCCU in 2011 from the University at Buffalo, where he was the assistant coach and recruiting coordinator.

During the 2015 season the Eagles were once again in the hunt for a division title, and featured one of the best pitching staffs in NCCU’s modern era. The team kept the second-lowest earned run average (4.55) and second-lowest opposing batting average (.286) in the program’s modern history.

In 2014, Koerner and the Eagles were right in the thick of the MEAC’s Southern Division race throughout the entire season, putting together one of the best season’s offensively since the program restarted. NCCU recorded 454 hits, the second-most since 2007, and ripped a Division I high 22 home runs, along with the most doubles in the modern era of the program (75). New standards were set in the 2013 campaign for Koerner and his program as the Eagles set a new modern era record with 27 wins overtaking the 21 victories collected in the 2007 season, the only year NCCU played at the NCAA Division II level. Despite finishing third in the Southern Division and dropping its opening round matchup against Norfolk State in the 2013 MEAC Baseball Championships, the Eagles recovered to win two of the next three to advance all the way to semifinals as one of the four remaining teams left in the tournament, going 2-2 during the week.

He received his bachelor’s degree in economics in 1997 from St. John Fisher College (N.Y.), and a master’s degree in athletic administration from Marshall University. Koerner and his wife, Kylie, have two children, Sam and Elizabeth.

MARK YOUR CALENDARS!

5/18/16 – Billy Lee, UNC Women’s Basketball, Special Assistant to Coach Sylvia Hatchell
6/1/16 – “Scholar-Athlete Awards Night” (5:30pm start time)
6/15/16 – Special Guest Speaker