2021 Hercules Tires MAAC Basketball Championships Program

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RETURN TO ATLANTIC CITY BILL MAHER CHAIR, COMMITTEE ON ATHLETIC ADMINISTRATION

teams were constructed in 2010. New LED lights were added to the Demske Sports Complex in 2019. Maher played an integral role in helping the school’s hockey program make the move to a permanent home at LECOM Harborcenter, a $172 million dollar hockey-based mix-use facility located directly across the street from KeyBank Center, the home of the NHL’s Buffalo Sabres. In March 2015, Canisius announced that the College’s athletic department and communications studies programs have entered into a new agreement with ESPN, under which its students produce live Canisius athletic events for ESPN3. This new athletic and academic collaboration provides students with hands-on learning experiences in live video production, while also helping broaden the reach and visibility for Golden Griffin athletics. To help facilitate this new partnership and to produce events for ESPN3 and ESPN+, Canisius has built a state-of-the-art Golden Griffin Sports Broadcast Center on the first floor of the College’s Science Hall building. The control room features top-of-the-line video production and audio equipment and also serves as a classroom space for the students in the Sports Broadcast Journalism class and other video production classes. Maher has formerly served the MAAC’s representative to the NCAA Council, which has one representative from each of the 31 Division I conferences. He chairs the MAAC men’s lacrosse committee, the MAAC Technology Committee and is currently the Chair of the MAAC Committee on Athletic Administration. Canisius has hosted 24 MAAC Championships since 2005 and will once again serve as the host for the 2021 MAAC Men’s and Women’s Swimming and Diving Championships. Additionally, Maher has served as the Tournament Director when Canisius has co-hosted the NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament with the MAAC and Niagara University on four previous occasions (2007, 2010, 2014 and 2017). In 2019, Canisius joined with the MAAC and Niagara to serve as hosts for the NCAA Division I Men’s Hockey Frozen Four, and the trio is on the schedule to host the 2022 and 2026 NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball First and Second Rounds. Those events will all be held in KeyBank Center in downtown Buffalo. Seventeen Golden Griffin teams have played in the NCAA Tournament during Maher’s tenure, with the women’s lacrosse program, one of the MAAC’s most dominant programs, earning back-to-back trips to the NCAA Tournament in 2016 and 2017. The baseball team has earned the MAAC’s berth into the NCAA Division I baseball championship three times under Maher’s direction and the school’s men’s lacrosse team has won three MAAC Tournament Championships (2008, 2012 and 2018). The Canisius athletic department had one of, if not the most successful years in school history during the 2012–13 athletic campaign. Canisius became the first Division I school in Western New York to send three teams to the NCAA Tournament in the same athletic year, won four conference titles and had four teams experience postseason play, as the men’s basketball program made its first postseason appearance since 1996. Since 2012–13, the men’s basketball program has made four appearances in the CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament (CIT), earning a trip to the quarterfinal round of the event in 2013 and 2015. The Griffs’ 41 wins on the hardwood are the third-most of any MAAC school since the start of the 2012–13 campaign.

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Bill Maher, a graduate of Canisius College, officially took over the Golden Griffin athletic department on July 1, 2005. He returned to Main Street after spending seven years in various athletic administration roles at the University at Buffalo, including a stint as the Bulls’ Interim Athletic Director from 2003–05. Since Maher took over at Canisius, the 20 varsity athletic programs have won 45 conference or regional championships, with a number of teams producing the

best seasons in program history. A total of 73 student-athletes have won conference player or rookie of the year awards, including a program-record 10 honorees in 2017–18. Canisius has also claimed the Battle of the Bridge and won the Canal Cup in 11 of the last 13 seasons (including nine straight), which is an all-sports competition with rival Niagara University. A total of four Canisius student-athletes have been tabbed as the MAAC Student-Athlete of the Year during Maher’s tenure, highlighted by the school’s most recent winner, former women’s lacrosse player Erica Evans in 2017. Baseball student-athlete Connor Panas earned the award in back-to- back seasons in 2014 and 2015, while Katie (Miranto) Burd (softball) and Jenel Stevens (women’s basketball) were recognized in 2008 and 2003, respectively. Twenty-six Golden Griffins that have been drafted professionally since 2005–10 men’s lacrosse players and 16 baseball players. Former Canisius pitcher John Axford, the 2011 National League Rolaids Reliever of the Year, recently completed his decade-long career in the major leagues. Two hockey players have signed NHL contracts, including Cory Conacher, who was named the 2011–12 American Hockey League Rookie of the Year. In the spring of 2015, former Canisius men’s soccer player Asani Samuels, the school’s first three-time all-region honoree, became the first former Griff to sign a professional contract when he joined the Rochester Rhinos of the USL. Former men’s basketball captain Chris Manhertz plays for the Carolina Panthers in the National Football League. Canisius has added five varsity sports during Maher’s tenure, starting with the addition of women’s rowing in 2011–12. Canisius also added indoor and outdoor track for men and women during the 2013–14 athletic calendar. During Maher’s tenure, the Canisius athletic facilities have undergone a number of renovations and branding initiatives. In 2007, the College opened the Center for Athletic Training; a facility which is widely regarded as one of the premier on-campus athletic training facilities in the MAAC. New locker rooms were constructed for all women’s teams and finished in 2008 while the men and women’s basketball teams each moved to new locker rooms in the summer of 2009. The Demske Sports Complex received a $1.7 million facelift with the installation of new A-Turf as well as new scoreboards in 2008. New offices for head coaches and their assistants, along with new locker rooms for all of the men’s

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