Roman Catholic Vs Neumann Goretti Basketball

CBS Sports and Turner Sports have US television rights to the tournament. As part of a cycle that began in 2016, TBS televised the 2022 Final Four and the national championship game. The Final Four and title game broadcasts were the last CBS Sports assignments for longtime director Bob Fishman, who retired from CBS Sports after 47 years (and 50 with CBS) and has been a director on 39 of the 40 Final Fours CBS/Turner have carried. The 2022 Tournament was Mark Emmert final season as the NCAA President with Charlie Baker succeeding him starting in 2023.A major upset occurred on the first full day of the tournament, when 15-seed Saint Peter’s upset 2-seed Kentucky, and subsequently became the third 15-seed to reach the Sweet 16 (the second consecutive year in which this occurred and third in the last nine years) and the first ever 15-seed to advance to the Elite Eight. This was the tenth time a 15-seed defeated a 2-seed overall, but it was the sixth time since 2012 this occurred. The defending champions Baylor were defeated by North Carolina in the second round, ensuring the defending champion and at least one top seed was eliminated before the regional semifinals for the fifth consecutive tournament, and at least one double-digit seed (this year, four: 15-seed Saint Peter’s, 11-seeds Michigan and Iowa State, and 10-seed Miami) made the Sweet 16 for the 15th straight tournament. Also, when Kansas defeated Providence in the Sweet 16, the Jayhawks passed Kentucky for the most all time wins by a Division I program, with 2,354. The top four teams outside of the ranking (commonly known as the “first four out” in pre-tournament analyses) acted as standbys in the event a school is forced to withdraw before the start of the tournament due to COVID-19 protocols. Any recipient of an automatic bid would designate a replacement from within their own conference if they need to withdraw. Otherwise, the replacement teams were as follows, in order: Once the tournament starts, any team that is forced to withdraw will not be replaced; the bracket will not be reseeded, and the affected team’s opponent will automatically advance to the next round.Eight teams (the four lowest-seeded automatic qualifiers and the four lowest-seeded at-large teams) played in the First Four. The winners of these games advanced to the main bracket of the tournament.

The 2022 NCAA Division I men’s basketball tournament involved 68 teams playing in a single-elimination tournament that determined the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I men’s college basketball national champion for the 2021–22 season. The 83rd annual edition of the tournament began on March 15, 2022, and concluded with the championship game on April 4 at the Caesars Superdome in New Orleans, Louisiana, with the Kansas Jayhawks defeating the North Carolina Tar Heels, 72–69, overcoming a 16 point first half deficit (the largest deficit overcome in championship game history), to claim the school’s fourth national title.After the 2020 tournament was cancelled and the 2021 tournament was held in a single location due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it was reverted to the standard format for the first time since 2019.

Per the NCAA, “Upsets are defined as when the winner of the game was seeded five or more places lower than the team it defeated.” The 2022 tournament saw a total of 13 upsets; 6 of them were in the first round, 5 of them were in the second round, one in the Sweet Sixteen, none in the Elite Eight, and one in the Final Four.Big South Conference champion Longwood and Northeast Conference (NEC) champion Bryant made their tournament debuts. Bryant was eliminated in the First Four by Wright State, and Longwood was eliminated by Tennessee in the first round.

In his book, Donohue also wrote the following: “The Forward, a Jewish weekly, published an editorial in 2004 saying it was merely a ‘sociological observation’ to note that ‘Jews run Hollywood.’ The newspaper quite rightly said that to say ‘the Jews run Hollywood’ is an entirely different matter, one that smacks of anti-Semitism. So it concluded that ‘No, ‘the Jews’ don’t run Hollywood. But Jews do, just as Koreans predominate in New York dry-cleaning and blacks rule in basketball.'”

Donohue said, in October 2009, that the Catholic Church has a “homosexual”, not a “pedophilia”, problem, citing the John Jay Report. The Catholic League has blamed the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), for having “hired, hidden, defended, enabled, ignored and concealed the crimes of child molesters.” The Catholic League defended attacking SNAP on the grounds that they were “a menace to the Catholic Church.”The league under Donohue’s leadership is criticized for its conservatism and for its combative responses to high-profile media stories. Besides education campaigns, the group issues condemnations, initiates boycotts and protests, defends priests against accusations of child sexual abuse, fights proposed legislation and threatens legal action against what it sees as bigotry against Catholics, irreverence against religious figures, and attacks on Catholic dogma. However, the Catholic League stresses that “it does not speak authoritatively for the Church as a whole.”

Donohue has been asked to respond to Smith’s position many times. He argues that “if the acts were of a homosexual nature, and we know they were, it does not matter what the self-perception of the victimizers were.”When President Barack Obama named gay activist Harry Knox to the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships in 2009, Donohue termed Knox “an anti-Catholic bigot who has called the pope a liar.”

