photo by Liz Berie
Senior guard Yandell Denis goes through videos on Krossover Game Film Tools for Coaches and Athletes to use in his highlight videos.
With so many highlights throughout the basketball season, senior guards Jerah’me Williams, Kelvin Goodwin, and Yandell Denis have been making highlight videos for sites like YouTube in an attempt to get noticed by professional coaches overseas.
The three players make up more than half of the points made by the entire team. With a combined 1,340 points from the start to the end of the season, the players could potentially have bright futures ahead of them.
“They’re very good players,” assistant coach Gabe Bubon said. Kelvin and Jerah’me had really good numbers for points per game and Yandell was really good at rebounding for us. When you’re trying to play professional basketball, it’s good to have something in your resume.”
Williams was named all-conference second team at the end of the season and Goodwin was named first team all-conference. Goodwin was also an Honorable Mention on the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletes (NAIA) Division II All-American team.
“I’m making them so that I can get more publicity to get overseas for basketball,” Goodwin said during a phone interview “The guy that’s my agent said that a good thing for me to do is to post videos on YouTube so that more people can see them and also get my name out there.”
During the season, Goodwin was ranked seventh in NAIA DII in scoring, 16th in steals and 18th in assists. In the conference, he was ranked second in scoring, third in assists and first in steals. By the end of the season he played all but 45 minutes of the games with an average of 38.4 minutes per game.
12 head basketball coaches voted for players that deserved to be on the All-KIAC Team. Goodwin ended up finishing in third in the KIAC Player of the Year voting and Williams was the highest vote-getter not on the first team.
Because of his best representation of the NAIA five core characters of respect, responsibility, integrity, servant leadership and sportsmanship, Williams was also name to the KIAC Champions of Character Team.
Ever since Goodwin transferred from NCAA Division II Slippery Rock University, he started taking over the KIAC in several fields. Just like Goodwin, Williams was also a transfer and ended up coming from NAIA Lourdes (Ohio) University.
“I think I played fairly well. I practiced a lot during the summer time on my own with a lot of friends,” Williams said. “I feel like that I’m the kind of person that even when I do good, I feel like I can do better.”
Williams made 81 3-pointers last season. The highlight of his season was when he hit a three during a comeback victory against Rio Grande to reach 1,000 points in his Point Park career. By the end of the season, he had a total of 1,081 points during his two years with the Pioneers.
“My best moment during the season was when I scored my 1000th point,” Williams said. “We were losing, but then we came back. So when I shot my 1000th point, that was my big moment.”
Williams was the 20th member to reach the 1,000 point mark and the fourth to reach the milestone in just two years. As a result, Williams passed his head coach Bob Rager on the Point Park all-time scoring list. Williams finished his career in 15th on the list.
Denis didn’t score as much as Goodwin and Williams, Assistant Coach Gabe Bubon said Denis was really good at rebounding for the team. At the end of the season, Denis averaged eight points and seven rebounds per game.
“When you’re trying to play professional basketball,” Bubon said. “It’s good to have something in your resume and having high scoring averages helps.”
“I felt like I grew as a player and more as a man especially from the experiences throughout the whole season and learning how to cope with other players and even my coaches,” Denis said. “We didn’t win, but at the end of the day I felt like we still tried our hardest throughout the whole season.”
With each season, there are always ups and downs. Bubon was asked during an interview which game was the highlight game for the seniors. He said when the Pioneers defeated Indiana University East on the road Feb. 19 86-84. IU East made the final four this year in the NAIA DII Basketball National Tournament.
Bubon said the seniors always came through during clutch moments of the games.
“It was always a 4-5 point game and they always made the plays at the end of the game,” Bubon said. “This was the first time in six times against them that we made the plays at the end of the game. We got the win. We got the stop at the very end. We made the shots that we needed to make. That was kind of our breakout game when everybody realized that we could beat the really good teams.”
The seniors take their videos from Krossover. The website allows coaches to upload videos for athletes to see them. The athletes download the videos from the website so that they can make highlight videos.
All of the players would like to play overseas, but in order to get recruited they must make videos so that coaches overseas can see them. The players make several different videos from particular games to show coaches what each can bring to the team.
“It’s kind of like an audition so that they can see my talent, but it’s also a resume,” Denis said. “It’s basically just showing them everything that I can bring to the table, from shooting, playing defense and other aspects of the game.”
With players like Goodwin and Williams, they have higher expectations since both are able to bring something big to a table.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if they both succeed,” Bubon said. “Kelvin has a really, really great work ethic and Jerah’me is learning that.”
