CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – After joining the Illinois women’s gymnastics program as an assistant coach in August 2024, Aja Sims-Fletcher will retain that position on head coach Josh Nilson‘s staff. Nilson was named the program’s head coach on Tuesday.

“When evaluating what our program needs to continue rising, Aja was the first person who came to mind,” Nilson said. “She commands excellence while creating a culture built on trust and integrity. Her athletes know she believes in them, challenges them, and supports them—qualities that are essential to sustained success.

“In this new era of Illinois Women’s Gymnastics, there is no better complement to my vision or coaching philosophy than Aja. She brings both elite-level experience and a deeply genuine, team-first approach. I couldn’t be more excited to build this next chapter with her by my side. We’re thrilled that Aja and her husband, Allen, are here to stay.”

“I’m incredibly excited to continue with the Illinois program and to work alongside Josh in his new role as head coach,” said Sims-Fletcher. “This past year, I saw firsthand the passion, vision, and leadership he brings to the gym every day. He truly cares about the growth of each athlete and the success of the team as a whole. I’m proud to be part of this next chapter and can’t wait to see what we accomplish together.”

In her first season with the Fighting Illini, Sims-Fletcher led the Orange and Blue to Round 2 at the 2025 NCAA Regionals. She helped freshman Chloe Cho become the third gymnast in program history to win Big Ten Freshman of the Year, while Cho was also an All-Big Ten First Team and Big Ten All-Freshman Team honoree under Sims-Fletcher’s guidance.

Prior to her time at Illinois, Sims-Fletcher spent one year as the inaugural head women’s gymnastics coach at Talladega College, where she became the second-ever HBCU gymnastics coach in the program’s debut season.

Sims-Fletcher competed collegiately at Alabama from 2014-17 as an all-arounder. She was a three-time All-American (first team twice, second team once) and a four-time NACGC/W Scholastic All-American during her career. She now holds a bachelor’s degree in kinesiology and exercise science, as well as a Master of Business Administration from the University of Alabama.

The Orlando, Fla., native has coached at various levels, including high school, club, and college, and was a volunteer assistant coach at her alma mater.

College football keeps changing — it happened again on Thursday.

After the first year of the 12-team playoff format, the 2025 College Football Playoff will feature a straight seeding format for the top squads as opposed to the previous campaign where four conference championship winners claimed the premier seeding with a first-round bye.

“After evaluating the first year of the 12-team playoff, the CFP Management Committee felt it was in the best interest of the game to make this adjustment,” executive director of the College Football Playoff Rich Clark said in a statement.

The Nittany Lions had one of, if not the most favorable draw in last year’s playoff. Despite losing the Big Ten championship to Oregon, Penn State was rewarded by having SMU and Boise State in its path to the College Football semifinal, who were arguably the two weakest teams in the field.

Oregon on the other hand didn’t have the same luck of the draw as Penn State. The Ducks’ first-round bye left them with a matchup with the soon-to-be national champions in Ohio State, which beat up on Dan Lanning’s team in a 41-21 Rose Bowl victory.

If the newly implemented seeding was in place last year, Penn State would’ve been the No. 4 seed, resulting in a first-round bye. It also meant the Nittany Lions would face the winner of Clemson vs. Notre Dame in the quarterfinal.

Penn State ultimately fell to the Fighting Irish in the semifinal with last year’s model, but the Tigers were arguably a stronger squad than both SMU and Boise State, led by quarterback Cade Klubnik, who’s in the conversation with Drew Allar as one of the top 2026 NFL Draft quarterbacks.

Oregon got screwed over by winning the Big Ten title, but it’s not like other conference-championship winners had any more luck as Arizona State, Georgia and Boise State joined the Ducks in losing their quarterfinal games.

Some of it you can chalk it up to luck of the draw, but the old format didn’t favor those that won the conference title, which is largely why straight seeding is being put in place.

“This change will continue to allow guaranteed access to the Playoff by rewarding teams for winning their conference championship, but it will also allow us to construct a postseason bracket that recognizes the best performance on the field during the entire regular season,” Clark said.

Not only does it benefit teams that win a conference championship, it benefits Power 4 schools with harder strength of schedules, namely the Big Ten and the SEC, as reports of the 2026 season’s format having 16 teams with both conferences getting four automatic qualifiers.

This in turn punishes the Group of Six conference champion as Boise State athletic director Jeramiah Dickey wrote on X saying the rule might as well be called the “Boise State policy.”

“When the system is created to keep you down, you fight like hell to break it,” Dickey said.