In a statement issued by her publicist, Griffin responded to the denouncement by the Catholic League with a question: “Am I the only Catholic left with a sense of humor?”Smith said that several of the protests occurred before the film was even finished, suggesting that the protests were more about media attention for the groups than for whatever was controversial about the film. The Catholic League’s main complaints were that the film’s main character is supposedly a descendant of Mary, who happens to work in an abortion clinic, which were seen as ironic conventions for a Catholic. The film’s distributor, Miramax, removed its name from the production, and hired attorney Dan Petrocelli to defend it publicly. Petrocelli accused Donohue of trying to stir a violent reaction to the film. Donohue responded by taking out an op-ed ad in the New York Times on September 12, 1999, saying that the comments were an attempt to stifle his free speech.

The Irish politician and child rape victim Colm O’Gorman was highly critical of such statements made by Donohue on the Irish radio show The Last Word. O’Gorman later wrote that Donohue’s analysis was shockingly “simplistic”.The Catholic League is a lay Catholic organization that is independent of the Catholic Church. However, it is listed in The Official Catholic Directory (see the Miscellaneous section under the Archdiocese of New York). According to a New York Times interviewer, the organization “maintains close ties to the New York Archdiocese leadership. Several bishops make personal donations. John Cardinal O’Connor spoke at the group’s 25th anniversary reception in 1998 and vacated part of his suite for its expanding operations, said Joseph Zwilling, a spokesman for the Archdiocese of New York.” The league includes on its website endorsements from many prominent clerics. The Catholic League has taken a stand against anything they perceive as anti-Catholic, including the entertainment industry, certain art exhibits, school programs for sex education, government-funded contraception and abortion, media bias, restrictions against anti-abortion activism, and restrictions on religious schools. It publishes a journal, Catalyst, and operates a website. The league was founded in Milwaukee on May 12, 1973, by Virgil Blum. Blum served as president of the Catholic League until 1988. John Tierney served as president from October 1990 to 1993.The Catholic League says it is politically neutral, which is mostly required of non-profits. The website states, “The League wishes to be neither left nor right, liberal or conservative, revolutionary or reactionary.” Although often characterized as conservative the league has at times been at odds with conservative figures and organizations. For example, they criticized the anti-illegal immigration group, the Minutemen, for opposing a San Diego priest’s facilitation of employment for Latino immigrants and for condemning the church as a whole in public statements about the matter. The Catholic League also condemned pastor and televangelist John Hagee for what they called “anti-Catholic hate speech” and called upon John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign to renounce this alleged bigotry.

As part of a two-month protest campaign, Donohue called for a boycott of the film The Golden Compass, believing that while the religious elements of the film would be “watered down” from the source novels, the film would still encourage children to read the series, which Donohue says “denigrates Christianity” and promotes “atheism for kids”, citing author Philip Pullman as saying that he is “trying to undermine the basis of Christian belief.” Donohue hopes that “the film [will fail] to meet box office expectations and that [Pullman’s] books attract few buyers.” The call for a boycott resulted in action by some Catholic groups in the US and Canada, and a Catholic school board in Ontario has ordered the source novel removed from its library shelves. Pullman has since said that the books do not have a religious agenda, saying of Donohue’s call for a boycott, “Why don’t we trust readers? Why don’t we trust filmgoers? Oh, it causes me to shake my head with sorrow that such nitwits could be loose in the world.” Pullman described the Catholic League as “a tiny, unrepresentative organisation,” suggesting that “the only person Bill Donohue represents is himself.”Since 1993, the league has been led by its board of directors president, Bill Donohue, who works with a small number of organizational staffers. In a 1999 New York Times article, a reporter said Donohue is pragmatic in regards to religion, “media savvy” and “steers clear of divisive debates on theological doctrines and secular politics”. The article said Donohue “fans simmering anger with inflammatory news releases, a Web site and newsletter” with “scathing attacks on the blasphemous and the irreverent”. In a 2007 interview, Salon Life staff writer Rebecca Traister discussed Donohue with Frances Kissling, former head of the organization Catholics for Choice, which opposes Catholic teaching on abortion, who characterized Donohue as “abusive”, and stated she avoided doing media interviews with him for this reason.In Donohue’s book, Secular Sabotage: How Liberals Are Destroying Religion and Culture in America, he responded to what he believed was misrepresentation of his comments via taking them out of context. For example, in that same interview, he said the following: “You have got secular Jews. You have got a lot of ex-Catholic priests who hate the Catholic Church, wacko Protestants in the same group.” Later in the debate, in that same segment of the interview, he said, “There are secularists from every ethnic and religious stock,” emphasizing that when people talk about Hollywood, they are “talking mostly about secular Jews.”After US President George W. Bush used the term “Holidays” instead of “Christmas” on the White House 2005 Christmas cards, Donohue stated “The Bush administration has suffered a loss of will and … they have capitulated to the worst elements in our culture.”

