A freshman football player at Villanova University has been charged with rape and sexual assault stemming from a December incident on campus, a university spokesperson said Sunday.
D’Hani Cobbs, 20, faces charges of rape, sexual assault, and related offenses in Delaware County, court records show. He is accused of assaulting another student on Dec. 7, the university said in a statement, which did not provide any additional details about the alleged incident. The arrest was first reported by student newspaper The Villanovan.
Cobbs was arraigned Friday and held on $250,000 bail, according to court records.
A university spokesperson said school leaders reported the incident to law enforcement and “removed” Cobbs from campus shortly after the incident in December.
“Sexual violence of any kind is not tolerated on our campus and we are committed to both supporting the victim and fostering a safe environment for all of our students,” the university said in the statement.
A player bio page on Villanova’s website was out of service with an error message on Sunday, but according to social media and sports news outlets, Cobbs graduated from Camden High School in 2025 and played wide receiver at Villanova. Recruiters for the Villanova Wildcats posted a “welcome to the family” message on social media after recruiting Cobbs in December 2024.
An attorney for Cobbs did not immediately respond to a request for comment Sunday.
Villanova University was one of several colleges nationwide that saw its operations disrupted Thursday by a series of hoax threats.
The Main Line Catholic university with 6,700 undergraduates closed the campus early Thursday morning, advised students on campus to stay in their residence halls, and warned others to stay off campus while authorities investigated. The move followed an undisclosed threat about one of its academic buildings.
By 2 p.m., the private university gave the all-clear and said while in-person classes would remain canceled, students could leave their residences and get into some buildings, including the library, main dining halls, the health center, and the Connelly Center.
Villanova’s threats were part of a swatting pattern nationwide. In September, the Associated Press reported that about 50 college campuses had been hit with hoax calls nationwide in recent weeks. The U.S. Department of Education put out tips on how to recognize fake calls, including questions to ask callers to determine if there are inconsistencies.
Locally, colleges including Temple, Drexel, and Villanova said in September they had taken steps in response to the spate of swatting incidents nationwide, including upgrading training on how to handle them.
On Thursday, another wave of calls appears to have occurred. New York University received threats against two school buildings, the school announced around the same time as Villanova. One threat included mention of bombing an NYU building. NYU did not go on lockdown.
The FBI’s Philadelphia Field Office said in a statement that it was aware of the threats made to universities on Thursday.
“We continue to stay in close coordination with our law enforcement partners,” an FBI spokesperson said. “As always, the FBI encourages members of the public to remain vigilant and immediately report anything they consider suspicious to law enforcement.”
Villanova said the FBI was investigating, alongside state and local law enforcement. There were no reports of activity posing a danger to the campus.
In its 2 p.m. update, the schools said that classes that are fully online could continue on Thursday and that graduate courses meeting in the evening could be “offered remotely at the discretion of the professor.”
Intramurals scheduled for Thursday evening, the school said, also would be held.
University spokesperson Jonathan Gust declined to say which Villanova building was targeted or describe the nature of the threat, given the investigation is ongoing.
“In an abundance of caution, the university made the decision to close,” he said earlier Thursday.
Additional police will remain on campus, the school noted.
A backpack sits around toppled chairs at the Villanova University campus where an active shooter was reported Thursday, Aug. 21, 2025, in Villanova, Pa.
Villanova students and staff on Thursday were trying to cope with another disruption to their campus life.
At First Watch restaurant just off campus, freshman finance major Nolan Sabel said he woke up to a university alert on his phone, warning him of “an unknown threat of violence.”
Sabel said he was disappointed to learn that an academic building had been targeted — for the third time in a year.
“It’s kind of crazy,” Sabel said. “You hear that Villanova is really safe. It doesn’t feel that way.”
Now, he and his lacrosse teammates are wondering whether a scrimmage set for Thursday afternoon would be canceled.
The university told the students they were “on lockdown,” Sabel said. But that didn’t stop them from walking just off campus to get breakfast.
“We needed food,” he said. “We have a game today.”
Villanova senior James Haupt said he learned of the threat and class cancellation about 7:30 a.m. He lives off campus and had not yet headed to the school for his morning class.
“After the last incident, it’s hard to take it completely seriously when we know that was a hoax,” said Haupt, 21, a communications major from Long Island. “But it’s still a little scary knowing this can happen at any point.”
He said he was glad that the school canceled classes.
“It’s a great gesture by the school,” he said. “I’d rather not have to go into class and be worried.”
Haupt had one class scheduled for Thursday and an intramural basketball game in the evening.
While students seemed to be taking the incident in stride, parents were expressing concerns on private Villanova Facebook pages, said one staff member who was not authorized to speak to the media and asked not to be named.
“Terrible sign of the times we live in,” one parent wrote, according to the staff member. “Thinking of everyone. These poor kids and us parents having to deal with this. Hope it’s nothing and all are safe and whoever is behind this is brought to justice.”
As Joshua Weikert shared ground rules for quizzes in his early morning international relations class, he sought to put his students at ease.
“I don’t want you stressing out about these,” he said Tuesday, as the new semester got underway at Immaculata University in Chester County.“I myself was a terrible student.”
Weikert, 47, of Collegeville, may not have been a star student, but he sure knows a lot.
The politics and public policy professor will compete onJeopardy! 2026 Tournament of Championsat 7 p.m. Friday on ABC, having won six games when he was on the show in March.
Joshua Weikert teaches a class in international relations at Immaculata University.
Over a couple weeks, Jeopardy! shows will feature him vying against 20 other champions, including Allegra Kuney, a doctoral student at Rutgers University’s New Brunswick campus, and Matt Massie, a Philadelphia lawyer who moved to the area in 2024, who also will appear on Friday’s show.
Friday’s match is a quarter-final, and if Weikert wins, he’ll advance to the semifinals. (Kuney won her quarter-final Tuesday.)
Weikert won about $103,000 when he competed last year, 10% of which he donated to a memorial scholarship fund named for his late friend, Jarrad Weikel, a Phoenixville man who died unexpectedly at age 40 in 2022. The winner of the champions tournament —which will conclude sometime in early February — will take home a grand prize of a quarter million.
Weikert will watch the show Friday among family and friends — including his fellow contestant Massie — at Troubles End Brewing in Collegeville, which named one of its beers after him. It’s an English Bitter, one of Weikert’s favorites, called “Who is Josh?”
