UWGB men's basketball coach Doug Gottlieb signs international center Yonatan 'Jonathan' Levy

UWGB men’s basketball coach Doug Gottlieb signs international center Yonatan ‘Jonathan’ Levy

Posted by author January 2, 2025 Basketball

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GREEN BAY – University of Wisconsin-Green Bay men’s basketball coach Doug Gottlieb implied after a loss to Purdue Fort Wayne on Sunday that there would be some changes to the roster the next time the team took the court.

Gottlieb wasn’t prepared to jump the gun and announce anything before it was official, but the first-year coach added a promising piece to the Phoenix before Thursday night’s game at Wright State.

UWGB signed Yonatan “Jonathan” Levy, a 6-foot-9 freshman center from HaMerkaz, Israel, who received final eligibility certification from the NCAA last month and is immediately available to play.

Levy joined the Phoenix for its road trip this week, which includes a game at Northern Kentucky on Saturday.

While Levy is classified as a freshman, he is 23 years old and will provide both size and some veteran influence for a young team.

Levy has four years of eligibility, although because he won’t redshirt the rest of this season, he will be down to three starting in 2025-26.

Levy played for the Hapoel Eilat, a professional team in the Israeli Basketball Premier League, last season, averaging 4.2 points and 4.6 rebounds in 15.6 minutes per game.

He averaged 2.1 points and 1.5 rebounds in 14 contests in his first season with the team in 2022-23.

UWGB has played 6-6 sophomore forward Marcus Hall out of position at the 5 spot this season, some of which was by design but some because the Phoenix hasn’t had much choice.

Mouhamadou Cisse, a 6-10 junior center, has been unavailable most of the season, while 6-10 freshman forward-center Roee Oselka still is getting acclimated to the college game and has played 24 minutes in seven games.

Sophomore 7-1 center Isaiah Miranda is no longer on the team.

Gottlieb has known about Levy for a while and has connections with people who Levy either played against or played for in recent years.

“It’s a major addition,” Gottlieb said. “It will take an adjustment period playing with a player with a different skillset, but he has played enough basketball that he kind of instinctively gets things that others have to be taught a little bit more.

“Obviously, I haven’t crushed him yet in terms of his fitness level. So, we have two games in under 48 hours. It’s going to be hard. Then we have a week off before we play Milwaukee, but we have been one of the worst rebounding teams in the country, and we are pretty sure this is going to help.”

Gottlieb isn’t exaggerating about UWGB being one of the worst rebounding teams in the nation. It entered Thursday ranked 351st out of 355 DI teams in the category, averaging 29.47 rebounds per game. It ranks last in offensive rebounds at 5.87.

Gottlieb said Levy’s playing time will be “matchup based” but that he expects him to get double-digit minutes.

“We need maturity across the board, and the reason we got him, we were willing to do whatever it took to get him to play this year,” Gottlieb said. “Bigger schools wanted him to come in and redshirt for the second semester. We don’t.”

Walk-on Muoneke leaves team

Junior guard Muodubem Muoneke will not return to the team for the second semester. The 6-5 walk-on appeared in eight games, averaging 1.3 points and 3.8 minutes.

He spent his first two seasons at Abilene Christian in Texas.