Donohue’s position on this controversy was spelled out in a 31-page booklet, “The Golden Compass: Agenda Unmasked”. It details his objections to what he said were Pullman’s anti-Catholic comments, his books, and the movie.Founded in 1973 by the Jesuit priest Virgil Blum, the Catholic League was formed to counter discrimination against Catholics in American government and popular culture. The low-profile group initiated public education campaigns and some lawsuits. In 1993 the group became much more aggressive with a new president, the former sociology professor Bill Donohue, who also increased its size to become the largest Catholic advocacy organization in the US. The Catholic League is known for press releases about what it views as anti-Catholic and anti-Christian themes in mass media. On September 8, 2007, Kathy Griffin won her first Emmy for season two of reality show Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D-List. Griffin stirred up controversy with her acceptance speech, saying that “a lot of people come up here and thank Jesus for this award. I want you to know that no one had less to do with this award than Jesus. He didn’t help me a bit.” She went on to hold up her Emmy and say, “Suck it, Jesus, this award is my god now!” In 1997, Donohue declared the ABC show Nothing Sacred as deeply offensive to Catholicism, although not anti-Catholic in the traditional sense. Calling for a boycott, he stated that the show portrayed Catholics with a traditional view as cold or cruel while glorifying more the maverick, irreverent voices in the community. However, the show was defended by some Catholics and had been written with the consultation of Jesuits, from which it later won the Humanitas Prize. Many Catholics agreed with him that the show was hostile to the beliefs and values of the Catholic Church, and ABC canceled Nothing Sacred after less than a season, reportedly for poor ratings. Observers think Donohue may have played a significant role in the show’s rapid demise as advertisers often become leery of shows deemed “controversial”. With regard to the controversy, Henry Herx, director of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Office of Film and Broadcast (successor to the National Legion of Decency), emphasized that the Catholic League is not an official agency of the church. Other evangelical groups, such as The Christian Film and Television Commission, adopted a “wait-and-see” approach to the film before deciding upon any action, as did the Roman Catholic Church in Britain. The New York Times reported that the Catholic League had 11,000 members when Donohue took over the group in 1993. By 1999, membership had grown to 350,000, two-thirds of whom were paying members. This is the last estimate of overall membership that the league made. The league’s 2003 statement showed 15,000 members in Nassau and Suffolk counties of New York alone. Annual donations entitle members to home delivery of the print version of Catalyst, the group’s monthly journal, which is also available for free on the Catholic League’s website.

Her remarks were quickly condemned by Donohue, who urged the TV academy to “denounce Griffin’s obscene and blasphemous comment.” After the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences decided to censor Griffin’s remark, Donohue said, “The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences reacted responsibly to our criticism of Kathy Griffin’s verbal assault on 85 percent of the US population. The ball is now in Griffin’s court. The self-described ‘complete militant atheist’ needs to make a swift and unequivocal apology to Christians. If she does, she will get this issue behind her. If she does not, she will be remembered as a foul-mouthed bigot for the rest of her life.”The year 1999 saw the release of Kevin Smith’s controversial film Dogma. Smith was a practicing Catholic, as Kevin Smith confirmed in an interview on the film’s DVD. Several religious groups, especially the Catholic League, said the film was anti-Catholic and blasphemous, and organized protests, including one that took place at the November 12 premiere of the film at Lincoln Center in New York City.

Since the Ryan Report was released, Donohue has been defending the church and saying that much of the outrage is “moral hysteria”. While stating that he agrees that rape and physical abuse are wrong and that he would not defend those actions, he says the report has conflated these abuses with “lesser” forms of punishment and is therefore not as serious. He also says many of the purported forms of abuse found by the commission were present and acceptable in the time period.According to Donohue, this prediction proved to be false. The movie did so poorly at the box office, Donohue says, that Pullman decided not to go forward with the sequels and blamed Donohue for his decision.

After the complaints, Marcotte wrote, “The Christian version of the virgin birth is generally interpreted as super-patriarchal where God is viewed as so powerful he can impregnate without befouling himself by touching a woman, and women are nothing but vessels.” After Marcotte parted with the campaign, Donohue stated, “It is not enough that one foul-mouthed anti-Christian bigot, Amanda Marcotte, has quit. Melissa McEwan must go as well. Either Edwards shows her the door or she bolts on her own. There is no third choice – the Catholic League will see to it that this issue won’t go away.” He continued, “The Edwards campaign is in total disarray and the meltdown will continue unless McEwan is removed from his staff. The fact that Marcotte had to quit suggests that Edwards doesn’t have the guts to do what is morally right.” McEwan resigned on February 13, 2007, citing the hostility of the Catholic League and emails threatening rape and murder.The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, often shortened to the Catholic League, is an American Catholic organization whose stated purpose is to “defend the right of Catholics – lay and clergy alike – to participate in American public life without defamation or discrimination.” The Catholic League states that it is “motivated by the letter and the spirit of the First Amendment … to safeguard both the religious freedom rights and the free speech rights of Catholics whenever and wherever they are threatened.” According to the Encyclopedia of American Religion and Politics, the league “is regarded by many as the preeminent organization representing the views of American lay Catholics.”