At Immaculata, a Catholic college where Weikert has taught since 2016, students and staff are stoked. A campus watch party is planned, President Barbara Lettiere said.
His appearance last year, she said, has put a welcome spotlight on the school and brought an outpouring of enthusiasm from alumni. On tours, some prospective students and their parents who spot Weikert have recognized him, she said.
“I never knew that this show was as watched as it appears to be,” she said. “Win or lose, Immaculata wins.”
Student Ben Divens talks about his Jeopardy-star professor Joshua Weikert.
Ben Divens, 19, said it’s “jaw-dropping” and “surreal” to know his teacher will compete in the Jeopardy! champion tournament.
“I knew from the first time I met him he was a super, super smart person,” said Divens, a prelaw major from Souderton.
“He’s guided us so much in our major already,” added Bailey Kassis, 18, a political science major from Fort Washington.
“He’s guided us so much in our major already,” student Bailey Kassis said about her professor Joshua Weikert.
An early gamer
Weikert said he has watched Jeopardy! ever since he can remember, probably since 1984 when he was 6, and it came back on the air with Alex Trebek as host. He grew up just outside of Gettysburg in a family that loved to play games, he said.
“We took them very seriously, which is to say that they didn’t just let the kids win,” he said of his parents, both of whom had accounting degrees. “We were destroyed routinely in the games we played.”
About his performance as a student, he said he often skipped his homework.
“Just give me an exam,” he said, describing his attitude at the time. “I’ll pass it.”
He got his bachelor’s degree in international relations from West Chester University, master’s degrees from Villanova and Immaculata, and his doctorate from Temple. He also attended the Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center, where he studied modern standard Arabic while serving in the U.S. Army.
Joshua Weikert sets expectations for students as a new semester gets underway at Immaculata University.
In addition to teaching, he also works as a policy adviser to the Pennsylvania House of Representatives under state Rep. Joe Webster, a Democrat serving part of Montgomery County. He vets legislators’ ideas and offers ideas of his own.
“The only thing they’ve ever told me no on was [when] I tried to abolish the Pennsylvania Senate,” he said.
So many bills pass one body, then die in the other, he explained. If there were one legislative body where all House and Senate members served, that might be different, he said.
Weikert’s office walls are lined with framed newspaper front pages highlighting major events: “Nixon Resigns,” “Nazis Surrender,” “Man Walks on Moon,” “Kennedy Shot to Death.”
“Every once in a while, I just get up and read one of the stories,” he said.
He got them from his mother-in-law’s basement and put them up after his wife told him his office needed some decor.
Weikert’s status as a Jeopardy! champion makes clear he’s a fast thinker. He’s also a fast talker.
“I don’t really drink caffeine. I just talk this fast,” he told his students.
His wife, he told the class, tells him to slow down.
“Keep up,” he tells her, he said.
The road to Jeopardy
Since his mid-20s, Weikert has been trying to get on Jeopardy!. Years ago, he got a call from the game show, but he put the caller on hold to get to a quiet place. They hung up.
“I was like, well, I guess I missed that opportunity,” he said.
But he kept trying and started taking the online tests, which typically draw 200,000 participants annually. In 2024, he got an email, inviting him to take the test again — and then again under Zoom surveillance.
Next came a virtual audition and practice game in August 2024. That earned him a place in a pool of about 3,000 people, of whom a few hundred eventually became contestants.
Weikert got the call last January and was invited to fly to California the next month to compete.
In reality, his varied interests and life path had already prepared him for the show. He reads a lot. He’s a fan of historical fiction, pop culture, and movies. His work as a public policy scholar helps, too.
But to try and up his game, he read plots of Shakespeare plays and a book on great operas. He flipped through lists of presidents and vice presidents. His wife, Barbara, a Norristown School District middle school music teacher, read questions to him from old Jeopardy! shows. He knew about 80% of the answers, he said.
That, however, didn’t stop him from having panic dreams of being on stage and knowing nothing.
The toughest category for him, he said, is popular music. Movies, history, and politics are his strongest.
But the hardest questions, he said, are the ones with four or five strong possible answers.
“Getting a Jeopardy! answer right is more about knowing what it’s not than what it is,” he said.
Ultimately, he said, it’s impossible to really study for the game show.
“The odds that something you study would come up is almost zero,” he said.
It was an intense experience on stage last March, but the staff put contestants at ease, he said. Host Ken Jennings, formerly one of the show’s most successful contestants, told them, according to Weikert: “I promise you something today is going to be a win for you, so just relax and have fun.”
He has a hard time remembering his winning answers. He readily recalls his dumbest, he said.
The answer was “sacred cow.” He uttered “holy cow.”
“Even as it was coming out of my mouth, I knew it was wrong,” he said.
He’s proud that he only froze on one answer involving lyrics from the B-52’s “Love Shack,” he said.
There was less pressure competing in the championship match last month, given he was already a winner, he said. But it was harder in that the contestants were the best of the best.
“During the regular season, it’s a little under a quarter of a second between when you can start to buzz in and when the buzz actually comes,” he said. “In the tournament of champions, that drops to 0.08 seconds.”
This time, he also prepped by reading children’s books on topics such as basic cell biology, a tip he got from another contestant.
“It’s the simplest language they can use to convey the information,” he said.
He also read the book, Timelines of Everything: From Woolly Mammoths to World Wars.
He most enjoyed the camaraderie among contestants, he said. When filming was over, they hung out in a bar and — watched Jeopardy!.
At local colleges with major sports programs, some student athletes are now getting paychecks — from their athletic departments.
Pennsylvania State University, Temple, Villanova, St. Joseph’s, Drexel, and La Salle are among the Pennsylvania schools that have begun to directly pay athletes following a settlement last year in federal class-action lawsuits over student athlete compensation.
The move arguably ends college athletes’ status as amateurs and begins to address long-standing concerns that players haven’t fairly profited from the lucrative business of some college sports.
It also raises questions about how schools will fund the athletes’ pay and whether equity complaints will arise if all athletes are not comparably awarded. Some also question how it will impact sports that are not big revenue makers.
Locally, most colleges have been mum on how much they are paying athletes, and some have also declined to say which teams’ athletes are getting money through revenue sharing, citing competitive and student privacy concerns. Villanova, a basketball powerhouse that has 623 athletes across 24 sports, said it will provide money primarily to its men’s and women’s basketball teams.
