While a few former University of New Hampshire football players anxiously await the NFL Draft this week and current players steam toward May 5 and the annual Blue-White game that wraps up spring football, Maureen Magarity and her women's basketball staff got some good longer-term news recently.

Corinne Coia, a 6-foot-4 center, is transferring into Durham after spending a season at the University of Rhode Island of the Atlantic 10.

“We're thrilled,” Magarity said. “We recruited her out of high school and it came down to us and Rhode Island as far as we know.”

Rhode Island had a rough season and finished 1-28.

Coia started 11 of the 27 games she played in as a URI freshman and averaged 7.7 points and four rebounds in her 22.5 minutes a game.

“She has real good size and she's very strong around the basket,” Magarity said. “She moves pretty well up and down the floor for a big kid and has great hands. Her lateral foot speed is pretty good and I think she'll fit pretty well in our system. She's pretty mobile and can hit the 15-foot jumper.”

Coia will practice with the team next season, but will sit out games as a transfer and have three seasons of eligibility starting with the 2013-14 season.

“She'll continue to get in good shape and she did have an early injury with her back and she'll rehab and get that better and learn our system,” Magarity said.

UNH also has landed a recruit for the fall of 2013, according to numerous newspaper accounts in Maine.

They report that Kristen Anderson of Greene, Maine, who will be a senior at Leavitt High School in Turner, told UNH coaches earlier this month that she will accept a scholarship to the school.

Anderson's sister, Courtney, went to the University of Maine as a walk-on last fall and ended up starting 25 games and playing 27 minutes a game.

Kristen is a 5-foot-7 combination guard and plays AAU for Kara Leary's New England Crusaders. She averaged about 27 points, five rebounds and eight assists a game last year for Leavitt.

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Sean McDonnell and his staff put the UNH football team through a practice in front of dozens of the state's high school coaches in a clinic on Sunday afternoon.

McDonnell cited running back Chris Setian and wide receiver R.J. Harris as guys who stood out in practice last week.

“Chris Setian had a heck of a practice on Friday,” McDonnell said. “He's been good, but he really showed some pop on Friday. He did some nice things. It's been good to have R.J. Harris running around out there. He's been good, too.”

Setian will be a junior and Harris a sophomore in the fall.

Linebacker Matt Evans, who will be a senior, is back practicing. He had been slowed by a hamstring issue. Offensive lineman Chris Zarkoskie, another senior-to-be, hurt his knee on Friday and is scheduled to have an MRI today.

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Quarterback Kevin Decker and defensive ends Brian McNally and James Jenkins are among the hundreds of football players coming out of college who hope to have work assignments after this week's NFL Draft.

The first round of the draft is Thursday night, rounds two and three are on Friday and rounds four through even begin at noon on Saturday.

The three Wildcats worked out in a UNH Pro Day for seven NFL scouts in Durham last month, along with Marc Wilson of St. Anselm College and several former Dartmouth players.

“I'm not thinking of being drafted, I'm just trying to get into a camp,” Decker said at Pro Day. “That's what any of us want to do, us small school guys, and from then on just prove what you can do.”

McNally agreed.

“The biggest thing is just to get a shot,” McNally said. “I don't care how it is, drafted or not drafted. Whatever, however, I can get in there is the biggest thing right now.”

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The lacrosse team improved to 5-9 overall and 2-3 in America East with a 12-11 win over UMBC at home on Saturday. The Wildcats kept their playoff hopes alive with the victory.

They are down to two games left in the regular season, at Stony Brook on Saturday and at Boston College on May 1.

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The men's and women's track teams host the Wildcat Invitational II on Saturday at 11 a.m.

The America East championships are set for May 5 and 6 at Maine.

Allen Lessels covers UNH athletics for the New Hampshire Union Leader and Sunday News. He may be reached at alessels@unionleader.com.