Tuesday, February 6, 2018

Half-Court Hoos

With ESPN’s College Game Day poised to make a return visit to JPJ on Saturday, Whitelaw Reid looks into what it takes to make the $18,000 half-court shot, by speaking with Tyler Lewis, one of two former UVA students who made it on their first tries in back-to-back years during the program’s visit to UVA in 2015 and 2016. According to ESPN, the odds of hitting a half-court shot are roughly 1 in 100. Given that, the odds of two players hitting consecutive shots are approximately 1 in 10,000, according to UVA statistics department lecturer Rebecca Hehn. According to Hehn, the odds of three UVA students making the shot three years in a row on their first attempt are roughly 1 in 1,000,000, so Lewis gives his advice to whoever the lucky individual is to attempt it this weekend.

Black History Month

Congratulations to former #UVAWBB player Deborah Stroman who is being recognized tomorrow night in a tribute to Black History Month. Stroman is one of four individuals being lauded this week by the Tar Heels and the Carolina Black Caucus as an African American pioneer from UNC women’s basketball and the university community. Stroman is a current faculty member at UNC’s Gillings School of Global Public Health and business advisor for the university and is also an Entrepreneur-in-Residence at the American Underground in Durham. The 1982 Virginia alumna was the recipient of the 2013 General Alumni Association Harvey E. Breech Outstanding Faculty/Staff Award and the 2013 The Class of 1996 Award for Advising Excellence and in the spring of 2017, was inducted into The Order of the Golden Fleece, the University of North Carolina’s highest and oldest honor society.