Erica Roedl, Villanova’s vice president and athletic director, speaks during a news conference at the school’s Finneran Pavilion in 2024.
“Our objective is to share revenue at levels which will keep our basketball rosters funded among the top schools in the Big East [Conference] and nationally,” Eric Roedl, Villanova’s vice president and director of athletics, said in a June message after the court settlement.
St. Joe’s, another basketball standout, said its arrangement is also with men’s and women’s basketball athletes, like its peers in the Atlantic 10 Conference.
Temple University established Competitive Excellence Funds that allow all of its 19 teams to raise money for revenue sharing, but declined to say which teams are currently distributing money to athletes.
“Donors could, if they wanted to, make sure their money went to a certain sport,” said Arthur Johnson, Temple’s vice president and director of athletics. “They have that ability.”
Other local colleges, including St. Joseph’s and Villanova, also launched funds to help raise money for revenue sharing. And all three schools also plan to use athletic revenue.
Under the revenue-sharing framework established by the court settlement, each college can pay its athletes up to a total of $20.5 million this academic year. Football powerhouse Penn State, which has about 800 athletes, has said it intends to reach the cap, according to a June 7 statement from athletic director Pat Kraft.
“This is a rapidly evolving environment that we are monitoring closely to ensure our approach remains consistent with applicable rules, while supporting the well-being and academic success of our student-athletes,” said Leah Beasley, Penn State’s deputy athletic director for strategic engagement and brand advancement.
Penn State athletic director Pat Kraft gives two thumbs up to the student section following a 31-0 win in a football game against Iowa in 2023.
‘It’s a job’
To athletes, revenue sharing seems only fair, given many are so busy practicing and playing through summers and other breaks that they don’t have time to work.
“It is a job at the end of the day,” said former Villanova University basketball player Eric Dixon, who holds the Wildcats’ record as all-time leading scorer. “You put a lot of time into it every single day, every single week.”
Players get hurt and can see their sports careers harmed or halted, said Dixon, who grew up in Abington and played at Villanova from 2020 to 2025. College may be their only time to earn money for their sports prowess.
Villanova’s Eric Dixon drives against Alex Karaban of UConn during the 2025 Big East Tournament at Madison Square Garden in New York.
Dixon didn’tbenefit from revenue sharing. But he got money through external name, image, and likeness (NIL) endorsements and sponsorships that the NCAA began allowing in 2021. Dixon declined to specify how much he received, but said it was “seven figures” over four years and allowed him to help his family.
Like some other schools, Villanova, he said, provided players with financial guidance so they could make wise decisions on how to use their money.
External NIL arrangements, though, he said, were a little “like the Wild West.”(NIL compensation is allowed to continue under the lawsuit settlement, but deals of more than $600 have to be reported.) Revenue sharing from colleges will offer athletes more predictable income, said Dixon, who now plays for the Charlotte Hornets’ affiliated team in the G League.
Tyler Perkins, a Villanova junior from Virginia, currently plays for the Wildcats, who won national championships in 1985, 2016, and 2018. While he declined to say how much he is receiving, he said revenue sharing is helping him prepare for his future and “set up for the rest of my life.”
Maddy Siegrist, also a former Villanova basketball player who now plays for the Dallas Wings in the WNBA, is pleased universities are able to share revenue directly with athletes.
“It will be interesting to see how it all plays out,” said Siegrist, the Big East’s all-time leading scorer in women’s basketball and Villanova’s overall highest scorer, of men’s and women’s basketball.
Dallas Wings forward Maddy Siegrist celebrates a three-point shot during a WNBA basketball game against the Chicago Sky in 2024 in Arlington, Texas.
While the big revenue sports are likely to see the money first, she said, “I would hope there will be a trickle-downeffect where almost every sport is able to benefit.“
A lawsuit spurs changes
For years, there have been growing concerns that athletes were not getting their fair share of the profits from college sports, which make money onbroadcast rights, ticket sales, and sponsorships. Meanwhile, coaches can be among the highest paid in a university’s budget.
In 2020, former Arizona State swimmer Grant House became the lead plaintiff in House vs. NCAA, a class-action antitrust lawsuit that argued athletes should be able to profit from the use of their name, likeness, and image and schools should not be barred from paying them directly.
The settlement approved in June of that suit and two others against the NCAA requires the NCAA and its major conferences to pay $2.8 billion in damages to current and former Division 1 athletes. Another provision gave rise to the revenue sharing.
It initially applied to the major sports conferences: the Big Ten, Atlantic Coast Conference, Southeastern Conference, and the Big 12. Penn State belongs to the Big Ten and the University of Pittsburgh to the Atlantic Coast.
But other athletic conferences, along with many of their members, decided to opt in to the agreement to remain competitive in select sports. St. Joseph’s, La Salle, Villanova, Drexel, and Temple all are part of conferences participating in revenue sharing with athletes this year.
“We support student-athletes’ ability to pursue value among their peers and to leverage commercial opportunities that may benefit them or the institution,” said Maisha Kelly, Drexel’s vice president and director of athletics and recreation.
Temple belongs to the American Athletic Conference, which said its members must agree to pay at least $10 million over three years to its athletes. Johnson, Temple’s athletic director, noted that total also includes new scholarships, not just pay.
No tuition, state dollars to be used
Pitt alumnus J. Byron Fleck has called on the Pennsylvania State Board of Higher Education to advise three state-related colleges — Penn State, Temple, and Pitt — not to use tuition dollars, student fees, or state appropriations to fund athlete payments.He also asked lawmakers to take action.
“It doesn’t relate to any educational or academic purpose,” said Fleck, a 1976 Pitt alumnus and lawyer in California.
Karen Weaver, an expert on college athletics, higher education leadership, and public policy, said the same concerns about public funds being used to pay athletes have risen in other states, including Michigan and Washington.
But Penn State, Temple, and Pitt all said in statements that they would not use tuition, student fees, or state appropriations to fund revenue sharing with athletes.
“Penn State Intercollegiate Athletics is a self-sustaining unit of the university,” said Beasley, Penn State’s deputy athletic director.
Pitt said it would use athletic revenues.
In addition to donations, Temple, too, is using athletic department revenues, such as ticket sales, but it is also looking at other “nontraditional ways” to raise money, Johnson said.
“We’re turning over every stone,” he said.
