St. Thomas' basketball promising start helped by transfer Raheem Anthony
ST. PAUL, Minn. — The St. Thomas University men's basketball team is off to a 2-1 start to their season, and their newest transfer is off to an impressive start.
A Division III to Division I jump made sense for Raheem Anthony.
"Division III I could probably just jump over somebody and make it. But now there's gonna be some seven-footers in our league that are pretty good," said Anthony.
He left his decorated Division III career to play for a team that he used to compete against. That's because St. Thomas recently jumped up in competition.
"Raheem played in this gym four years ago. He was a freshman. We couldn't keep him out of that paint right there. He kept getting in the lane. I'm like guys, can we please keep him out of the lane? We didn't," said Johnny Tauer, St. Thomas' head coach.
He played well against the Tommies that day.
"I think he had maybe 28 points against us, and all I could do was sit and watch from the bench in admiration. It's cool to see him in a Tommie uniform now," said Brooks Allen, a forward for St. Thomas.
Anthony decided it was time to level up after four years in the Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference so he could "really just prove that I could play with some of the best," he said.
Becoming a Tommie appears a natural fit. St. Thomas' recent journey from Division III sports to Division I ran parallel to Anthony's.
"This has never happened, I don't think. I don't think anybody has ever been Division III, played against a team that transferred to Division I, then later transferred to that team. So yeah, it's been crazy to think about and you kind of never know where life is gonna take you," said Anthony.