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Cleveland State guard D’Aundray Brown, an Ursuline High grad and preseason first team All-Horizon League selection, is averaging 11.6 points, 4.9 rebounds and a league-best 2.5 steals per game for CSU (17-4, 7-2), which will play at Youngstown State on Saturday.
Ursuline’s D’Aundray Brown has recovered
for a strong bonus season for CSU
By Joe Scalzo
With his hand in a cast and his senior year wiped out with injury, Cleveland State guard D’Aundray Brown spent last season on the end of the bench, watching his teammates earn a share of the Horizon League title and grab a spot in the NIT.
With so little separating CSU from co-champions Milwaukee and eventual national runner-up Butler, it was hard for the Vikings not to wonder, “What could Brown do for us?”
“Last year hurt a lot,” said Brown, an Ursuline High graduate who is now a redshirt senior for the Vikings. “It feels really good to be back, especially after having basketball taken away from me.
“But I know everything happens for a reason and I’m excited to be back on the floor.”
Brown, a preseason first team All-Horizon League selection, is averaging 11.6 points, 4.9 rebounds and a league-best 2.5 steals per game for CSU (17-4, 7-2), which will play at Youngstown State on Saturday.
“It’s a really important game,” said Brown, whose team lost to YSU 73-67 on Dec. 31. “Every conference game is important, especially when you’re playing a team that beat you on your home court.
“And it’s always a good feeling to go back home, to a gym I’m familiar with, where my high school is right across the street.”
Brown was a first team All-Ohioan as a senior at Ursuline, averaging 22.3 points per game for the Irish, who fell to Campbell in a Division III district final that is remembered as one of the best games in Mahoning Valley history.
“That game still hurts me to this day,” said Brown, who scored 32 points with 10 rebounds in the 69-63 loss. “It was a great game.”
YSU didn’t offer Brown a scholarship, a decision the coaching staff later admitted was a mistake.
When asked if he would have considered the Penguins, Brown said, “I would have considered any Division I basketball school that offered me a scholarship.
“But I feel good about the situation I ended up in and I really love Cleveland State and the coaching staff.”
So there’s no chip on your shoulder?
“Oh, no,” he said. “I don’t even think about that. The only chip on my shoulder is that they beat us on our home court. We just want to get another win, especially a conference win.”
Brown, who is an internship short of earning his sports management degree, said he hopes to keep playing basketball after graduation.
“That’s every kid’s dream,” he said. “Hopefully I’ll get that opportunity.”
Until then, he’s focused on his last season of college basketball — and, most likely, his last chance to play in Youngstown.
“It’s going to be a hostile environment,” he said. “I’ll have a lot of family there and I’m expecting a packed house and a rowdy crowd.”