This new system also benefits Notre Dame. The Fighting Irish are independent, which Marcus Freeman and Co. take great pride in. There’s advantages to not playing a conference schedule, but there’s no longer the disadvantage of being ineligible for a first-round bye due to the inability of playing in a conference title game.

When Freeman and James Franklin sat a foot away from each other in their joint presser leading up to the Orange Bowl, the pair of coaches made their case. Freeman said it was part of the Notre Dame brand to be independent while Franklin said every team should be in a conference.

Franklin’s argument was there should be a need for “consistency” across college football. Now with the new format, Freeman’s comments don’t ring true anymore for the advantage that has been set up for Notre Dame.

“We know we can’t play in a championship game,” Freeman said. “We can’t have a first-round bye, but we continue to use not playing in Week 13 as our bye. And that’s the way we view it.”

The cliff notes is that this move benefits the top teams in the country, as it should’ve from the jump. It also creates an imbalance in power between the dominant conferences with futuristic changes in play with the potential 16-seed playoff.

The new model is another example of the ever-changing landscape of college football. Who knows what the format will look like a year from now, but in the meantime this is what’s in place.

It’s a moving target to figure out what’s best for college football with all the different pieces in play — just ask vice president for intercollegiate athletics Pat Kraft.

“I just think there’s a lot of things and nuances that may not be getting the attention,” Kraft said in February about the potential College Football Playoff expansion. “For us as practitioners and trying to operate this world, we need to better understand how that will work.”

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Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) has announced the full schedule of graduation ceremonies for the Class of 2025. Ceremonies will take place from late May through mid-June at venues across the region, including DAR Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C., the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC), the Xfinity Center at the University of Maryland in College Park, and several school campuses.

More than 12,000 students are expected to graduate from MCPS high schools this year. The ceremonies will recognize the accomplishments of the Class of 2025 and feature keynote speakers, performances, and the presentation of diplomas.

Some schools will hold ceremonies at their home campuses, while others will gather at major venues to accommodate large audiences. The schedule begins May 28 with Wheaton High School and concludes June 12 with Paint Branch and Clarksburg high schools.

Commencement Speakers

Several high-profile figures will take the stage as commencement speakers for Montgomery County Public Schools’ Class of 2025. Among them are elected officials such as Maryland Comptroller Brooke Lierman, Montgomery County Councilmembers Evan Glass, Natali Fani-Gonzalez and Will Jawando, and District Court Judge Zuberi Williams. Notable alumni returning to inspire graduates include NBC News correspondent Maya Eaglin (Blake High School), Olympic gold medalist Haley Skarupa (Wootton High School), and entrepreneur Caitlyn Kumi (Northwest High School). The lineup also features media personalities like Hillary Howard, host of It’s Academic, and Alex Tsironis, founder of The MoCo Show, as well as former NFL player Moise Fokou and NCAA track coach Noella Anyangwe. Their diverse experiences and local ties are expected to offer students encouragement and perspective as they celebrate this milestone.

2025 MCPS Graduation Schedule

May 28

• Wheaton High School – UMBC, 9 a.m. | Speaker: Terrell Zimmerman, Assistant Principal, WHS

May 29

• RICA – Home, 9 a.m. | Speaker: Isaiah Bolgiano, Former RICA Teacher
• Blair G. Ewing Program – Blake HS, 10 a.m. | Speaker: TBD
• Quince Orchard High School – UMBC, 2 p.m. | Speaker: Elizabeth (Beth) Thomas, Former Principal, QOHS
• Winston Churchill High School – UMBC, 9 a.m. | Speaker: Kami Crawford, Television Host, Podcast Host, Model, Actress, and Churchill HS Alumna

May 30

• Damascus High School – Home, 9 a.m. | Speaker: TBD
• Sherwood High School – UMBC, 9 a.m. | Speaker: Will Jawando, Montgomery County Council Executive Member
• Col. Zadok Magruder High School – DAR, 10 a.m. | Speaker: Alex Tsironis, Founder, The MoCo Show
• Albert Einstein High School – DAR, 2:30 p.m. | Speaker: Natali Fani-Gonzalez, Montgomery County Councilmember, District 6
• Seneca Valley High School – UMBC, 2 p.m. | Speaker: N/A

June 4

• Montgomery Blair High School – Xfinity Center, 9 a.m. | Speaker: Evan Glass, Montgomery County Councilmember
• Richard Montgomery High School – UMBC, 9 a.m. | Speaker: Hillary Howard, Host, It’s Academic
• Stephen Knolls School – Home, 10 a.m. | Speaker: Adriana Friedman, Transition Specialist, MCPS
• Gaithersburg High School – UMBC, 2 p.m. | Speaker: Sydney Montgomery, Entrepreneur
• Walter Johnson High School – Xfinity Center, 2 p.m. | Speaker: Clair Lipsitz, English Teacher, NHS Sponsor

