Basketball

Basketball playoffs begin Friday in the IAAM, with most teams taking a break until Tuesday's quarterfinals. The title games are scheduled for Feb. 18 at UMBC's RAC Arena with the C Conference at 1 p.m., the B Conference at 3 p.m. and the A Conference at 5 p.m. Following are Tuesday's quarterfinal matchups, scheduled for 5:30 p.m.: A Conference Mercy/Severn at McDonogh Seton Keough at Roland Park St. Frances at Pallotti ...

College basketball Antonio Barton expected to announce his choice Sunday Antonio Barton , a Baltimore native and former Memphis guard, will announce Sunday afternoon where he is transferring. Will Barton , Antonio's brother and a Portland Trail Blazers guard, posted the news on his Twitter account Tuesday night. Antonio Barton , a Lake Clifton graduate who is considering Maryland and Tennessee among other schools, would be eligible to play next season because he plans to graduate from Memphis this summer.

Sun columnist Mike Preston weighed-in on the NFL lockout yesterday. He wrote about the skyrocketing costs of gasoline, the tsunami in Japan and the rising national debt. His point was simple: There are things in life more important that millionaire athletes bickering with billionaire owners. There are things in life more important than sports.  President Obama, it seems, has a different take. Instead of spending every waking hour concerning himself with America's stagnant economy or whether the U.S. should take action against Libya, Obama has been spending his time researching college basketball to make his March Madness picks  for a segment on ESPN.

NAME, PREP SCHOOL AND/OR HIGH SCHOOL, COLLEGE Jamel Artis , Notre Dame Prep (Mass.), PITTSBURGH Chase Cormier , Fishburne Military / Milford Mill, GRAMBLING STATE Will Darley , Fishburne Military / Dulaney, UMBC Rodney Elliott , John Carroll, UMBC Ben Grace , Gilman, UMBC Rodney Hawkins , Mt. Zion Prep / Lake Clifton, SAINT PETER'S Lavon Long , Oakland...

Annapolis Area Christian School needs a girls varsity basketball coach and a varsity swimming coach for next season. Anyone interested should contact athletic director Jim Domoracki, 410-519-5300 x3150 or jdomoracki@aacsonline.org .

It all still lives in Larry Gibson — the warm lights of Cole Field House, the coaching assistant who told him to remember "1, 2, 3, swish" before free throws, his shots that beat No. 1 Notre Dame and sent Maryland fans streaming onto the court on Super Bowl Sunday 1979. It is through pulsating, basketball-filled nights — through memories of sweat and rebounds and cheerleaders and fight songs — that Gibson, now 55, returns to his aging teammates in fleeting moments.

Mike Coughlan is a basketball junkie in the purest form. He simply loves the game and everything that comes with it.  Just how much? He was happy to see the Super Bowl come and go, so he can start seeing and hearing more about the NBA.  Since 1997, he has coached boys and girls basketball at various levels, everything from a junior varsity/assistant varsity boys coach at Howard High to a number of successful girls AAU teams.   When Marriotts Ridge...

Gilman seniors Cyrus Jones and Ryan Ripken combined for 50 points in the Greyhounds' 67-59 victory over Annapolis Area Christian School in a Maryland Interscholastic Athletic Association BConference semifinal Friday at the Finney Athletic Center in Roland Park. Jones' 27-point outburst made him the school's all-time leading scorer with 1,712 points and helped Gilman advance to the conference final against St.Vincent Pallotti on Sunday at UMBC at 1 p.m. —Nelson Coffin, Towson Times

The Annapolis boys basketball team will host a team Saturday led by one of the top senior guard prospects in the country. Upper Room Christian Academy in Raleigh, N.C., will travel to Annapolis for a 7:15 p.m. showdown against the Panthers. Upper Room is led by Rodney Purvis, the No. 1 shooting guard prospect in the country according to Rivals.com, and the No. 16 player in ESPNU's Top 100 for the 2012 class. Purvis, who averages 28 pionts, seven rebounds and five assists, has committed to North Carolina State.

The senior guard, a four-year varsity player and three-year starter, saved his absolute best for the final second of his high school career. Walker beat the buzzer with a driving layup in Saturday's Class 2A state championship game to give the Red Storm (22-5) a 56-54 win over Wicomico for the program's first title. Walker, an All-Metro first-team selection as a junior, finished the title game with 15 points, eight rebounds, six assists and four steals. In the team's 60-56 semifinal win over Oakdale, from Frederick County, on Friday, Walker had similar heroics in the second overtime.

