Rutgers Athletics Weekly Roundup - Summer Friday Edition

It’s a summer Friday and a heat wave is approaching the east coast. Despite the school year being done for about a month now, there is still plenty of new regarding Rutgers athletics this time of year. Let’s catch up on some notable news items from yesterday, as well as recapping things that previously occurred this week.

Ronnie James Ends Football Career

We start with some sad news, as once promising Rutgers football player Ronnie James is retiring from the game due to “too many concussions”. He made a statement on his private Instagram account, but Ryan Dunleavy of NJ Advance Media covered the full story below. The former 3-star recruit who held an offer from Ohio State and is the brother of former Rutgers star Paul James told Dunleavy he will continue his academic career at the school. We wish him the best and hopefully he can find another role one day working in the game he loves. From a roster perspective, this certainly hurts the depth at linebacker for Rutgers.

CJ Gettys Signs Pro Contract Overseas

Fan favorite and starting center from last season’s men’s basketball team, CJ Gettys, has signed a pro contract in England with the Cheshire Phoenix of the British Basketball League. It’s been around for 30 years and there are 12 teams, with the league schedule played from September through April. We wish CJ the best of luck in his pro career!

Men’s Basketball Summer Workouts

With summer in full swing, the men’s basketball team began their offseason practice schedule and as always, the program did a great job featuring activities on social media. Below is a cool ‘motion in stills” video, as well as a short highlight film from their first team workout. Seeing Corey Sanders, as well as newcomer Souf Mensah, are welcomed sights in the Rutgers backcourt. There is still one open scholarship for next season.

Football Practice Fields Making Progress

Back in December, prominent Rutgers boosters Jeff and Amy Towers donated a major gift to the football program for new practice fields to be constructed. Jeff Towers has been updating the progress periodically on twitter and below is the most recent one. I also included the tweet from Rutgers Football back in December that gives a virtual tour of what the facility will look like completed. It will be fun for fans to see this vision in completion during visits to High Point Solutions Stadium for games this fall. Thanks again to the Towers family for this tremendous addition to the football program.

McCourty Twins Fundraiser

Last weekend, Eric LeGrand successfully raised over $100K during his 7th annual A Walk To Believe 5K Run/Walk Event. This weekend, Devin and Jason McCourty are holding their Tackle Sickle Cell 5K event in Jersey City. For more details, click here.

Additional News & Notes

This has been a busy week in Rutgers athletics news, so here are some links to stories we covered so you can catch up.

Chris Mirabelli earned First Team All-American status in the Javelin at the NCAA Outdoor Championships. The two-time Big Ten champ had the best year of his career and set and re-set the school record several times. He is primed to return for a big senior season next year.

John Tsimis announced Wednesday night on social media that he will be playing at FCS school Towson next season as a graduate transfer. We wish the receiver well in his continued football and academic career.

The ACC/Big Ten Challenge matchups were announced yesterday and Rutgers will host Florida State at the RAC in November next season. For a full review of the schedule that’s been assembled so far, click here.

Former Rutgers football player Chris Muller signed a free agent contract with the Denver Broncos, joining fellow Scarlet Knights Quentin Gause and Kevin Snyder.

We started this post with football and we will end with it as well. Kickoff times for the month of September for next season are now set, as Rutgers avoided the dreaded noon start time for all three non-conference home games this season. That’s a reason to be happy, as the season kicks off twelve weeks from today!

Have a great summer weekend everyone!