When the Los Angeles Dodgers planned their annual Pride Night in 2023, they invited the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, a charity group of gay men who dress up as nuns to bring attention to sexual intolerance and gender. The team received backlash from the Catholic League, Sen. Marco Rubio, and Catholic Vote, who sent a letter to commissioner Rob Manfred comparing the group’s performances to blackface. The Dodgers subsequently disinvited the group, likely owing to the large Catholic population of the city. In response, the Los Angeles LGBT Center, the ACLU, County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, City Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez, State Senator Scott Wiener, and the Sisters called for the group to be reinvited, and the LGBT Center and LA Pride backed out of Pride Night. The nearby Los Angeles Angels even promised to invite the group to their Pride Night instead. However, the Dodgers reversed their decision on May 22, 2023 and announced the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence were once again welcome at the event. The group accepted the team’s apology.In July 2008, a controversy arose surrounding a Communion rite altercation involving Webster Cook, a student and member of the University of Central Florida (UCF) student senate. Cook attended a Catholic Mass on campus and was given the Eucharist but walked out without consuming it. This action was allegedly related to his protest of the use of public funds for organized worship in the student union hall. According to Donohue, Cook’s actions were a form of desecration of the sacrament. Cook was proposed for censure by the student senate and was criticized by local media. He also received numerous death threats.

The Catholic League accused Myers of anti-Catholic bigotry and asked UMM and the Minnesota State Legislature to take action against Myers. Myers then also received threats and hate mail. The Catholic League also called for Cook to be expelled from the university, with Donohue describing his confiscation of the Eucharist as a hate crime as well as a form of kidnapping. Donohue also accused those who supported Cook of anti-Catholic bigotry, and sent a letter to the UCF asking them to take legal action against Cook. A week after the initial communion Cook apologized and returned the Host. The Catholic League, however, continued to lobby the university for his expulsion.Donohue demanded that John Edwards fire two of his presidential campaign staffers in February 2007, charging that they were “anti-Catholic, vulgar, trash-talking bigots.” He cited a blog written by Amanda Marcotte regarding the church’s opposition to birth control, saying it forces women “to bear more tithing Catholics”. He also cited another posting called “Pope and Fascists”. Donohue also objected to one of the staffers describing President Bush’s “wingnut Christofacist base”.

In November 2010, a portion of a video by the late artist David Wojnarowicz, which was included in an exhibit focused on gay-themed art, “Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture” at the National Portrait Gallery, was removed after complaints from the Catholic League. Columnist Frank Rich said of the intervention and removal that the Smithsonian had been “bullied by bigots” and quoted the Los Angeles Times art critic, Christopher Knight, to the same effect. Tracing the evolution of the issue, Rich cited a piece by Kriston Capps which in turn said “the role of Penny Starr remains hazy. [However, a]…reporter and conservative advocate, [Starr] deserves much credit for both instigating” the negative attention to the piece of art amongst a number in the show.

Donohue called the statements “incendiary” and “inflammatory”, saying, “It’s scurrilous and has no place being part of someone’s resume who’s going to work for a potential presidential contender.” On February 8, John Edwards addressed the writings of the staffers, Amanda Marcotte and Melissa McEwan, saying “that kind of intolerant language will not be permitted from anyone on my campaign, whether it’s intended as satire, humor or anything else.” Donohue insisted that Edwards fire the pair immediately.

In March 2007, a sculpture created by the Italian-Canadian artist Cosimo Cavallaro was to be displayed at Manhattan’s Roger Smith Hotel. The sculpture, entitled “My Sweet Lord”, was of a crucified Christ, nude, in molded chocolate. Although the artist says he is a practicing Catholic, Bill Donohue decried the work as “hate speech”, “garbage”, and “one of the worst assaults on Christian sensibilities ever,” describing Cavallaro as a “loser artist” and telling him in a television interview on Anderson Cooper 360, “You’re lucky I’m not like the Taliban, because you would lose more than your head.” Under the leadership of Donohue, the Catholic League organized a boycott of the hotel aimed at forcing it to remove the statue. The hotel’s management stating that the protests “brought to our attention the unintended reaction of you and other conscientious friends”, eventually agreed to the league’s calls, prompting the curator of the gallery, Matt Semler, to resign in protest. Semler said the six-foot sculpture was the victim of “a strong-arming from people who haven’t seen the show, seen what we’re doing. They jumped to conclusions completely contrary to our intentions.” Responding to David Kertzer’s book and Alfred Uhry’s play about the Mortara case, in which a Jewish boy was kidnapped on the order of the Supreme Sacred Congregation of the Roman and Universal Inquisition, the Catholic League charged: “Whether it’s based on fact or fiction, or whether it’s portrayed on the stage or on the screen, the Catholic bashers are a busy lot these days. They are as good at twisting the facts as they are at developing fictional accounts. Truth doesn’t matter. What matters is results.”

On his blog Pharyngula, biologist and University of Minnesota Morris (UMM) professor PZ Myers publicly expressed support for Cook as well as outrage that Fox News appeared to be inciting readers to cause further problems for the student. Myers invited readers to acquire some consecrated Eucharistic Hosts, which he described as “crackers”, for him to treat “with profound disrespect.”Christian Leftist John Swomley criticized the Catholic League as the “most dangerous of the far-right organizations.” Donohue has been called “right-wing” and “a conservative reactionary who wants to undo the work of Vatican II and suppress varying opinions within the Church.”