Weaver, an adjunct professor at the University of Pennsylvania, said she worries that as the caps on revenue sharing get higher and costs grow, schools, especially those tight for cash, may start raising recreation and other student fees. The University of Tennessee added a 10% student talent fee for season ticket renewals, according to the Associated Press, while Clemson is charging a $150 per semester student athletic fee, according to ESPN.
Roedl, the Villanova athletic director, said in a statement that it had launched the Villanova Athletics Strategic Excellence (VASE) Fund to raise money for the payments.
“Additionally, we are looking for other ways to maximize revenue through ticketing, sponsorships, and events, and identifying cost efficiencies throughout our department,” he said.
St. Joe’s, which has about 450 student athletes, said that it started a Basketball Excellence Fund to raise revenue and that payments also are funded by the basketball program. Athletes that receive funds “serve as brand ambassadors for the university,” the school said in a statement. “… These efforts have included community engagement — particularly with youth in the community — and marketing initiatives that directly support the Saint Joseph’s University brand.”
La Salle declined to say how much student athletes receive or in what proportion.
“We can share that any funds provided to students come from external sources and not tuition dollars,” said Greg Nayor, vice president for enrollment management and marketing.
Weaver, author of a forthcoming book, Understanding College Athletics: What Campus Leaders Need to Know About College Sports, said plans that call for the bulk of revenue sharing to go to football and basketball players would lead to legal action, charging that female athletes are not being treated equally.
“Any day now I expect we’ll see a huge Title IX lawsuit,” she said.
Rosemont College’s accrediting body has asked the school for information on its student records and finances and policies “to ensure truthfulness in public relations announcements.”
The private, suburban liberal arts college has until Tuesday to submit a report to the Middle States Commission on Higher Education, according to an announcement on the accrediting body’s website.
Rosemont announced last spring that it was planning to close for good in 2028 and that nearby Villanova University is purchasing its campus. The college’s enrollment for thefall semester stood at 428, down about 45% from last year.
The freshman class of 21 students is just a quarter of the size of last year’s first-year enrollment. And it will be the last freshman class to enter the 104-year-old Catholic college.
It’s unclear what prompted Middle States to ask Rosemont for the report; the body doesn’t elaborate on its posted actions. Rosemont President Jim Cawley did not respond to a request for comment.
The questions are a likely indicator that more action is coming, which could be as basic as accepting the college’s report, or could be more serious, such as an accreditation warning. Colleges need accreditation to keep their students eligible for federal aid.
Middle States also asked Rosemont to provide evidence of “fair and transparent policies and procedures regarding the evaluation and acceptance of transfer credits, policies and procedures for the safe and secure maintenance and appropriate release of student information and records, including student athletics” and “full disclosure and financial information … that includes realistic enrollment and budget projections and the assumptions on which they are based, is adequate to support educational purposes and programs.”
The college in 2022 received a warning from the commission that its accreditation could be in jeopardy because it did not appear to be meeting requirements around planning, budget and academic assessment. But in 2023, the warning status was removed and the school’s accreditation was reaffirmed through 2028-29.
It could become increasingly challenging for the school to operate as it enrolls fewer students each year until its closure. Another hit could come next year, when NCAA sports are discontinued and more athletes may transfer. Under the merger agreement, Rosemont is expected to receive some financial support from Villanova through 2028.
Rosemont was one of 13 colleges The Inquirer examined in 2024 and found was in poor financial health, using an index developed by a finance executive at a small college in Illinois. The school had reported operating losses for five straight years through June 2023.
On Creighton Road in Lower Merion, it’s not unusual for residents to buy the house next door.
The owners of the 3.85-acre property at 648 Creighton Rd. did just that when they purchased the home but wanted a pool. They decided to put one on the neighboring property.
The century-old main house with seven bedrooms, seven full bathrooms, and three half bathrooms is available for $7.9 million. And the one-bedroom, one-bathroom carriage house next door that was rebuilt in 2015 is on the market for $2 million.
Creighton Road “has become the estate street,” said listing agent Lavinia Smerconish with Compass Real Estate.
The property is 3.85 acres and includes a sprawling yard.
The owners are open to selling their properties separately, but they won’t sell the carriage house before the main one in case a buyer wants both.
The fieldstone main house is 11,418 square feet. It used to have a series of small rooms for staff and a giant entrance that looked like a banquet hall that no one knew what to do with, Smerconish said. A previous owner reimagined the home with larger rooms, more natural light, and more functional space.
The home has a commercial kitchen with a large island with seating.
The front door opens to an entrance tower with a chandelier and winding staircase. Living and dining rooms branch off from the foyer with the family room straight ahead.
The home has a commercial kitchen with an island with seating. The property includes an exercise room, solarium, four fireplaces, suite above the attached garage for guests or a nanny, sprawling yard lined with trees and hedges, terraces, and detached garage. The sitting room off the primary bedroom could be kept as is or turned into a huge closet, Smerconish said.
The finished basement spans 1,538 square feet and includes a wine cellar.
The basement includes a sports bar with TVs, wine cellar for up to 3,000 bottles, movie room, gym, and bathroom.
The property “is both impressive and cozy at the same time,” Smerconish said.
The carriage house on the market for $2 million on Creighton Road in Lower Merion is being sold as a package along with the $7.9 million house next door.
The carriage house next door spans just over 1,000 square feet on an almost one-acre lot. It has a bedroom, bathroom, laundry room, eat-in kitchen, and living room. A flagstone patio leads to the heated saltwater pool.
The properties are walking distance from the Appleford estate, which is an event venue, bird sanctuary, and arboretum with gardens and walking paths. They are minutes from Villanova University and Stoneleigh, a public garden of the nonprofit Natural Lands.
And they’re also minutes from the Schuylkill Expressway and I-476.
The carriage house includes a kitchen, bathroom, and bedroom.
The properties were listed for sale on Dec. 5. Now that the holidays are over, Smerconish said, she will start accepting appointments to tour them. She said photos of the main house especially don’t do it justice.
“You get more with a physical tour and experiencing it,” she said.
Flagstone surrounds the carriage house’s heated saltwater pool.
Lower Merion swore in five new commissioners on Monday, kicking off the board’s 126th year of governing the Montgomery County township.
Between rounds of applause and family photos, commissioners outlined the major challenges, and opportunities, the body will face in 2026. Board members highlighted recent accomplishments — creating a process for establishing board priorities, restricting gas-powered leaf blowers and plastic bags, advancing capital projects, hiring a police superintendent, supporting the development of affordable housing, and reversing the post-pandemic decline in police staffing levels.
