Dan Weber’s Just Sayin’: Looking at 2025 and liking what we see from Northern Kentucky

Time to take a look ahead as 2025 rolls in for sports here in Northern Kentucky. And so we will. Seems like a good time with the colleges moving into conference basketball and the high schools heading into more regional play.

But January is just our starting point. We’re looking ahead to the whole year here.

• How about we see that NKU men’s basketball, as Coach Darrin Horn always says, proves that all that matters are those “three games in March” when it’s Horizon Tournament time in Indianapolis. Great way for grad student Trey Robinson to finish up his career here and Sam Vinson to complete his comeback season by earning another spot in the NCAA Tournament.

• For Thomas More, without the star-power of back-to-back All-Americans Ryan Batte and Reid Jolly, the hope here is that Justin Ray’s young guys have enough time to coalesce and develop as a group and get through the GMAC and on to the NCAA division II tourney the way TMU always seemed to in the Mid-South on their way to the NAIA nationals.

• As for high school hoops here, Lloyd Memorial led by 17.9 scorer EJ Walker, the 6-foot-8 South Carolina commit, and Covington Catholic, with sharpshooter Athens McGillis – a pair of two-loss teams — look like the first ones to step up. Both have been on the road and out of state and playing tough competition for Lloyd, under Mike Walker and CovCath, under new coach Jake Thelen in the Ninth Region. Although we’re waiting to see if the arrival of Cooper transfer Jamil Rondon gets Newport’s Wildcats off the dime and back on top behind their big guys and Coach Rod Snapp. Whoever gets going, just don’t count Tim Sullivan’s Cooper guys out. The good news here is that whatever you’re looking for, you’ll get a tournament time preview as Lloyd heads to CovCath Friday for an early showdown. And no matter who you root for, it’s time again for Northern Kentucky to produce a team that can make a run in the Sweet 16.

• For the girls, with four of Kentucky’s top 11 teams – according to MaxPreps — calling Northern Kentucky home, there are plenty of ways to go with No. 3 Notre Dame (8-1), No. 6 Cooper (6-2), No. 8 Holy Cross (8-1) and No. 11 Simon Kenton (9-2). Here’s one way to root: With Simon Kenton in the Eighth Region, pull for the Pioneers and whichever one of the three Ninth Region teams that emerges to have a pair of rooting interests in the Sweet 16.

• With spring bringing baseball and softball, it’s way too early to single out any teams but the one hope here is that when the Ninth Region teams hit Lexington this year, they also figure out how to hit the ball. And with Ryle sophomore AJ Curry, whose 72 hits in 41 games (a .571 average) were tops in the state and CovCath’s Jackson Reardon No. 5 with 56 hits in 37 games (.463), there should be a chance of that happening. Same for the girls who return two of the state’s top dozen hitters in Walton-Verona’s Danielle Oldfield, whose .711 average topped the state while Scott’s Emerson Morman was No. 12 at .582.

• As for the Florence Y’alls, it’s time to retool the roster for Manager Chad Rhoades after a couple of underwater seasons (44-51, tied for 10th in the Frontier League last year and 38-58, good for 13th in the league in 2023. Still, the fans come out for what is a fun-filled experience from mid-May to the end of August. In 2024 and 2023, the Y’alls drew a total of 212,329 fans – an average of some 2,190 fans a game and good for sixth in the 16-team league both years.

• Northern Kentucky’s other play-for-pay guys – senior golfer Steve Flesch out of CovCath, UK and Union; veteran MLB catcher and team leader Luke Maile, also out of CovCath and UK; and Oakland Raider tight end Michael Mayer, also out of CovCath by way of an All-American career at Notre Dame and Holy Cross alum and Covington native Derrick Barnes, who has missed much of the Detroit Lions’ season – his fourth in the NFL — with a knee injury – give fans here someone to root for in the spring, summer and fall.

Flesch, 57, has won $18,662,025 in his career including a best-ever year in 2004 when he won $2,649,287. He’s won $6,282,135 on the Champions Tour with four tourney wins and 31 top 10 finishes. Maile, 33, is a free agent after two years with the Reds in a career with Tampa Bay, Toronto, Pittsburgh, Milwaukee and Cleveland and seems to have a future as a coach/manager when he retires.  His first cousin, Mayer, will be headed into his third season in the NFL after a second year interrupted by a six-game leave of absence from the team and now seven games back after “figuring some things out,” Mayer was quoted this weekend as the Raiders’ blocking, not so much pass-catching, tight end. Barnes, a free agent after this season, has said he could see returning to Detroit next year.

• Moving into the fall, the hope here is that the new football facilities for Dayton and Bellevue do as much good for those two neighbors with the last grass fields in Northern Kentucky and 178 years of history on their old playing fields as the new football facilities the last two years have down for Ludlow and Newport. Right behind them will be Newport Central Catholic after the dedication of its under-construction football facility on Thoroughbred Hill. All told, with all the facilities’ improvements, the three schools have dedicated more than $30 million for these athletic projects.

• And finally, we’re back to the fall where so many of Northern Kentucky’s top prospects from 2024 will return for 2025 on a number of teams with real shots at state championships. Both state finalists from Union, Ryle in Class 6A and Cooper in 5A, return players who could challenge for Kentucky’s Mr. Football in Ryle running back/linebacker Jacob Savage and Cooper quarterback Cam O’Hara aided by Ryle’s Nathan Verax at quarterback and Cooper’s multi-positioned Ryker Campbell. CovCath and Highlands will each return this year’s quarterbacks and team leaders in the Colonels’ Cash Harney and Highlands’ Rio Litmer with Dylan Gaiser giving CovCath a dynamic running back and Tayden Lorenzen giving Highlands a big-time tight end. As for Class 2A state champ Beechwood, speedy sophomores Tyler Fryman and Nathan Pabst return and that’s a tough matchup for the rest of the state. There’s a chance here to win more than the one state title Northern Kentucky did this year.

Contact Dan Weber at [email protected]. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter, @dweber3440.