After trailing for most of the first and second quarters, NG’s Wright, who finished with 13 points, hit a step back three-pointer, tying the game at 29 in the third. The momentum then shifted for the Saints, who took a 35-31 lead to end the third.But with time winding down, the free-throw battle became crucial. Roman hit two freebies, taking a 55-52 lead with 9.7 seconds left. The Saints, however, missed their pair on their next possession.

The senior point guard, who led Roman with 20 points, knew his Cahillites were taking home the Philadelphia Catholic League title over defending champion Neumann Goretti. And after he hit both free throws, sealing a 57-52 victory, he was right.

While leading 48-45 in the fourth quarter, Neumann missed a free throw, giving Roman one last possession. With 2.6 seconds on the clock, the crowd erupted as Brown hit a three to tie the game, 48-48, sending it into overtime.Roman’s Jermai Stewart-Herring, who finished with 10 points, hit a crucial three to open OT. But Neumann Goretti’s Robert Wright III, a top recruit in the class of 2024, came back with a follow off teammate Bruce Smith’s attempted corner three, a spot from where he went 2-of-4.

“As good as they are, I think they struggle a little bit against pressure and our zone pressure got them a little bit,” he said. “That got us in the driver’s seat and we’re a good frontrunning team with our guards. And then Sultan can be a force when he wants to be. Sometimes he’s his own worst enemy on offense. He’s been a great rebounder all year and he’s a very good shot blocker. He anchors our defense and what’s amazing is he had all those rebounds and blocks and he was still guarding people on the perimeter all night.“We talk about that great game we had with them in 2014 and we know they’re organized and a couple of those kids can really shoot,” Arrigale said. “We were just hoping we could bother those guys enough so they would miss some shots and we could get rebounds and spread the floor.”

Pulieri, who finished with 16 points, scored in the lane to make it 45-35 in the final minute of the third quarter, but the Saints got the last field goal of the period and the first five of the fourth stanza to go up 17. The Eastern Pennsylvania Conference and District 11 champs battled as hard as they could, but ultimately encountered the same fate as other D11 champs did on Saturday when West Catholic wore down Executive Education and Roman Catholic pulled away from Parkland in quarterfinal-round games. But Adewale answered with a three-point play and then scored back-to-back baskets off rebounds and it was 39-30 and Goretti began to punch its ticket for Thursday’s state final at Hershey’s Giant Center.Robert Wright III closes the first quarter with a layup. He has 9 and @NGSaintsHoops leads @ACCHSVikings 18-10 after 8 minutes. pic.twitter.com/yUzJZAxQLT

Asked if they had a chance to play Goretti again and could do something differently, senior Nico Pulieri said: “We’d have to box out better. They got too many offensive rebounds. [Adewale] scored a lot of their points off second chances. He was a huge factor.”“We had a difficult time rebounding the ball,” Csensits said. “We’ve been able to overcome our lack of length and size on a number of occasions this year, but whenever we needed a big stop, they’d miss a shot but still get two or three attempts at their end.” “I told them I’ve been at this a long time and I know what a team looks like that’s ready to go win a game and I told them I didn’t see that team. It looked like they didn’t care. But it picked up at the end of practice, and I felt a little better.” “I’d have to go back and look at the tape,” he said. “Sometimes what you see during the game isn’t always the case. I thought it was a high-paced game and very physical. But I don’t think [the officiating] made any difference in the basketball game.”Robert Wright III, the Pennsylvania Gatorade Player of the Year and a Baylor commit as a junior, didn’t disappoint. He scored 24 points and finished off the Vikings with 10 points in the final period. He also sprinkled in several assists and steals and took over the game in subtle ways.

“Our four seniors mean an awful lot to our program,” Csensits said. “They had a lot of success on the floor, but more importantly they represented Central Catholic in a first-class manner. They’re going to be missed.”And there was plenty to feel good about in that accomplishment even after the Vikings were denied in their bid to get back to Hershey’s Giant Center on Thursday night for the PIAA Class 4A championship game.

Ashley-Wright 2-2 0-0 5, Wright III 10-19 4-6 24, Myers 3-12 2-3 9, Guokas 0-0 0-0 0, Adewale 6-9 3-5 15, Williams 5-12 0-0 15, Smith 0-6 0-0 0. Totals 26-60 9-14 67.But in a game that has been taken over by guards and 3-point shooting, the biggest factor was a big. Goretti has its own Sultan of Swat in 6-foot-8 senior center Sultan Adewale who scored 15 points, collected 12 rebounds and had at least a half-dozen blocks. If he didn’t block every shot, he at least altered most.

The Vikings needed to play as close to a perfect game as possible to have a chance against the Philadelphia Catholic League champs. They were far from perfect and the athleticism, size and strength of the Saints took their toll.