“We’re solving problems, we’re moving forward, and we’re even having a little fun,” said commissioner V. Scott Zelov, who was sworn in for his sixth term.
Zelov on Monday night became the eighth commissioner in Lower Merion history to serve for at least 20 years, board President Todd Sinai said.
Sinai, who was first elected to the board in 2017, was unanimously reelected board president. Incumbent commissioner Sean Whalen called Sinai a “stalwart leader of this board,” praising Sinai’s leadership througheconomic ups and downs.
Jeremiah Woodring, also an incumbent commissioner, was unanimously elected vice president. Sinai described Woodring as “thoughtful and inquisitive,” “balanced,” and “diplomatic.”
Jana Lunger was sworn in as Lower Merion tax collector.
Here’s a who’s who of the five newly elected Lower Merion commissioners, all of whom replaced outgoing commissioners who chose not to run again in 2025.
Michael Daly, an attorney and the former president of the Gladwyne Civic Association, was sworn in to represent Ward 2, which includes Gladwyne and Penn Valley. Daly has lived in Lower Merion for around 15 years with his wife and three children, all of whom are products of the Lower Merion School District. In his law practice, he focuses on defending class action lawsuits and complex litigation. In a candidate interview earlier this fall, Daly said he’s focused on quality of life issues, including walkability, public parks, and safe streets. He replaced outgoing commissioner Joshua Grimes.
Charles Gregory, a longtime township employee, will represent Ward 4, which encompasses Ardmore and Haverford. Gregory, who was born and raised in Ardmore, worked for Lower Merion Township for 23 years until 2024. He’s the former president of the Lower Merion Workers Association and a Boy Scout troop leader. During a candidate forum, Gregory said he believed he could “make a difference from a blue collar aspect.” Gregory replaced outgoing commissioner Anthony Stevenson.
Christine McGuire is a forensic psychologist and business owner who will serve Rosemont and Villanova in Ward 6. McGuire lived in Gladwyne for nine years before moving to Villanova around three years ago. In a candidate forum, McGuire said she has been active in the Gladwyne Civic Association and in the parent group that studied Lower Merion’s school start time change. As the owner of a psychology practice, she said she understands “what a budget is and that you have to work within the budget and not look at it like a blank check.” She replaced outgoing commissioner Andrew Gavrin.
Craig Timberlake, an Ardmore resident who was instrumental in the 2025 redevelopment at Schauffele Plaza, will represent Ward 8’s South Wynnewood and East Ardmore. Timberlake moved to Ardmore around 15 years ago from Maine. He says he was drawn to Ardmore’s high-quality schools, walkable neighborhoods, and transit options. He believes the township should incentivize “smaller,” “incremental,” and locally funded development and decrease speed limits to protect pedestrians. Timberlake is a project manager at OnCourse, an education technology platform. He replaced Shawn Kraemer, the board’s outgoing vice president.
Shelby Sparrow, the former president of the Penn Wynne Civic Association and a longtime community organizer, will represent Penn Wynne and Wynnewood in Ward 14. Sparrow’s priorities include ensuring the community is engaged in Main Line Health’s redevelopment of the St. Charles Borromeo Seminary property; addressing pedestrian safety; and encouraging sustainability and park stewardship. She was previously the director of development for St. Peter’s Independent School in Center City. She replaced outgoing commissioner Rick Churchill.
Sinai and Zelov, who were reelected in November, were sworn in, and sitting commissioners Woodring, Whalen, Daniel Bernheim, Louis Rossman, Ray Courtney, Maggie Harper Epstein, and Gilda Kramer were welcomed back.
This suburban content is produced with support from the Leslie Miller and Richard Worley Foundation and The Lenfest Institute for Journalism. Editorial content is created independently of the project donors. Gifts to support The Inquirer’s high-impact journalism can be made at inquirer.com/donate. A list of Lenfest Institute donors can be found at lenfestinstitute.org/supporters.
Way back in 2022, when Philadelphians gathered on an abandoned pier to watch a man eat a rotisserie chicken, folks on social media began to wonder: “Is Philadelphia a real place?”
Sure, that perception has a lot to do with an unbelievable event that actually happened in the suburbs (Delco never fails to carry its weight), but Philly also saw its fair share of the bizarre this year, too.
As we prepare for what may be one of the most important (and hopefully weirdest!) years in modern Philadelphia history, let’s take some time to look back on the peculiar stories from across the region that punctuated 2025.
Five uh-oh
Kevon Darden was sworn in as a part-time police officer for Collingdale Borough on Jan. 12 and hit the ground running, landing his first arrest just four days later.
The only problem? It was his own.
Pennsylvania State Police charged Darden with terroristic threats and related offenses for an alleged road rage incident in 2023 in which he’s accused of pointing a gun at a driver on the Blue Route in Ridley Township. At the time of the alleged incident Darden was employed as an officer at Cheyney University.
A Pennsylvania State Police vehicle. The agency provided two clean background checks for a Collingdale police officer this year, only to arrest him four days after he started the job.
Here’s the thing — it was state police who provided not one but two clean background checks on Darden to Collingdale officials before he was hired. An agency spokesperson told The Inquirer troopers had to wait on forensic evidence tests and approval from the District Attorney’s Office before filing charges.
Darden subsequently resigned and is scheduled for trial next year in Delaware County Court.
For the Birds
The Eagles’ second Super Bowl win provided a wellspring of wacky — and sometimes dicey — moments on and off the field early this year.
Mayor Cherelle L. Parker started the championship run off strong by going viral for misspelling the most popular chant in the city as “E-L-G-S-E-S” during a news conference. Her mistake made the rounds on late night talk shows and was plastered onto T-shirts, beer coozies, and even a license plate. If you think the National Spelling Bee is brutal, you’ve never met Eagles fans.
Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts at the line of scrimmage during the fourth quarter of the NFC divisional playoff at Lincoln Financial Field on Jan. 19. The Philadelphia Eagles defeated the Los Angeles Rams 28 to 22.
Then there was the snowy NFC divisional playoff game against the Los Angeles Rams at Lincoln Financial Field; continued drama around the Tush Push (which resulted in Dude Wipes becoming an official sponsor of the team); and Cooper DeJean’s pick-six, a gift to himself and us on his 22nd birthday that helped the Birds trounce the Kansas City Chiefs 40-22 in Super Bowl LIX.
