The University of Maine is expected to name assistant men’s basketball coach Ted Woodward as its new golf coach.

Woodward joined first-year head basketball coach John Giannini’s staff last year after serving as assistant and recruiting coordinator at Central Connecticut for five seasons.

The Suffern, N.Y., native also was an assistant coach under Jim Calhoun at the University of Connecticut, where he earned a master’s degree in athletic administration in 1989.

Woodward was out of town on a recruiting trip and could not be reached for comment.

Woodward replaces Chris Lander who stepped down after six seasons to devote more time to his family and a new job at XL Golf in Hermon.

In addition to Ellsworth’s Joe Patten, a former New York Jets assistant trainer, UMaine announced two other finalists Monday to replace Wes Jordan as head athletic trainer.

Senior Associate Director of Athetics Dino Mattessich said Eric Nussbaum, assistant trainer at Rutgers University, and Charlie Thompson, assistant trainer at Penn State, were also being considered.

Mattessich, who heads the search committee, said the committee is looking for a trainer who, in character and qualifications, can continue the tradition built by Jordan during his 32-year career.

The University of Hartford has been awarded the second annual America East Academic Cup for the 1996-97 academic year.

The Cup, recently established by the America East Board of Directors, is presented to the institution whose student-athletes post the highest grade point averages.

Hartford fielded teams in 17 of the 21 sports sponsored by the conference and led the league in GPA in three sports.

UMaine and Hofstra were the only two schools in the 10-school conference that did not have at least one team that led the league in GPA. Drexel and Vermont each had a league-high four teams that led in GPAs.

Competition was close with Hartford’s collective grade point average winning at 2.96, followed by Boston University at 2.94 and Drexel at 2.93

America East Commissioner Chris Monasch said each of the mem America East Commissioner Chris Monasch said each of the member schools had GPAs above 2.73, which is above the national average.