Before heading to the bus, Csensits spread the praise around to his players, especially his four seniors — Pulieri, Anthony Jones, Griffin Patridge and Alistair Stewart-SmithSUPER SENIORS @ACCHSVikings had 4 seniors. But my first interview before the season was with Nico Pulieri and Anthony Jones. Fitting that my last interview of the season is with the same two guys. pic.twitter.com/4OU0X9AY6W

Trailing 30-23 at halftime, the Vikings had another burst to start the second half and got within 32-30 on a Jahrel Vigo basket with 5:49 remaining in the third period. The dynamic Vigo, who will be one of the players to watch next season, finished with a team-high 17 points and collected eight rebounds.Cook 2-2 0-0 4, Fridia 0-0 0-0 0, Spinosa 0-0 0-0 0, Csensits 0-0 0-0 0, Pulieri 7-14 1-2 16, Davis 1-2 0-0 2, Jones 1-4 0-0 2, Patridge 0-2 0-0 0, Vigo 8-13 1-4 17, Mushrush 3-8 0-0 8, A. Stewart-Smith 0-1 0-0 0. Totals 22-46 2-6 49.

“We want Neumann!” the Cahillites’ crew chanted when it was clear their squad would vanquish Archbishop Wood. A few hours later, as triumph crystalized in overtime against West Catholic, Saints fans chanted, “We want Roman!”Arrigale won the first two. McNesby won the last two, including back-to-back titles in 2015 and 2016. The success of both schools, however, runs much deeper. In total, Roman owns a league-best 32 championships while Neumann Goretti has 22.

He also owns a Catholic League record with a 73-game winning streak that included the playoffs and regular season. He has taken teams to the PCL semifinals 20 times. Wednesday night, several former Saints were in attendance, including Ja’Quan Newton, Troy Harper, Quade Green, and Jamal Custis. Monday’s finale will mark the 18th time Arrigale has taken a team to the title game.That loss marked just the third time since 1968 that an undefeated regular-season champ had lost before the semis. Roman, led by junior guard Maalik Wayns, had gone 14-0 in league play that season.“I know our fans think it’s on the schedule,” he joked, “but it’s not. I can tell you it’s not. It’s hard to get here and the fact that we’ve been here that many times, I’m proud of it, but it’s always more fun when you win. So we’ll see what happens on Monday.”

The Saints (21-2, 12-1) needed overtime to hold off the Burrs, who used a putback by senior guard Amyr Walker as time expired in regulation to force the extra stanza. Senior forward Sultan Adewale led the Saints with 18 points, 12 rebounds, and 5 blocked shots. Junior guard Robert Wright, the league’s leading scorer in the regular season, finished with 15 points, 10 rebounds, and 6 assists.As victory neared in Game 1 of Wednesday’s Catholic League boys’ semifinals at the Palestra, the Roman Catholic student section, clad in purple, pointed their fingers at the Neumann Goretti student section and shouted a familiar refrain. Roman’s size and savvy proved too much for the Vikings. Senior guard Xzayvier Brown, who has signed with St. Joseph’s University, led the Cahillites with 22 points, while fellow senior Jermai Stewart-Herring added 13. Sophomore forward Shareef Jackson, the son of Roman alum Marc Jackson, added eight points and helped dominate down low. Junior guard Jalil Bethea, who was named league MVP this season, led Wood with 22 points. The Saints, however, started a new streak the following season, winning the first of what became six consecutive titles from 2009-14. That run equaled Roman’s record reign from 1989-94 under Dennis Seddon.“He’s up there with all of them,” McNesby said of Brown. “As a coach, when you have a point guard who can run the team, run the offense, doesn’t turn it over, and shares it, he makes it a lot easier as a coach. I’m a better coach because of him.”

Meanwhile, Spain, fighting at the behest of the emperor’s successor and son, Ferdinand III, and later under Leopold I, mounted counter-attacks and invaded French territory, threatening Paris in 1636. However, the French recovered, and fighting between the French-Protestant alliance and the forces of Spain and the Holy Roman Empire were at a stalemate for the next several years.Thus, the French entered the conflict in 1635. However, at least initially, their armies were unable to make inroads against the forces of Ferdinand II, even after he died of old age in 1637.

At around the same time, French monarch Louis XIII died, leaving the throne to his 5-year-old son, Louis XIV, and creating a leadership vacuum in Paris.Weakened by the fighting, for example, Spain lost its grip over Portugal and the Dutch republic. The peace accords also granted increased autonomy to the former Holy Roman Empire states in German-speaking central Europe.

Still, the Holy Roman Empire may have controlled much of Europe at the time, though it was essentially a collection of semi-autonomous states or fiefdoms. The emperor, from the House of Habsburg, had limited authority over their governance.

The Thirty Years’ War was a 17th-century religious conflict fought primarily in central Europe. It remains one of the longest and most brutal wars in human history, with more than 8 million casualties resulting from military battles as well as from the famine and disease caused by the conflict. The war lasted from 1618 to 1648, starting as a battle among the Catholic and Protestant states that formed the Holy Roman Empire. However, as the Thirty Years’ War evolved, it became less about religion and more about which group would ultimately govern Europe. In the end, the conflict changed the geopolitical face of Europe and the role of religion and nation-states in society.Ultimately, though, historians believe the Peace of Westphalia laid the groundwork for the formation of the modern nation-state, establishing fixed boundaries for the countries involved in the fighting and effectively decreeing that residents of a state were subject to the laws of that state and not to those of any other institution, secular or religious.