June 5

• Northwest High School – UMBC, 9 a.m. | Speaker: Caitlyn Kumi, Founder of Miss EmpowHer, 2017 Graduate
• Poolesville High School – Mount St. Mary’s University, 10 a.m. | Speaker: Gene Stanton, PHS Teacher
• Rock Terrace School – Home, 10 a.m. | Speaker: Jordan Masker, Program Specialist, Carl Sandburg
• Watkins Mill High School – DAR, 10 a.m. | Speaker: Alex Tsironis, Founder, The MoCo Show

June 9

• Rockville High School – UMBC, 9 a.m. | Speaker: Zuberi Williams, Judge, District Court of Maryland
• Thomas S. Wootton High School – DAR, 10 a.m. | Speaker: Haley Skarupa, Wootton HS Alumna and 2018 Olympic Gold Medalist in Women’s Ice Hockey
• Longview School – Northwest HS, 10 a.m. | Speaker: Rebecca Leonard, Award-Winning Board Certified Clinical Specialist in Pediatric Physical Therapy
• Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School – UMBC, 2 p.m. | Speaker: Moise Fokou, Former NFL Player and B-CC HS Alumnus
• Walt Whitman High School – DAR, 2:30 p.m. | Speaker: Brooke Lierman, Comptroller of Maryland

June 11

• James H. Blake High School – UMBC, 9 a.m. | Speaker: Maya Eaglin, NBC News Correspondent
• John F. Kennedy High School – DAR, 10 a.m. | Speaker: Evan Glass, Montgomery County Councilmember
• Springbrook High School – UMBC, 2 p.m. | Speaker: Darren McLinton, CEO of McLinton Basketball Academy

June 12

• Clarksburg High School – UMBC, 9 a.m. | Speaker: Noella Anyangwe, Alumna and NCAA Track Coach
• Northwood High School – DAR, 10 a.m. | Speaker: Student Speakers, TBD
• Paint Branch High School – UMBC, 2 p.m. | Speaker: Will Jawando, Montgomery County Council Executive Member

Details for Model Learning Program and summer school graduations will be announced at a later date, according to MCPS.

For updates and more information about individual ceremonies, visit the MCPS graduation website.

KITTERY, Maine — Jane Durgin, principal of Robert W. Traip Academy, has announced the co-valedictorians and Latin Honor students from the Class of 2025. 

Nearly 50 years ago, at the age of 35, Linda Sinrod laced up her ice skates for the first time since graduating college. She had just been laid off from her job and decided to rekindle her passion for figure skating on an icy pond in Annandale. On the ice, she met the founder of a Northern Virginia women’s hockey team, the Washington Redcoats, who urged Sinrod to join. With zero ice hockey background but a love for competition, Sinrod thought why not? 

Last month, Sinrod hung up her skates for the last time, at age 84. She holds the Guinness World Record as the oldest woman to play ice hockey. 

Now, if you’re anything like us, you probably have lots of questions. How does an 84-year-old stay in shape to play competitive ice hockey? Did she ever get hurt? We sat down with Sinrod (who also happens to be the mother of New York Times chief White House correspondent Peter Baker) to hear her story—from her first day on that Annandale pond to her last day at the MedStar Iceplex. 

The following has been lightly edited for clarity and length. 

How and when did you originally start playing ice hockey?

Back in 1960, when I was a sophomore in college, my roommate was a figure skater and she got me into figure skating. That was the last that I skated until 1975, when one day I just decided to go out to the pond near the Northern Virginia Community College in Annandale. I started trying to do one of the jumps that I had done. That’s when Marylin Schnibbe came up to me and asked if I would play ice hockey. I was a member of one of the first and in fact the only [women’s] ice hockey team in the Washington area for our first year.

Tell me more about when you started playing for the Redcoats. And how did you come to love it? 

As soon as I started playing I loved it. I borrowed some equipment, including a hockey stick, which I had never used before. I had trouble learning how to stop. But, I just loved everything about it.

I was ten years older than the next oldest person playing. Some of them had even played ice hockey in college. After 10 years, I decided I was too old to play, so I quit. 

It wasn’t until I was 67 that I was retired [from her job] and decided to try to come back. I was looking up my old teammates and I found one who was coaching a team in Woodbridge, the Prince William Wildcats. So I contacted her.  

Why did you decide to get back on the ice at age 67?

