NEW ROCHELLE, NY – Iona College women's basketball alum Damika Martinez '15 and former men's basketball head coach Tim Welsh were named to the 2017 Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference Basketball Hall of Fame Honor Roll.
Each member institution of the MAAC honors one male and one female from its basketball "family" as part of the 2017 induction class. All honorees will be recognized at a dinner event on Saturday, Sept. 16 hosted by the Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame at the Court of Dreams.
Each honoree will be profiled in the game program for the 2018 MAAC Basketball Championships, and will also be featured in a video display at "The MAAC Experience."
Damika Martinez
Damika Martinez set new standards for the Iona College women's basketball program with her unprecedented personal success on the court. Martinez was named the MAAC Player of the Year three straight years spanning her sophomore through senior season. As a rookie in 2011-12 she was voted the MAAC Rookie of the Year in addition to earning All-MAAC Second Team distinction.
Martinez is the Maroon & Gold and Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference's all-time leading scorer with 2,581 points; she is the only player in program history to ever cross the 2,000-point threshold. She averaged 20.6 points per game, ranking first all-time at Iona and fourth in conference history. Her shooting from beyond the arc propelled her to record scoring outputs; Martinez made 2.49 three-point field goals per game, shooting 40.2 percent from three for her career.
Martinez has the six highest single-game scoring outputs in Iona history and nine out of the top 13. Her highest total came on Feb. 16, 2014 against Rider when she scored 46 points, tying the all-time MAAC record. Her outpouring set a women's Hynes Center record.
In addition to her MAAC accolades, Martinez was a 2014 AP All-American Honorable Mention as well as the All-MET Player of the Year. That same year she was a Nancy Liebermann Award finalist. Martinez is the lone student-athlete to ever lead the MAAC in scoring for four straight seasons.
Tim Welsh
Tim Welsh spent three seasons as head coach of the Iona College men's basketball team from the start of the 1995-96 season through the 1997-98 after coaching 10 games at the end of the 1994-95 campaign on an interim basis. In the three full seasons, Welsh posted the highest winning percentage (.761) in program history behind a 70-22 record.
In all three seasons with Welsh at the helm, the Maroon & Gold captured the MAAC regular season title. The success culminated with the 1998 MAAC Tournament Championship title, the first for the program since 1985.
The Gaels appeared in the National Invitation Tournament (NIT) in Welsh's first two seasons, hosting St. Joseph's in 1996 before traveling to face UConn in 1997. Behind the MAAC Title in 1998, Iona dropped a heartbreaking two-point setback to Syracuse in the First Round of the NCAA Tournament.
Welsh earned MAAC Coach of the Year honors in 1996-97 and 1997-98 behind a combined 49 victories in the two seasons. He also coached the MAAC Player of the Year in both of those years as Mindaugas Timinskas and Kashif Hameed were celebrated in respective seasons.
The Iona duo joins the following Iona basketball legends named to the MAAC Hall of Fame Honor Roll in previous years:
Steve Burtt Sr. / Patty Reynolds-Basile
Dave Brown / Maggie Timoney
Kevin Hamilton / Celeste Grier-Johnathan
Sean Green / Noreen Winterfeldt
Pat Kennedy / Tony Horvath
Kashif Hameed / Sandie Capifali
The 2017 MAAC Basketball Honor Roll Class (to date):
| MAAC Honoree |
Bob Belber |
| Canisius College |
Craig Wise |
| Canisius College |
Jenel Stevens |
| Fairfield University |
Mark Young |
| Fairfield University |
Dana (Pellegrino) Farinella |