But after Ferdinand’s decree on religion, the Bohemian nobility in present-day Austria and the Czech Republic rejected Ferdinand II and showed their displeasure by throwing his representatives out of a window at Prague Castle in 1618.We strive for accuracy and fairness. But if you see something that doesn’t look right, click here to contact us! HISTORY reviews and updates its content regularly to ensure it is complete and accurate.

Even with help from soldiers from Scotland, however, the armies of Denmark-Norway fell to the forces of Ferdinand II, ceding much of northern Europe to the emperor.Using military assistance of Bohemian nobleman Albrecht von Wallenstein, who provided his army of an estimated 50,000 soldiers to Ferdinand II in exchange for the freedom to plunder any captured territory, began to respond and, by 1635, the Swedes were vanquished.One of Ferdinand II’s first actions was to force citizens of the empire to adhere to Roman Catholicism, even though religious freedom had been granted as part of the Peace of Augsburg.The war also fostered a fear of the “other” in communities across the European continent, and caused an increased distrust among those of different ethnicities and religious faiths – sentiments that persist to some degree to this day.This radically altered the balance of power in Europe and resulted in reduced influence over political affairs for the Catholic Church, as well as other religious groups. HISTORY.com works with a wide range of writers and editors to create accurate and informative content. All articles are regularly reviewed and updated by the HISTORY.com team. Articles with the “HISTORY.com Editors” byline have been written or edited by the HISTORY.com editors, including Amanda Onion, Missy Sullivan, Matt Mullen and Christian Zapata. To the west, the Spanish army aligned with the so-called Catholic League, nation-states in present-day Germany, Belgium and France, who supported Ferdinand II. At least initially, Ferdinand II’s forces were successful, quelling the rebellion to the east and in northern Austria, leading to the dissolution of the Protestant Union. However, fighting continued to the west, where Denmark-Norway’s King Christian IV threw his support behind the Protestant states. The resulting treaty, the so-called Peace of Prague, protected the territories of the Lutheran/Calvinist rulers of northeastern Germany, but not those of the south and west in present-day Austria and the Czech Republic. With religious and political tensions in the latter regions remaining high, fighting continued.As brutal as the fighting was in the Thirty Years’ War, hundreds of thousands died as a result of famine caused by the conflict as well as an epidemic of typhus, a disease that spread rapidly in areas particularly torn apart by the violence. Historians also believe the first European witch hunts began during the war, as a suspicious populace attributed the suffering throughout Europe at the time to “spiritual” causes.

The first stage of the Thirty Years’ War, the so-called Bohemian Revolt, began in 1618 and marked the beginning of a truly continental conflict. Over the first decade-plus of fighting, the Bohemian nobility formed alliances with the Protestant Union states in what is now Germany, while Ferdinand II sought the support of his Catholic nephew, King Phillip IV of Spain.But in 1630, Sweden, under the leadership of Gustavus Adolphus, took the side of the northern Protestants and joined the fight, with its army helping to push Catholic forces back and regain much of the lost territory lost by the Protestant Union.

Over the ensuing years, the French army had several notable victories, but also suffered significant defeats, particularly at the Battle of Herbsthausen in 1645. Also in 1645, the Swedes attacked Vienna, but were unable to capture the city from the Holy Roman Empire.The next year, in the Battle of Prague – the last significant fighting in the Thirty Years’ War – the Swedes captured Prague Castle from the forces of the Holy Roman Empire (and looted the priceless art collection in the castle), but were unable to take the bulk of the city.

In 1640, the Portuguese began to revolt against their Spanish rulers, thereby weakening their military efforts on behalf of the Holy Roman Empire. Two years later, the Swedes re-entered the fray, further weakening Habsburg forces. The so-called Defenestration of Prague (fenestration: the windows and doors in a building) was the beginning of open revolt in the Bohemian states – who had the backing of Sweden and Denmark-Norway – and the beginning of the Thirty Years’ War. Signed in 1555 as a keystone of the Reformation, the Peace of Augsburg’s key tenet was “whose realm, his religion,” which allowed the princes of states within the realm to adopt either Lutheranism/Calvinism or Catholicism within their respective domains.

The next year, 1643, was pivotal in the decades-long conflict. That year, Denmark-Norway took up arms again, this time fighting on the side of the Habsburgs and the Holy Roman Empire.Reigns was soon joined by his twin cousins (and fellow members of the Anoa‘i family) Jimmy and Jey Uso (Jonathan and Joshua Fatu), who interfered on his behalf to help him win matches. They even got involved in the main event match of WrestleMania 37, in which Reigns defeated both WWE hall of famer Edge (Adam Copeland) and beloved grappler Daniel Bryan (Bryan Danielson) by pinning them at the same time. In 2021 Reigns once again wrestled in the main event of WrestleMania, this time defeating his archrival Lesnar for the WWE Championship. After winning both major championships in WWE, Reigns was declared the undisputed WWE Universal Champion.