Frankly, I was bored. When I looked up some of my old teammates, some of them were still playing. In fact, three of them still are. I said to myself, why not try again and see what happens?

What positions did you play?

I was always a left wing. When I was with the Washington Redcoats, which was the first team, we played all up and down the East Coast. With the Prince William Wildcats, we played teams up in Pennsylvania and down in North Carolina; we played all over the place.

In 2016, I was 17 years older than the next oldest player and they decided I wasn’t competitive enough—which I wasn’t. So, basically, they kicked me off the team.

How did that moment feel and how did you continue playing?

Well, obviously I was disappointed and a little hurt, because I had been with them for so long. But, I was already playing at the MedStar ice rink in an in-house league and we don’t play teams outside the ice rink. Originally, they divided us up into four teams. And each season they would re-pick the teams based on how well they skated. Now, they have eight teams out there. Anybody can play if they’re 18 or older and no skill level is required.

Did you ever get injured?

Well, three times, only one of which was serious. The first time, I had gone to a Can/Am Hockey training camp in 1977. One of the things they had us do—we were all women—we would hip-check each other, even though we don’t do that in a game. The winner was the person who lasted the longest. Well, at that time, my ice hockey pants were not as well cushioned as they should have been. I ended up with a broken tailbone.

The second time was the more serious one, and that was in February of 2009. I was practicing with the Wildcats and another girl and I backed into each other. I twisted my leg as I went down and hit the ice. I had a medial and a lateral meniscus tear of my left knee, and that required surgery. It was about five or six months before I could come back and play.

The last one was funny, actually. That November, of 2009, I was playing with a couple teams at the Prince William ice rink and suddenly I found myself flat on my back on the ice. My helmet had flown off. The next thing I knew, I was in the locker room with everyone else, changing my clothes, and I had no idea how I had gotten there. I had a concussion. Which resolved fairly quickly. Those are my only injuries.

How have you stayed fit?

Once I started playing ice hockey, I biked three times a week and I lifted weights twice a week. I’ve continued to do that all through the years and I still do it today. I have an indoor bike, and in the wintertime that’s what I use. But I also bike outdoors. 

I have a strict schedule. I bike Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays and lift weights on Tuesdays and Saturday nights while my husband and I watch TV. I spend about an hour lifting weights. We like watching Shark Tank, we like The Conners, we’ll watch Love is Blind once it’s on again, and we like Undercover Boss. 

So after 50 years, what have been some of the most memorable moments of your hockey career?

The year 2012 was one of my most memorable, because out of all the 60 players at MedStar, I had the most assists, which was very unusual. I had 11 compared to the next highest, which was seven. Believe me when I say that other people were a lot better than I was. I was never a goal scorer; I was somebody who did assists. I would pass and let somebody else score the goal. 

When we were the Redcoats, since we were the only team in the southern division, we won the southern division, which meant we could go to the Nationals. The year I remember most is when we went to Lake Placid the year after the US team had won the “Miracle on Ice.” Skating on that rink after that was one of my most memorable moments.

Also, one of my most memorable moments would have been when I was invited to participate in the ceremonial puck drop at the March 9, 2024, Capitals Hockey game and shake [Alex] Ovechkin’s hand. I went along with four other women—one was six, one was 12, and one was 27—who were in the learn-to-play program at MedStar. 

Did anyone else in your family play ice hockey? Did your kids or your husband ever play?

Nope, I was the only one. 

When you broke the Guinness World Record, did you know about it prior? Did you continue to play in order to beat the record? Or was it happenstance? 

Well, the rink had of course closed during Covid. In about 2021, they opened for a short session. I played about seven times and, at that point, the Delta variant was getting worse. My husband told me I needed to quit, so I quit and I hadn’t thought anything about the Guinness World Record at that point. The following year, after not playing and being bored, I looked it up to see who was the oldest women’s ice hockey player. That’s when I discovered that my time of playing the previous year would beat it. So that’s when I applied for the Guinness World Record. 

In October of 2023, I had felt a pain at the top of my left leg. It was not a hockey injury, although it did happen when I was going into the rink. It was a partial tear of my glute medius and my glute minimus tendon. I saw a doctor and had a cortisone shot and two PRP injections and physical therapy. Even when the doctor told me it was only 50 to 60 percent healed and he said I risked tearing it if I played again, I said I wanted to play again to break my record. So I went out and played five times in the fall of 2024, quit on November 4, and applied for [another] Guinness World Record.

I was assigned somebody there who would answer my questions and I asked her if all the things I had submitted the previous time would work. She told me no, that I needed a video. I couldn’t produce a video of November 4. So that is why I went out one more time on April 7 to shoot the video. I have submitted everything and she’s assured me there’s no reason why it wouldn’t be accepted. So I will have established a new record that would be at 84 years and 198 days. 

