Arizona
Oakland star Trey Townsend has decided where he’ll play his final season
The Trey Townsend mystery tour has reached its final destintation.
Townsend, who starred for Oakland for four years and recently helped lead the Golden Grizzlies to the best season in program history, will finish his college career at the University of Arizona. Townsend and Oakland head coach Greg Kampe both confirmed Townsend’s next stop to The News on Wednesday.
Townsend, 21, had made multiple official visits as one of the hottest transfer targets on the market, including to Arizona and Ohio State. His final choice came down to those two schools.
Townsend also made an unofficial visit to Michigan, to meet with new head coach Dusty May, and he spoke on the phone with Michigan State head coach Tom Izzo, but he canceled his visit to East Lansing this week. Michigan State was interested in both Townsend and fellow forward Frankie Fidler from the University of Omaha; Fidler committed to Michigan State on Tuesday, a day after Townsend’s visit to MSU was canceled.
Townsend had significant interest from at least a dozen other schools at the power-conference level.
At Arizona, Townsend will help fill the void left by forward Keshad Johnson, who averaged 11.5 points and 5.9 rebounds as a senior. Johnson is expected to be a second-round pick in the NBA Draft.
Townsend, 6-foot-6 and 225 pounds, is coming off a stellar fourth season at Oakland, averaging 17.3 points and 8.1 rebounds in being named the Horizon League player of the year. He also was named MVP of the Horizon League tournament, after scoring 38 in a championship-game victory over Milwaukee to earn the Golden Grizzlies their first trip to the NCAA Tournament since 2011. In the NCAA Tournament, Townsend posted double-doubles in a win over Kentucky and an overtime loss over N.C. State, to draw significant interest in the transfer market.
Townsend is an Oxford native whose parents, Skip and Nicole Leigh, both played basketball at Oakland. Since the age of 8, Townsend wanted to play for Kampe, and he did for four years. He earned his degree, and his No. 4 someday will hang from the rafters at the O’Rena.
After this season ended, Townsend declared for the NBA Draft and hired an agent, to test the process, but he always was expected to play a fifth collegiate season and take advantage of his Name, Image and Likeness opportunities. Townsend, who averaged 16.5 points as a junior and 13.3 points as a sophomore, was expected to get an NIL deal worth well into the six figures by transferring to a power conference.
Arizona, coached by Tommy Lloyd, will play in the Big 12 Conference next season. The Wildcats are coming off an appearance in the Sweet 16, falling to Clemson as a No. 2 seed.
Townsend, who was named the Lou Henson Award winner as the top mid-major player in college basketball, is one of several big roster losses for Oakland this offseason, along with Blake Lampman, Jack Gohlke and Rocket Watts, who have graduated and have exhausted their college eligibility.
tpaul@detroitnews.com
@tonypaul1984
Arizona
Arizona State’s Season At Crossroads Following Letdown Loss
TEMPE — The 2025 Arizona State Sun Devils have officially joined the ranks of confounding sports teams based in the Phoenix area following a 24-16 loss to the Houston Cougars.
The third season of the Kenny Dillingham era began with such promise – as the team was ranked 11th in the AP preseason poll and many expected the team to be improved on both sides of the ball – at least as the season progressed.
Now the season is officially at an inflection point following a performance that screamed regression in response to one of the program’s biggest wins in years over Texas Tech.
While many will put the brunt of responsibility for the loss on uneven officiating or the absence of Jordyn Tyson, Dillingham ultimately doesn’t subscribe to it – stating that the team simply did not play well enough as a whole to secure a victory.
“Yeah. I mean, you’re losing the number one pick in his position in the college football so that’s obviously, you know, pretty critical for your football team when you’re losing. You know him, is that an excuse? Heck no, we didn’t play good enough to win. You know, maybe, if he played, maybe we have survived not playing good enough to win. But that doesn’t mean we played good enough to win.