As soon as the Eagles won with Jalen Hurts as MVP, Philadelphians let loose, flooding the streets like a drunken green tsunami. Fans scaled poles and tore them down; danced on bus shelters, medic units, and trash trucks; partied with Big Foot, Ben Franklin, and Philly Elmo; and set a bonfire in the middle of Market Street.
Eagles fans party on trash trucks in the streets of Center City after the Birds win in Super Bowl LIX against the Chiefs on Feb. 9.
Finally, there was the parade, a Valentine’s Day love letter to the Eagles from Philadelphia. Among the more memorable moments was when Birds general manager Howie Roseman was hit in the head with a can of beer thrown from the crowd. He took his battle scar in pride, proclaiming from the steps of the Philadelphia Art Museum: “I bleed for this city.”
As we say around here, love Hurts.
Throngs of Birds fans lined the Benjamin Franklin Parkway for the Eagles Super Bowl Parade on Feb. 14.
A $40 million goodbye
As far as inanimate objects go, few have experienced more drama in recent Philly history than the SS United States, the 73-year-old, 990-foot luxury liner that was docked for nearly three decades on the Delaware River waterfront.
Supporters spent more than $40 million on rent, insurance, and other measures to keep the ship in Philly with the hopes of returning it to service or at least turning it into a venue. But a rent dispute with the owners of the pier finally led a judge to order the SS United States Conservancy, which owned the vessel, to seek an alternate solution.
Workers on the Walt Whitman Bridge watch from above as the SS United States is pulled by tug boats on the Delaware River.
And so in February, with the help of five tugboats, the ship was hauled out of Philly to prepare it to become the world’s largest artificial reef off the coast of Okaloosa County, Fla.
If the United States has to end somewhere, Florida feels like an apt place.
The ‘Delco Pooper’
While the Eagles’ Tush Push was deemed legal by NFL owners this year, a Delaware County motorist found that another kind of tush push most definitely is not after she was arrested for rage pooping on the hood of a car during a roadway dispute in April.
Captured on video by a teen who witnessed the rear-ending, the incident quickly went viral and put a stain on Delco that won’t be wiped away anytime soon.
Christina Solometo, who was dubbed the “Delco Pooper” on social media, told Prospect Park Police she got into a dispute with another driver, whom she believed began following her. Solometo claimed when she got out of her car the other driver insulted her and so she decided to dump her frustrations on their hood.
A private security guard holds the door open for alleged “Delco Pooper” Christina Solometo following her preliminary hearing Monday at Prospect Park District Court.
“Solometo said, ‘I wanted to punch her in the face, but I pooped on her car instead and went home,’” according to the affidavit.
I’ve written a lot of stories about Delco in my time, but this may be the most absurd.
Hopefully, she won’t be clogging up the court system anymore.
The Delco pope
Delco is large, it contains multitudes, and never was that more clear than when two weeks after the Delco Pooper case broke, a Delco pope was elected.
OK, so Pope Leo XIV is technically a native of Chicago, but he attended undergrad at Villanova University — which, yes, technically straddles Delco and Montgomery County — but Delco’s had a tough year so I’m gonna give it this one.
This video screen grab shows Pope Leo XIV wearing a Villanova University hat gifted to him during a meeting with an Italian heritage group.
Born Robert Prevost, Pope Leo is the first U.S. pope in history and also a citizen of Peru. He earned his bachelor’s degree in mathematics from Villanova in 1977 and an honorary doctor of humanities from the university in 2014.
Center City Sips, the Wednesday Center City happy hour program, long ago earned a reputation as a rite of passage for 20-somethings who are still figuring out how to limit their intake and want to do so in business casual attire.
Things seemed to calm down after the pandemic, but then Philadelphians took Sips to another level and a whole new place this year — the streets.
Videos showed hundreds of people partying in the streets of Midtown Village on Wednesday nights this summer. Granted, the parties look far more calm than when sports fans take over Philly after a big win, but the nearby bar owners who participate in the Sips program said their places sat empty as people brought their own alcohol to drink.
Jason Evenchik, who owns Time, Vintage, Garage, and other bars, told The Inquirer that “No one is inside, and it’s mayhem outside.”
“Instead, he claimed, people are selling alcohol out of their cars and bringing coolers to make their own cocktails. At one point on June 11,Evenchik said, a Tesla blocked a crosswalk while a man made piña coladas with a pair of blenders hooked up to the car,” my colleague Beatrice Forman wrote.
In no way am I condoning this behavior, but those two sentences above may be my among favorite this year. Who thinks to bring a blender — with a car hookup — to make piña coladas at an unauthorized Center City street party on a Wednesday night?
Philly.
Getting trashed
Philadelphians experienced a major city workers strike this summer when Mayor Cherelle L. Parker and AFSCME District Council 33 couldn’t agree on a new contract for the union’s nearly 9,000 members.
Residents with trash arrive at garbage dump site at Caldera Road and Red Lion Road in northeast Philadelphia during the AFSCME District Council 33 workers strike in July.
As a result, things got weird. Dead bodies piled up at the Medical Examiner’s Office; a striking union member was arrested for allegedly slashing the tires of a PGW vehicle; and for eight days in the July heat, garbage heaped up all across Philadelphia. The city set up temporary trash drop-off sites, which often overflowed into what were nicknamed “Parker piles,” but that also set off a firestorm about whether using the sites constituted crossing a picket line.
Wawa Welcome America July Fourth concert headliners LL Cool J and Jazmine Sullivan even pulled out of the show in support of striking workers, resulting in a fantastic “Labor Loves Cool J” meme.
It was all like something out of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. In fact, the gang predicted a trash strike in the 2012 episode “The Gang Recycles Their Trash.”
The real strike lasted eight days before a contract was reached. In true Philly form, AFSCME District Council 33 president Greg Boulware told The Inquirer “nobody’s happy.”
A large pile of trash collects at a city drop-off site during the AFSCME workers strike this summer.
97-year-old gives birth to 16 kids
A local nonagenarian couple became national shellebrities this year for welcoming seven babies in April and nine more in August, proving that age ain’t nothing but a number, as long as you’re a tortoise.