Have you heard from anyone about how your story has inspired them? 

The three women and girls at the ceremonial puck drop all said that they were inspired. In fact, one of them said she was inspired to break my record. 

Why did you finally decide to hang up your skates and retire? 

As I mentioned, the doctor said that I really should not be playing and that I risk tearing those tendons again. But truthfully, it’s not as fun as it used to be when you’re this old. You can’t keep up with everybody else and therefore they’re not going to pass to you because they know somebody’s going to be on top of you instantly. I don’t get the puck as quickly because I’m not as fast, so I don’t even get to touch the puck too often. 

I’m thankful I was able to play as long as I have. It certainly has produced many memorable moments. 

The University of Maine men’s hockey team has added three players from Canada’s Major Junior Hockey Leagues, and two of them are National Hockey League draft choices.

Center Jaden Lipinski was a fourth round draft choice of the Calgary Flames and the 112th overall player selected in 2023, and defenseman Luke Coughlin was a sixth round pick (191st overall) by the Florida Panthers — also in 2023.

The other addition is defenseman Simon Motew.

The upcoming season will be the first in which players from Canada’s three Major Leagues will be eligible to play U.S. college hockey.

Players from the Quebec Maritimes Junior Hockey League, the Ontario Hockey League and the Western Hockey League had previously been deemed professionals in the eyes of the NCAA because they received monetary stipends. That disqualified them from playing U.S. college hockey.

But now all NCAA student-athletes are allowed to earn money from the addition of Name, Image, Likeness deals and, under a recent settlement, schools will be allowed to pay them directly.

Lipinski, Coughlin and Motew give the Black Bears a current total of six incoming Major Junior players as they join defensemen Jeremy Langlois and Loic Usereau and left winger Will Gerrior. And there could be more additions.

The 6-foot-4, 209-pound Lipinski registered 17 goals and 41 assists in 59 regular season games for the Vancouver Giants of the Western Hockey League this past season and added two goals and three assists in five playoff games.

The 20-year-old from Scottsdale, Arizona, appeared in 260 career games for the Giants and notched 68 goals and 124 assists.

According to the Elite Prospects 2023 NHL draft guide, Lipinski is a center with “mobility, point production and flashes of skill.”

The Elite Prospects guide says Lipinski “has a deep bag of skating skills, surveying the perimeter with heel-to-heel skating and separating from opponents with powerful cutbacks” and that he “combines handling and passing skill to hook pucks back into space or pulls pucks closer to his feet before releasing.”

Coughlin had four goals and 20 assists in 54 regular season games this season for Rimouski Oceanic in the QMJHL and had 15 goals and 68 assists in 188 career regular season games with the team.

According to the Elite Prospects guide, “with his loose hips and flexibility, Coughlin can easily shift his weight to launch himself around opponents and open up his skates to walk the blue line while facing his options.”

The draft guide describes him as a “fluid mover at the offensive blue line and a deceptive one, too. He uses his hip pocket handling and fake shots to keep defenders at bay and move the puck or find good lanes to fire in.”

Hip pocket handling is a technique which sees a player hold the puck close to their side, near their hip, which allows them to quickly pass, shoot or skate away with the puck.

The 22-year-old Motew, a native of Highland Park, Illinois, played Canadian college hockey for St. Francis Xavier this past season after his 212-game Ontario Hockey League career with the Kitchener Rangers.

The 6-foot, 183-pound Motew had three goals and 12 assists in 25 games for the Nova Scotia school after tallying 21 goals and 66 assists in his career for Kitchener.

The 2021 Elite Prospects NHL draft guide said Motew’s “hands and skating are very clean” and that he “explodes into gaps and is transitioning constantly” and “defends one-on-one situations relatively well, especially off the rush where he matches the speed of attackers and forces them to dump the puck before the blue line.”

UMaine went 24-8-6 this past season and won the Hockey East tournament for the first time since 2004. The Black Bears also qualified for the NCAA Tournament for the second consecutive season but were upset in the first round by regional host Penn State 5-1.

It was the first time since the 2005-06 and 06-07 seasons that UMaine earned back-to-back NCAA tournament appearances. UMaine has gone 47-20-8 during those two seasons.

They wound up seventh in the country in the final USA Hockey poll and eighth in the United States College Hockey Online poll.

UMaine will have to replace four of its top 11 scorers including outstanding veteran centers Harrison Scott, Nolan Renwick and Lynden Breen, along with two of its top six defensemen and its backup goalie.