By Dylan Butler
Since choosing York College over her hometown College of Staten Island three years ago, Tamara Taylor has met nothing but success on the basketball court. Twice she has been named to the All-CUNY first team and, after leading the Lady Cardinals to one of its best seasons in recent memory, Taylor has garnered the league’s top honor — the Player of the Year award.
The 5-foot-9 junior has had a banner year for the undermanned Lady Cardinals. She leads CUNY and is sixth in the nation in scoring, averaging 22.8 points per game. She is also the conference’s leading free throw shooter, averaging 77.1 percent from the line, and is third in CUNY with a 54.5 field goal percentage.
Taylor has been named CUNY Player of the Week twice this year and once garnered ECAC Player of the Week honors.
Despite having just seven players, York has two on the All-CUNY first team. Joining Taylor on the squad is junior point guard Garrianne Brown. The 5-foot-5 Brooklyn native leads CUNY and is second in the nation with 6.8 assists per game.
Former Cardozo standout Lauren Cargill was also named to the All-CUNY first team for the second consecutive year. The 5-foot-9 sophomore guard, who was CUNY’s Player of the Year last year, is 14th in the nation and second in the conference averaging 21.6 points per game.
Florena Rhodes, a 5-foot-9 freshman forward at Lehman, had a monster second half of the season and was also named to the All-CUNY first team. The Queens native averaged 14.4 points and 9.5 rebounds per game for the 22-2 Lighting.
On the men’s side Stanley O’Neil was the lone York player honored by the league as the Holy Cross grad was named to the All-CUNY second team. The 6-foot-3 guard averaged 16.6 points per game for the Cardinals and garnered All-CUNY honors for the third time in his four-year CUNY career.
Jamah Francis was the lone bright spot in what was a rather dreary season at Queensborough as the 6-foot-1 freshman guard out of John Adams High School, who averaged 15 points per game, was named to the Community College All-Star team.
Fellow Queens native Ricardo Reimers, a 6-foot-1 sophomore guard at Kingsborough, was also named to CUNY’s Community College All-Star team. The Van Buren grad averaged 17.2 points and 5.4 assists per game for the Wave.
<i>St. Francis Prep grads named to the Fordham Athletic Hall of Fame</i>
Jack Allen, a baseball standout, and Lorraine Grein-Aylmer, one of the top swimmers in Fordham history, joined four others as the newest members inducted into the Fordham Hall of Fame in a ceremony Saturday on the Rose Hill campus.
Allen, a 1988 Fordham graduate, was one of the top base stealers in Rams baseball history. The Queens native broke Frankie Frisch’s 67-year-old stolen base record with 48 in his freshman year, which was tops in the NCAA that year.
Allen was also second in the NCAA in stolen bases his sophomore year, broke a Fordham stolen base mark his junior year and was among the top 10 in the nation his senior year in stolen bases.
The St. Francis Prep grad broke seven offensive records at Fordham, including most stolen bases in a career (173) and most runs in a career (182).
Allen, the director of information systems for Access One Communications, lives in Orlando, Fla. with his wife Tonya and their son Nicholas.
Grein-Aylmer, a 1993 Fordham grad, was one of the top swimmers in Rams history and still holds five individual school records, including the 500 freestyle (5:06.04), the 100 backstroke (59.57), 200 backstroke (2:05.23), the 200 IM (2:07.50) and the 400 IM (4:29.79).
The Woodside native was also a member of the record-breaking 200 (1:38.76) and 400 freestyle relay teams (7:45.52).
Grein-Aylmer, who is head swimming coach at her alma mater, St. Francis Prep, lives in Garnerville with her husband Bob Aylmer, a former Fordham pitcher, and their two children, Nicole and Taylor.
<i>SJU Women Romp West Virginia</i>
Big East wins have been few and far between and conference blowout victories have been even rarer, but that was the case Saturday for the St. John’s women’s basketball team which defeated West Virginia, 66-41, in front of 2,155 at Alumni Hall.
Leading the charge for the Red Storm, who snapped a three-game losing streak, was freshman Sherri Brown who scored a career-high 17 points, including three three-pointers to lead four St. John’s players in double figure scoring.
Senior Latasha Thompson had 16 points, junior Rasheedah Brown added 15 points and six assists and senior Tynisha Myles added 10 points to lead the way for St. John’s (7-15, 2-9). Kate Bulger had 11 points for West Virginia (4-18, 2-9).
After a game at Miami scheduled for Wednesday, the Red Storm head to Washington, D.C. to take on Georgetown Saturday at 3 p.m.
<i>Former CTK gridiron standout signs with Buffalo</i>
Anthony Andriano, a 6-foot-2, 230-pound linebacker who went to Christ the King and now attends Milford Academy (Conn.), has signed a national letter of intent to play football at the University of Buffalo.
<i>Charles, Mena Lead Queensborough Track to Fourth-Place Finish</i>
Kori Charles captured the long jump with a distance of 21 3/4 and Juan Mena placed first in the 800 meters (2:03.40) as Queensborough placed fourth at the Wesleyan Invitational Saturday.
Reach Associate Sports Editor Dylan Butler by e-mail at Timesledgr@aol.com or call 229-0300, Ext. 143.
