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CUNY’s finest hoopsters set for Goodwill Tour

The first-ever Goodwill Basketball Tour is set to bring the finest players from the City University of New York Athletic Conference to the Dominican Republic for an eight-day trip showcasing the talent and diversity of the conference’s student athlet

The trip begins on Tuesday, Aug. 5, as the team heads from New York to Santo Domingo for a three-game stint against club teams in the Dominican Republic. The squad, made up of a conference all-star men’s basketball team, also will hold clinics for local children from the city of La Romana. At least one of the team’s games, also held in La Romana, is expected to be televised by a local Dominican television station.

“This is a great opportunity for us to show another area of the world what CUNY students are made of,” said Dr. Harold Merritt, the athletic director at the College of Staten Island, who will serve as the head coach of the team.

“Our goal is to go down there and win some games, but just as important is our objective to serve as role models and ambassadors of the CUNY system,” he said. “We want to emphasize the positive role that athletics can play in higher education.”

The team is made up of some of the best players in the CUNY system, including Michael Stewart from the College of Staten Island, the CUNYAC Player of the Year. The 6-foot-1 junior guard averaged 19.2 points and 4.7 rebounds per game this past season. He led the conference in free-throw shooting, connecting for 84 percent from the charity stripe. He also ranked second in the conference in three-point field goal percentage, knocking down 41 percent of his attempts from beyond the arc.

The CUNY squad also boasts a couple of Dominican Republic natives in John Jay’s Pablo Palma and Lehman College’s Luis Chavez. For Chavez, who came to the United States from the Dominican Republic five years ago, the tour represents a chance to go home and play ball in front of family and friends.

“My family is still in the Dominican,” said Chavez, a math major who lives in Queens with his aunt and uncle. “I don’t want to say I’m scared, but all my friends and family will be at the games. It will be exciting to play in front of them.”

Other CUNY schools are well-represented on the roster. In addition to Stewart and Chavez, the roster includes guards Jeffrey Jean-Baptiste (Brooklyn College), Joe Longobardi (Baruch), Lorcan Precious (Hunter) and Ricardo Reimers (Hunter). The front court players will include Garry Etienne (Baruch), Steve Jean (BMCC), Kwesi Liverpool (York) and Michael Nebavlakis (Staten Island).

The coaching staff includes Merritt, who served as head coach at Division I Northern Arizona from 1990 to 1994, Baruch College head coach Ray Rankis and Medgar Evers head coach George Moore.

The Goodwill Tour was made possible through outstanding financial and logistical support from CUNY Vice Chancellor Dr. Otis Hill and his staff at CUNY Central. Daily updates from the tour will be available on the CUNYAC Web site, www.cuny.edu/sports.