Darrell Moody: Carson’s Keema wins student-athlete honor

A belated congratulations to Carson High graduate Jace Keema, who was one of eight winners honored by My21 TV and the Reviglio family.

The other seven winners were Alli Reviglio and Katie Turner of Manogue, Samantha King Shaw of Reed, Damonte’s Adonis Williams, Galena’s Peyton Sakelaris, Reno’s Christian Chamberlain and Wooster’s Alex Malcolm.

All eight student-athletes were awarded with a plaque, a recognition luncheon and $500. The winners were chosen based on athletics and academics.

Keema, a three-sport varsity athlete at CHS, recently signed to play baseball for the College of Southern Idaho. He will join Galena’s Austin Wickham on the CSI roster. Keema originally was going to attend Butte Community College.

Keema injured his foot during football season, forcing him to miss the entire basketball season. He was able to return for baseball, and had a solid season, hitting .320 with 17 RBI.

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According to published reports, the Big 10 and ACC may increase the amount of conference basketball games they play in the near future. I applaud that. You should play everybody twice.

I mentioned that to Eric Musselman last year, and the Nevada coach said he would have no problem with that being implemented. It wouldn’t leave Nevada or any other school with many nonconference games, but maybe the NCAA should look at increasing the amount of games a school can play.

The MW may follow suit if some of the bigger conferences implement it. The advantage is conference games are usually closer, which ultimately could mean less missed class time.

Musselman admitted he is/was having some problems filling out his schedule. I know Mark Fox had the same problem during his stay at Nevada. I wouldn’t be opposed to seeing Nevada schedule some heavyweight, and say play the game in Sacramento at the Kings’ arena.

I’d love to see a neutral home and home with Gonzaga. Saint Mary’s has offered Nevada another away game, but I wouldn’t be in favor of that.

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And, speaking of Fox, the former Nevada coach hired David Carter to be an assistant coach on his staff at Georgia.

I applaud the move. Carter is a great guy, and I think he will be effective as an assistant coach. He did a great job working under both Trent Johnson and Fox, and he was a tremendous point guard in his own right at Saint Mary’s College.

Carter, who was still being paid by Nevada, worked as a volunteer coach at Saint Mary’s College for two years. His contract with Nevada ends at the end of the month.

Carter had a couple of good years at Nevada before the roof caved in. I may be in the minority, but when Nevada moved to the MW from the WAC it didn’t have enough good players to compete.