It’s not physically possible to see and do everything, but new Cleveland State assistant coach Steve Lanpher has come awfully close, at least in college basketball terms. He’s been a Division I hea…

Something about playing Robert Morris brings big moments out of Cleveland State midfielder Tom Mertz. Back on October 11th, his goal with one second remaining salvaged a 1-1 draw with the Colonials…

In one of those feel-good “everyone plays and everyone contributes” outings that happen once or twice per season, Cleveland State returned to the Wolstein Center on Wednesday night to d…

Whenever I fly somewhere, I always take a moment to examine the giant “departures” board, that airport staple doing its honest best to document every outbound flight on gigantic LED screens. The co…

In a contest that largely defies clean explanation, Cleveland State overcame a slow start, a resulting 12-point second-quarter deficit, Colbi Maples’ severe foul trouble, and a staggering 32 turnov…

In Cleveland State’s much-anticipated opening night with a largely-rebuilt roster, the Vikings clocked a dominant 71-49 win over Chicago State on Monday to begin the 2025-26 season on a positive no…

College soccer season begins in the sweltering heat of August, when water breaks are often required, and Krenzler Field spectators struggle to focus on matches with the relentless sun looming a sti…

Cleveland Rocks Whether it began with the Hough riots, the 1969 Cuyahoga River fire – the most notorious of several similar incidents – or, more broadly, its place as an avatar for Rust Belt decay …

Cleveland State’s men’s soccer team is now 6-2-6 overall and alone in first place in the Horizon League, with a 4-0-3 conference mark. The Vikings also carry an active 11-game unbeaten streak, with…

Back in August, Cleveland State’s board of trustees voted to begin negotiations to re-develop the Wolstein Center into a 15,000-seat soccer stadium. What does that mean for Vikings basketball…

Kiefer Haffey is a Southeast Michigan lifer who understands how fortunate he is to be the new head coach at Detroit Mercy. “There are not a lot of opportunities where you get to be a Division I hea…

Though she’s only 35 years old, Chandler McCabe has already seen a lot of places and done a lot of things. Originally from Orlando, the Robert Morris head coach won a state championship at Bishop M…

Chris Kielsmeier has no idea what the outside expectations concerning his 2025-26 Cleveland State team are likely to be. That’s not to say that he doesn’t know what they might be, he just isn’t sure which well-worn narrative will take hold before the ball is tipped in November. And there are several. Such are the fickle nature of expectations, unscientific calculations that attempt to synthesize known pieces of information, like a team’s recent performance and lists of incoming and outgoing student-athletes, then produce a guide to the unknowable.

Last season, Milwaukee found itself in an extremely unfamiliar position: last place. UWM has generally been a consistently-strong program and a postseason regular – including a 2020-21 campaign that saw a share of the Horizon League regular season title, and a demolition of Drake in the first round of the WNIT – so last place is about as acceptable in Cream City as Anheuser-Busch.

Maddy Skorupski had an outstanding case for the Horizon League’s Player of the Year award last season. As it was, she made the all-conference first team as a junior, thanks to finishing third in the HL in scoring (16.3), sixth in assists (3.1), and first in steals (2.8). The only thing that kept her from the league’s highest individual award was, arguably, her Oakland team’s 9-22 record.

Projecting the Horizon League for the coming season is primarily an exercise in trust. After all, last year’s top three teams, Green Bay, Purdue Fort Wayne, and Cleveland State, were each battered by high-profile departures, whether through graduation or the transfer portal. So really, anyone attempting to place those schools for 2025-26 is first answering a fundamental question: how much do you trust the team’s coaching staff and established legacy to execute an instant rebuild?

Chris Kielsmeier had a quick reply to what should have been a tough question: who does he need to step into a much bigger role during the upcoming season? Such a query has no shortage of possible o…

Whether fair or not, at least part of the story of Cleveland State’s 2024-25 women’s basketball season concerns disappointment. The Vikings, for the first time in program history, were voted as the…

New Cleveland State post players Izzi Zingaro and Laurel Rockwood have received overwhelmingly-positive reviews through their summer and preseason workouts, offering the promise that the Vikings wi…

After arriving in town for her freshman year of college in mid-August, Cleveland State women’s tennis player Laura Tapia tried her best to get settled in quickly. That can be a weighty transition f…

Welcome back to the #HLWBB Starting Five, your sporadic offseason rundown of news and fun from around Horizon League women’s basketball. 1. Money Since March, when the Horizon League and its member…

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In 2026, the Horizon League tournaments will be the beginning of the end. Or, more accurately, the beginning of a new end. The conference will substantially revise its playoff schedule in the comin…

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Welcome back to the #HLWBB Starting Five, your sporadic offseason rundown of news and fun from around Horizon League women’s basketball. 1. Style On Friday, Robert Morris shared their new navy jers…