BREAKING NEWS!

Okay, so we've known for a while, but it's official. WRGW will travel to Denver to cover the Democratic National Convention. I'll be going along with Jesse Regis, last year's political reporter. Be on the lookout for more details!

Post CI Briefs

We hope that you future freshmen had a nice time visiting GW. It won’t be quite like that when you come back in the fall – we promise! If you’re still interested in joining the news team and didn’t find the WRGW table at the student org fairs, we would love to have you! Just send me an email at wrgwnewsdirector (at) gmail.com.

• If you haven't heard, we have a new mascot. Little George is a thing of the past and now it’s just plain “George.” The new George is made of felt instead of the paper-maché. Little George is renovated every year, but Spirit coordinator Nicole Early-Macchione told the Hatchet that after twenty years, "it was getting to the point where there was nothing else we could do. We had to say goodbye." Photo courtesy of the Hatchet.

• The men’s basketball schedule is out. From the WRGW Sports blog:

HOME GAMES: Charlotte, Dayton, Fordham, La Salle, Rhode Island, Richmond, St. Bonaventure, Temple

AWAY GAMES: Charlotte, Duquesne, La Salle, Massachusetts, Richmond, Saint Joseph's, Saint Louis, Xavier

Charlotte, Richmond and LaSalle are the three teams the Colonials play home and home's against and the schedule lends itself to some winnable home games with Fordham, LaSalle, St. Bonaventure and Richmond all coming to the Smith Center.
The Colonials also get Dayton, URI and Temple at home avoiding the UD arena, the Ryan Center and the Liacouras Center. GW will be on the road against Xavier, UMass and St. Joe's who are playing this season in the Palestra while construction is done on Alumni Hall.

• The University has raised $1 million for the Smith Center renovations – so they’re one-tenth of the way there. If you remember back to February 14th, President Knapp announced that the Smith and Kogod families had given $10 million towards the renovation of the Smith Center - under some stipulations. The University must match the $10 million from other donors. The University will pay the remaining amount to complete the project. The remodeled Smith Center will feature an academic center for student-athletes, improved seating in the arena, new locker rooms, remodeled office space, enhanced training facilities, a renovated pool area as well as a new main entrance, box office and concessions concourse. The renovation project is expected to take three years, during which time the building will remain open. Check out the design concept here.

• I’m not sure why most of these updates are sports related, but DC has a new tennis team. The Washington Kastles. But what do Kastles have to do with DC? Not much, but the owner of the team, Mark Ein is the founder of Kastle Systems, a security system. The team includes a few big names – like Serena Williams and Justin Gimelstob. But be forewarned - this isn't normal tennis. The Kastles are part of the World Team Tennis Leauge. The style of play is quite different from regular tennis – the points of each game are counted from 1 to 3, instead of 15-30-40. They play five sets, each won by only five games, in various combinations of singles and doubles in a single evening. Also, cheering and noise are encouraged at WTT matches. The season is only a month long with eleven games played. Intrigued? Their next match is tomorrow against the NY Sportimes. If you want to check them out, they play at a new stadium on the old convention center site and ticket information can be found here.

• And just for fun – the world might be coming to an end. The Post reported today that 17 ducks were found dead in the capitol reflecting pool. Pretty creepy stuff.

-Mallory Thompson