You know, you got to look at the facts, and the facts are, we lost turnover battle. We had too many penalties. We lost field position. We couldn’t stop the plus one run game. And does have nothing to do with Jordyn and but, yes, not having Jordyn Tyson 100% is going to have an effect on the football game, right? But that’s not an excuse to why we lost the football game.”
The Sun Devil program now has to re-calibrate ahead of a road game against their 2024 Big 12 title game opponent in Iowa State – several areas of the squad have to be cleaned up in the week ahead, from special teams in lieu of another subpar showing, to the run defense – who ceded 111 yards on the ground to Houston QB Conner Weigman after getting torched by Utah QB Devon Dampier just two weeks prior.
The Sun Devils no longer have the ability to control their own destiny in the Big 12 – they now need Cincinnati and BYU to drop at least two games, as well as Utah to lose another game, Houston to drop one of their remaining four games, and potentially even more to have a shot at defending their Big 12 title. This is truly a crossroads in their season – but should this season be considered a failure if the team falls short? It remains to be seen, but stay tuned with Arizona State on SI in the meantime over the final four games of the regular season.
Read more on why the Arizona State men’s basketball team will exceed expectations in the 2025-26 season here, and on three major takeaways from the win over Texas Tech here.
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Arizona
Two hikers struck by lightning while taking photos from peak of Arizona mountain
FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. — Two hikers were rescued from the peak of a mountain in northern Arizona after being struck by lightning on Tuesday.
The Coconino County Sheriff’s Office confirmed the rescue, saying the hikers were saved from the summit of Humphreys Peak.
On Tuesday, the sheriff’s deputies received a call from two male hikers who told officers they had been struck by lightning.
Surprisingly, the two stranded hikers didn’t know each other and were from Flagstaff and Canada.
They were taking photos while at the summit of the mountain when they were hit by lightning, the sheriff’s office confirmed.
Search-and-rescue teams were immediately deployed to the trailhead.
Officials state they requested aircraft support but were denied due to severe weather, including lightning, hail, and heavy rain.
According to the sheriff’s office, rescue teams used two UTV vehicles to reach the victims before completing the rest of the rescue on foot.
“He reported that the other injured hiker had been unable to continue and had stopped near the saddle between Humphreys and Agassiz Peaks, roughly 0.7 miles farther up the trail at 11,800 feet,” read a press release from the Coconino County Sheriff’s Office.
First responders had to use a litter carry-out to extract the second victim since he was unable to walk due to the steep terrain and his physical condition.
Both hikers were successfully taken to the Incident Command Post in the area, where an ambulance then drove them both to Flagstaff Medical Center for treatment and observation.
According to the National Weather Service, lightning kills about 20 people in the U.S. each year, and hundreds more are severely injured.
Lightning strikes occur about 25 million times a year in the U.S.
Arizona
Woman killed in crash near Lake Pleasant near Peoria
PHOENIX — State Route 74 was closed in both directions near Lake Pleasant in Peoria on Thursday afternoon due to a crash that killed a woman.
The Arizona Department of Transportation (ADOT) said the highway closed at about 1:15 p.m.
The closure was put into place at Lake Pleasant Parkway for the westbound lanes and 87th Avenue for the eastbound lanes.
ADOT did not say when SR74 is expected to reopen.
UPDATE: SR 74 is closed in both directions (WB: Lake Pleasant Pkwy, EB: 87th Avenue) with no estimated reopening time. For current road conditions, check the following:
🖥 https://t.co/3l4R4g60mW
📱 Apple: https://t.co/YMcnUEeWQs
📱 Android: https://t.co/9oINS4ymQP— Arizona DOT (@ArizonaDOT) October 23, 2025
The Peoria Police Department told KTAR News 92.3 FM that two vehicles collided and a woman was pronounced dead at the scene.
No other details were released.
Get the latest KTAR News 92.3 FM traffic alerts sent straight to your phone by texting “TRAFFIC” to 620620.
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