Seven local girls basketball players will try out for the U16 national team this weekend at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs. First-team All Metro players Stephanie Jones, Aberdeen; Danielle Edwards, McDonogh; Taylor Murray, Annapolis Area Christian; and Dionna White, Milford Mill, as well as second-team selections Qalea Ismail, Patterson Mill; and Dajah Logan, McDonogh, will head to Colorado for the tryouts that begin Thursday. McDonogh's Jameira Johnson also will try out. Jones, a freshman forward-guard who led the Eagles to the state Class 3A championship, was among an original pool of 33 players invited to the tryouts while the others earned their spots via open application.

Sarah Dorl and James Frieson both regularly took care of many jobs that helped their respective teams, tasks that wouldn't show up in a score sheet. But the work Dorl did for the Dulaney basketball team and Frieson put in for Towson football finally earned some notice Monday night when they won top honors at the 73rd Annual McCormick Unsung Heroes Awards banquet at the Hunt Valley Inn. Dorl and Frieson became the 70th and 71st winners of the Charles Perry McCormick Scholarship, established in 1969.

College lacrosse Fletcher, Ratliff among Loyola's eight ECAC award recipients Loyola senior defenseman Joe Fletcher was named the Eastern College Athletic Conference Defensive Player of the Year on Thursday, and senior long-stick midfielder Scott Ratliff was named Specialist of the Year. Both also were named to the All-ECAC first team. Senior attackman Mike Sawyer , junior attackman Justin Ward (Old Mill), senior defenseman Reid Acton and senior midfielder Davis Butts were named to the second team.

Aberdeen freshman Stephanie Jones is one of 33 players who have accepted invitations to try out for the USA Basketball women's under-16 national team later this month in Colorado Springs, Colo. Jones, a 6-foot-1 All-Metro forward, led the No. 2 Eagles to the Class 3A state championship in March, averaging 17.3 points and 9.2 rebounds. Although she plays strong on the inside, Jones could also handle the ball and hit 3-pointers. Jones' quickness and versatility were keys to the Eagles' stifling defense and quick-strike offense after her sister, 6-foot-3 Maryland-bound senior Brionna Jones, was lost for the season with a torn anterior cruciate ligament in January.

On Wednesday at Churchill Downs, a crowd clad mainly in Louisville basketball shirts gathered at Barn 45 to watch Louisville basketball coach Rick Pitino as he visited a horse of which he owns five percent. Pitino, a month removed from becoming the first coach in NCAA history to win Division I basketball national championship tournaments with two different schools, appeared at trainer Doug O'Neill 's barn shortly after 8 a.m. and joined an entourage following Goldencents.

North Carroll announced the hiring of Rob Vaughn as boys basketball coach on Tuesday. Vaughn, a graduate of the school, previously coached the Panthers from 2003 to 2006, and he takes over the program from his brother, Chris, according to the school. Vaughn was an assistant coach at McDaniel College under Bob Flynn, and he currently teaches physical education at Shiloh Middle School in Carroll County.

They have survived badly sprained ankles and torn knee ligaments, mild concussions and more than their share of poor shooting days. Ralph Piersanti, one of the oldest in a group, has had two heart attacks. But they keep playing a game that used to be thought of for mostly younger men and women. Three times a week, more than two dozen men in their 60s, 70s and even a few like Piersanti, in their 80s, typically show up at the Bykota Senior Center in Towson - normally thought of as a place for more placid activities such as bingo and line-dancing - to play basketball.

C.J. Keyser, a 6-foot-3 sophomore small forward who transferred from John Carroll to Patterson Mill last week, has not yet been ruled eligible to play basketball for the Huskies. Patterson Mill athletic director Jason Bellamy said there was no update on whether Keyser would be declared eligible for the upcoming Class 2A East region playoffs. The Huskies are set to travel to Edgewood in tonight's opening round and Bellamy said Keyser was not a member of the team.

Annapolis Area Christian School needs a girls varsity basketball coach and a varsity swimming coach for next season. Anyone interested should contact athletic director Jim Domoracki, 410-519-5300 x3150 or jdomoracki@aacsonline.org .

Rutgers announced the suspension of men's lacrosse head coach Brian Brecht, a former Loyola University assistant, on Friday pending a university police investigation of allegations of verbal abuse. No length was given for the suspension, which is with pay. Brecht's suspension comes a little more than two weeks after the highly publicized firing of men's basketball coach Mike Rice. Rice was let go April 3 after a video surfaced of him making homophobic slurs and throwing basketballs at his players during practice.