PHOTO COURTESY OF RACHEL ZUCKERMAN ’19
On Friday, Mar. 8, 2019, the Hamilton College men’s basketball team took on #9-ranked Christopher Newport in the third round of the NCAA Championship tournament. After winning both the first (vs. Penn State Behrend, 72–70) and second (vs. Moravian, 83–72) round games on their home court at Margaret Bundy Scott Field House, the team was hoping to continue its winning ways and advance to the tournament’s Elite Eight round. Unfortunately, the Continentals came up just short in a hard-fought loss to Christopher Newport, 75–67.
It marked not the end of a great 2018–19 campaign for the men’s team but also the end of some of the senior’s collegiate basketball careers. For Peter Hoffmann ’19 and Michael Grassey ’19, however, there was another chapter ahead.
The Sports Changes Life Foundation’s Victory Scholar Program selected Hoffmann and Grassey to the program’s Class of 2020 following their graduation from Hamilton. The Victory Scholar Program, which is based in Ireland, offers recent student-athlete graduates the opportunity to continue with their studies and basketball careers. The 22 student-athletes selected this year are not only playing competitively at different universities and clubs in Ireland, but are also given the chance to study for a postgraduate degree and participate in community outreach programs, where they serve as community role models.
The main goal of the program is to allow the graduates to work with the local population and through their service work while offering the opportunity to continue playing basketball and pursuing academic studies.
Hoffmann and Grassey say they are excited to see what Ireland has to offer both academically and athletically. At Hamilton, they each majored in Public Policy. On the court, the two helped the Continentals win 76 games over the course of their careers and both 1,000 point scorers — Hoffman scored 1,488 points and Grassey scored 1,204 points. Hoffman also finished with 110 blocked shots and 500 rebounds. Grassey ended his Hamilton career with 186 made three pointers and 654 rebounds.
According to the Hamilton College Athletics website, in the 2018–18 season, Hoffman and Grassey “helped lead the Continentals to a 25–5 record as the team tied for first place in the NESCAC regular season standings for the second straight year, advanced to the conference championship final, and hosted the first four rounds of the NCAA tournament.”
Hoffman was awarded the College’s Riffle Award at the 2019 Jack B. Riffle Senior Varsity Athlete Ceremony. He is now studying at Cork Institute of Technology in Cork, Ireland, while Grassey ’19 is studying at Waterford Institute of Technology in Waterford, Ireland.
The dynamic’s duos accomplishments are already etched into Hamilton athletic history and the community will no doubt be watching to see what they will now accomplish abroad.