Western Santa Cruz Galapagos tortoise Mommy, and male Abrazzo, left, are shown on Wednesday, April 23, 2025, at the Philadelphia Zoo in Philadelphia, Pa. The hatchlings’ parents, female Mommy and male Abrazzo, are the Zoo’s two oldest animals, each estimated to be around 100 years old.
Mommy and Abrazzo, Western Santa Cruz Galapagos tortoises who reside at the Philadelphia Zoo, made history with their two clutches, becoming the first pair of the critically endangered species in the zoo’s 150-year history to hatch eggs and the first to do so in any accredited zoo since 2019.
Mommy is also the oldest known first-time Galapagos tortoise mom in the world, so it’s safe to say she doesn’t have any time or patience for shenanigans. She’s got 16 heroes in a half shell to raise.
Western Santa Cruz Galapagos tortoise egg hatchling.
Phillies Karen
Taking candy from a baby is one thing — babies don’t need candy anyway — but taking a baseball from a kid at a Phillies game is a deed so foul and off base it’s almost unimaginable.
And yet, that’s exactly what happened at a Phillies-Marlins game in September, when a home run from Harrison Bader landed in the stands and a dad ran from his seat to grab it and give it to his son. A woman who was sitting near where the ball landed marched over to the dad, berated him, and demanded the ball be given her. Taken aback, the father reached into his son’s baseball glove and turned the ball over.
The entire scene was caught on camera and the woman, with her Kate Gosselin-esque hairdo, was immediately dubbed “Phillies Karen” by flabbergasted fans.
While the act technically happened at the Marlins stadium in Miami, Fla., it captured the minds and memes of Philadelphians so much that it deserves inclusion on this list. Phillies Karen has made her way onto T-shirts and coffee mugs, inspired skits at a Savannah Bananas game and the MLB Awards, and she even became a popular Halloween costume.
To this day, “Phillies Karen” remains unidentified, so it’s a safe bet she lives in Florida, where she’ll have better luck with alligators than with people here.
Institutional intrigue
Drama at area institutions this year had Philadelphians sipping tea like we were moms on Christmas morning, and sometimes, left us shaking our fists in the air like we were dads putting up tangled lights.
David Adelman with the Philadelphia 76ers makes a statement at a press conference in the Mayor’s Reception Room in January regarding the Sixers changing directions on the controversial Center City arena. At left is mayor Parker, at right City Council President Kenyatta Johnson and Josh Harris, Sixers owner.
It started early in January, when the billionaire owners of the Sixers surprised the entire city by announcing the team would stay at the South Philly sports complex instead of building their own arena on Market East. The decision came after two years of seemingly using the city, its politicians, and its people as pawns in their game.
Workers gathered outside World Cafe Live before a Town Hall meeting with management in July.
In June, workers staged a walkout at World Cafe Live due to what they claimed was “an unacceptable level of hostility and mismanagement” from its new owners, including its then-CEO, Joseph Callahan. Callahan — who said the owners inherited $6 million in debt and that he wanted to use virtual reality to bolster its revenue — responded by firing some of the workers and threatening legal action. Today, the future of World Cafe Live remains unclear. Callahan stepped down as CEO in September (but remains chairman of the board), the venue’s liquor license expired, and its landlord, the University of Pennsylvania, wants to evict its tenant, with a trial scheduled for January.
Signage at the east entrance to the Philadelphia Art Museum reflects the rebrand of the institution, which was formerly known as the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
Finally, late this year at the Philadelphia Art Museum, things got more surreal than a Salvador Dalí painting, starting with an institutional rebrand that surprised some board members, didn’t land well with the public, and resulted in a lot of PhART jokes. In November, museum CEO Sasha Suda was fired following an investigation by an outside law firm that focused, in part, on increases to her salary, a source told The Inquirer. Suda’s lawyer called it a “a sham investigation” and Suda quickly sued her former employer, claiming that “her efforts to modernize the museum clashed with a small, corrupt, and unethical faction of the board intent on preserving the status quo.”
Nobody knows where all of this will go, but it’s likely to have more drama than a Caravaggio.
NEWARK, N.J. — More than an hour before the game, Kevin Willard was on and around the basketball court at the Prudential Center, the place he called home for 12 seasons as Seton Hall’s head coach.
The first-year Villanova coach, like most head coaches, normally is tucked away going over final game preparations while assistants get his players loose. But Willard was home. It was an emotional couple of days since the Wildcats arrived here Monday evening.
“This place helped raise my family in a very special way,” Willard said. The family saw the same security guards who used to carry his children — one now a college freshman, the other a high school senior — around after games.
Before tipoff, Willard embraced Seton Hall coach Shaheen Holloway, who coached under Willard for 11 seasons at Iona and Seton Hall. A video that played before the national anthem showed highlights of Willard’s tenure at Seton Hall, and the sellout crowd of 11,153 mostly responded with a nice ovation for the coach who left in 2022 for Maryland and returned Tuesday for his first game against his old program with one of its bitter Big East rivals.
The show at that point was over. “Walking out, once I got out, we got to win a game,” Willard said.
It was a sloppy-at-times Big East fight during the first half, but Villanova used an emphatic 16-0 run early in the second half and pulled away from Seton Hall in a 64-56 victory that wasn’t as close as the final score suggested. Villanova led by as many as 20 midway through the second half.
Kevin Willard spent 12 seasons from 2010 to 2022 with Seton Hall before taking a job at Maryland.
The Big East opener was a matchup of teams off to hot starts. Willard’s Wildcats improved to 10-2 and handed Seton Hall (11-2) its second loss of the season.
The Wildcats entered Tuesday ranked 30th in the NCAA’s NET rankings, and they shot up to 20th on Wednesday morning after winning their first Quad 1 game of the season. By 10 p.m. Tuesday, the metrics site KenPom had Villanova ranked 24th. Seton Hall was just outside the Associated Press Top 25 this week. The Pirates were 27th, based on ballot points. Surely, Villanova will be in the conversation to be ranked for the first time since November 2023 next week.
The Wildcats’ two losses are to then-No. 8 BYU and No. 2 Michigan. They hit the holiday break with a home victory over Pittsburgh and road wins at Wisconsin and Seton Hall.
“We’re trending in the right direction,” Willard said. “I like the fact that no one’s really talking about us.”
They are now. It was a light day on the college basketball calendar, and, given Seton Hall’s surprising start to the season and Willard making his return to Newark, there were plenty of eyeballs watching Villanova pass the eye test.