Reigns and his cousins became a faction known as The Bloodline. The Bloodline’s Uso twins frequently helped Reigns cheat so that he could win his high-profile matches, keeping him as the dominant champion. The group eventually recruited other members of the Anoa‘i family, and the Bloodline’s many deceptions and betrayals were regarded by many as some of best storytelling ever seen in professional wrestling.Born into a renowned American Samoan wrestling family, Anoa‘i was surrounded by ring legends. His father, Sika, was one half of the Wild Samoans tag team, and he counted among his extended family a number of wrestling greats and WWE stars such as Rikishi (Solofa Fatu, Jr.), Yokozuna (Rodney Anoa‘i), and, perhaps the most famous member of the Anoa‘i dynasty, Dwayne (“The Rock”) Johnson.The popularity of Reigns and The Bloodline story line led WWE to its most financially successful period in company history to date. Viewership of the wrestling brand was higher than ever, as WrestleMania 38 was the most viewed event in WWE history. Reigns became the de facto face of the company in marketing and on merchandise, and he made promotional appearances on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon on NBC and Conan on TBS. His reign as the undisputed WWE Universal Champion was compared to the historic reigns of wrestling legends Hulk Hogan (Terry Bollea) and Bruno Sammartino. Cody Rhodes sought to end Reigns’s historic title run at WrestleMania 39, but Reigns was able to stave off the challenge.

Later that year, Reigns once again returned to WWE, but his character now had a more villainous persona. Having aligned himself with notorious wrestling manager and advocate Paul Heyman, Reigns acted in a confrontational manner, threatening and manipulating those around him as though he were leading a criminal empire. He declared himself “The Tribal Chief” and “The Head of the Table,” which would stick as new nicknames for him. Reigns regained the WWE Universal Championship in Payback 2020 when he defeated WWE superstars Bray (“The Fiend”) Wyatt (Windham Rotunda) and Braun Strowman (Adam Scherr) in a Triple Threat Match. He would go on to defeat several other notable opponents, including John Cena, Kevin Owens, and Drew McIntyre (Andrew McLean Galloway IV).That same year The Shield broke up with a shocking story line in which Roman was betrayed by his stablemate Rollins. The resulting story line would lead Roman Reigns to becoming a main event player in WWE, a position cemented with his win in the Royal Rumble match in early 2015. Although now portrayed as a WWE hero, Reigns proved to be a polarizing figure when it came to crowd reactions. Many members of the wrestling fandom felt that his ascension had been rushed and attributed his early success to his familial connections. His appearances were met with some of the loudest reactions among the WWE roster, as dueling chants of support and derision erupted from the crowds during his matches. His rise was tempered by his failure to secure the WWE Championship in the main event match at WrestleMania 31 against former UFC star Brock Lesnar; both men lost when Reign’s rival Seth Rollins invaded the match and won instead. Despite this initial setback, later that year Reigns won the WWE Survivor Series Championship by defeating his former stablemate Dean Ambrose. He would go on to compete successfully in other WrestleMania main events, including against WWE hall of famers such as Triple H (Paul Levesque) and The Undertaker (Mark Calaway).

However, despite growing up in a family of grapplers, his first athletic endeavours were in American football. After playing in high school, Anoa‘i played college football as a defensive tackle for the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets. He was undrafted in the 2007 NFL draft and was later signed and subsequently released by both the Minnesota Vikings and the Jacksonville Jaguars without having played in any regular season games. He eventually landed in the Canadian Football League as a member of the Edmonton Eskimos (now the Edmonton Elks) but was released by that team in 2008.

Roman Reigns, byname of Leati Joseph Anoa‘i, (born May 25, 1985, Pensacola, Florida, U.S.), American professional wrestler, athlete, and actor. He is best known for holding multiple championships in World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) as one of the company’s most notable stars.In addition to his late-night television appearances, Reigns began an acting career. He appeared in the 2019 film Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw alongside his cousin Dwayne Johnson. In 2020 he appeared in the Netflix film The Wrong Missy, and he voiced characters in the animated TV series Elena of Avator (2020) and the family film Rumble (2021).Reigns would transition to WWE’s main roster as part of a stable (small alliance) known as The Shield alongside his fellow wrestlers Dean Ambrose (Jonathan Good [who later used the ring name Jon Moxley]) and fellow WWE mainstay Seth Rollins (Colby Lopez). The trio had an impactful debut at the 2012 Payback event, where they disrupted the main story line between CM Punk (Phillip Brooks) and Ryback (Ryback Reeves) to help Punk keep the title. In their first few years in WWE, the group was featured in a number of major story lines and won tag team and midcard titles. Although all three men were each popular in their own right, Reigns was the standout of the group, earning the nickname “The Big Dog.” In 2014 he was voted superstar of the year by fans in the WWE Slammy Awards poll. During the 16th century, a revolution began in Christianity. A German monk named Martin Luther became increasingly unhappy with corruption in the Catholic Church. Luther started a movement among Christians who believed authority should not belong to clergy, but to the laypeople and their study of the Bible. Followers of the Reformation were known as Protestants. As the reformation spread throughout Europe, it gained popularity in Switzerland. Thanks to the efforts of Huldrych Zwingli, Swiss people began to support the ideas of Protestantism. Following Zwingli, a Frenchman named John Calvin began a new form of Protestantism in Switzerland.As a member, you’ll also get unlimited access to over 88,000 lessons in math, English, science, history, and more. Plus, get practice tests, quizzes, and personalized coaching to help you succeed.