Freshman point guard Acaden Lewis “controlled the game,” Holloway said, after he led all scorers with 16 points on 6-for-11 shooting to go with five rebounds, two assists, and three steals (to cancel out three turnovers) in a season-high 37 minutes. Redshirt freshman Matt Hodge added 12 points and six rebounds, and redshirt sophomore Bryce Lindsay scored 15 points on nine shots.
The night was far from perfect for Villanova. The Wildcats turned the ball over 18 times and had trouble with Seton Hall’s press after the lead ballooned late in the game. They allowed 16 offensive rebounds and had just eight of their own.
Villanova freshman guard Acaden Lewis played a season-high 37 minutes in a 64-56 win over Seton Hall on Tuesday night.
But Villanova had an answer every time Seton Hall pushed back in the second half. Devin Askew hit a three-pointer to push the lead back to 17 (50-33). Hodge put back a Lewis miss with just over eight minutes to play that stopped a 6-0 Seton Hall run and bumped the lead back to 16. The Pirates then cut their deficit to 13 before Lindsay made a three-pointer. He made 3 of 7 attempts on the night.
“We’re battle-tested,” Willard said. “We played BYU on the road, Michigan on the road, Wisconsin on the road, three Big 5 games … so I have a lot of confidence in the fact that our guys have played against a lot of good teams.”
Villanova overcame its struggles because of its defense. Willard said the game plan was to make dynamic Seton Hall point guard Adam “Budd” Clark, a West Catholic graduate, be a scorer and not a “sprayer.” The Wildcats, who utilized a zone defense, forced him into tough spots and limited his driving opportunities. He also was limited to just five minutes in the first half because of foul trouble, and Seton Hall’s offense was disjointed without him. Clark finished 1-for-11 from the floor, and Seton Hall converted just 33.3% of its shot attempts.
The Pirates were 15-for-30 on what were considered layups by the official stats, but the majority of their shots were well-contested. The 16-0 run happened mostly because of Villanova’s active hands, which forced steals and easy transition buckets.
Earlier in the season, defense was one of Willard’s major concerns. It recently has become a strength. Why? Lewis said physical practices where fouls aren’t called have translated into higher-intensity stretches of defense during games.
Villanova returns home on New Year’s Eve for a game vs. DePaul (8-5). But first, a few days off to celebrate the holiday, a break that got a little merrier with Tuesday’s win.
“We’re trending up,” Lewis said. “Since that Michigan game, we really locked in and built with each other. [Michigan] showed us there’s levels, and we’re building up to that level to see them again when March comes around and we want a different look when that happens.”
After Tuesday, playing meaningful basketball in March seems like a real possibility.
Haverford College senior Jackson Juzang earlier this year had been talking to a school administrator about the need for more resources to support student journalism.
The administrator, Chris Mills, Haverford’s associate vice president for college communications, asked if there was a network of student newspaper journalists in the region that Haverford could join and seek support from.
There wasn’t.
“So I decided to create one,” said Juzang, 22, an English major from Pittsburgh who serves as associate editor of the Clerk, Haverford’s student newspaper.
Jackson Juzang explains why he started the Philadelphia Student Press Association.
He established the Philadelphia Student Press Association as a nonprofit and created a board with student editors from 11 college news organizations around the region, including Temple, Drexel, Villanova, St. Joseph’s, La Salle, Rowan, Rutgers-Camden, Bryn Mawr, Swarthmore, Haverford, and Eastern.
With the slogan “Rooted in Philly, Reporting for All,” the group — which collectively represents about 400 student journalists — is seeking funding from organizations to support student journalism at a time when college budgets are tight and the news industry faces challenges, including rising print costs and lower readership. The association already has held workshops with more planned next year, and its 21-member board meets monthly and discusses common issues and problems and brainstorms solutions.
“We have so many people coming from different regions, but we are united in the sense that we are all here for the same reason,” said Claire Herquet, an editor at the La Salle Collegian.
At a recent meeting, members talked about artificial intelligence and what to do if an editor suspects a student writer used it, Herquet said. There were two instances over the past semester when she read an article submission and thought the terminology and phrasing didn’t sound like the writer, she said.
“If I didn’t have PSPA, I wouldn’t have people to lean on,” said Herquet, 21, a junior communications major from Camden. “It would just be me versus the problem.”
Herquet manages communications for the association. She has been reaching out to foundations about obtaining grant funding for the association. Some college newsrooms are better funded than others and can give writers and editors stipends.
She’s hopeful that uniting the newsrooms will result in better experiences for students and more funding.
La Salle’s publication is only digital; there is no print version. Costs are minimal, but funding would cover professional workshops for students and costs, such as travel, associated with their reporting.
The Whit, Rowan University’s student news site, prints a newspaper once a week and receives financial support via student government, but print costs are rising, said junior Katie Thorn, who serves as managing editor.
“We’re trying to figure out with the budget we have if it is possible and what we are going to have to sacrifice to keep our paper printing,” Thorn said.
Thorn, who is serving as treasurer for the association, said it’s been helpful to learn that other student organizations are facing the same challenges.
“Journalism as a whole is such a scary world right now,” said Thorn, 20, a journalism major from Mantua, Gloucester County, “and you’re kind of throwing yourself into the fire. Am I going to find a job? Where does my future lie? Having people who support you and uplift you is a great thing.”
Haverford’s student newspaper has received funding via the president’s office and is able to pay its writers, Juzang said. In January, the Clerk will publish its first print edition.
But the Clerk would like resources for deeper reporting and investigative work and mentorship, he said.
Juzang, who hopes to pursue a graduate degree in communication management next year at the University of Southern California, said he’s invested thousands of dollars of his own money to get the association started. He currently works as a research/editorial intern for NBC Sports.
He said the association also has received support from the Philadelphia-based Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression.
Juzang said he would like to help schools, including Widener and Lincoln, that used to have student news sites revive them. He also has begun talking to student journalists in other metro areas, including Washington, Boston, New York, and Baltimore, about starting an association for their university newsrooms, he said.
Mills, the Haverford communications administrator, was pleased to see Juzang take that conversation the two had last March and create a mechanism for student journalists to share their experiences and learn from each other.
“It’s really important for the students to share resources and knowledge and wisdom,” he said. “For those of us who value student journalism, it’s great to see them prioritizing this and making the time to do it.”
