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The NCAA ruled on Monday that there would be no penalty forthcoming as a result of Kutchergate at the University of Iowa. We use that portmanteau in jest, of course, since there was never really any chance of the NCAA seeing anything sinister about what they agreed was an “unintentional and incidental” encounter. Still, we think that if Iowa’s going to have celebrities from their state visible at Hawkeye athletic events, they might want to take steps to keep it on the level of, say, Tom Arnold, or even Cloris Leachman. That way, there’s less chance that visiting high schoolers will end up talking about it in the papers or show up in a tweeted photo.
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Tom Izzo has suspended Korie Lucious for Michigan State’s exhibition against Saginaw Valley State tonight and the November 12 season-opener versus Eastern Michigan as a disciplinary action for Lucious’ DUI arrest back in August. Lucious eventually pleaded guilty in September to misdemeanor reckless driving. It’s obvious that he’d rather be playing, but at least he’ll have that much longer to rest that surgically repaired left knee.
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We were at Rupp Arena last night for Kentucky’s exhibition game against in-state NAIA opponent Pikeville College, and even though it was an exhibition it still got our juices flowing to commense our travels this season. Less excited about the whole affair was UK head coach John Calipari, who, despite a 97-66 victory and a 22-point performance from new floor general Brandon Knight, lamented his team’s lack of toughness and energy, noting in the post-game presser that right now his players “don’t get it yet; we need to get more physical…the guys are going to have to accept it.” While praising Pikeville’s effort and confirming that the NAIA squad “outworked” his team, Calipari (who coached this one sans necktie, oddly) drove home his frustration with his players seeming lack of interest by adding, “this isn’t about cool, this isn’t about style points,” and insinuated that Tuesday’s practice might divide the men from the boys.
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As of yesterday, a pair of schools “be gettin’ over in the Big Sky Coun-try…” OK, if you can’t tell by the lyric, the Big Sky Conference just got bigger. It announced yesterday that it will add Southern Utah and North Dakota to its roster starting with the 2012-13 season. While the decision was motivated largely by something called “football,” it shouldn’t be ignored that the revenue sharing bonus nets each athletic team at the schools an extra $135,000. And you thought conference realignment was all through.
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Is it possible that West Virginia’s Kevin Jones rebounded 12% of all shots missed by the Mountaineers last season? And that WVU rebounded 41.8% of their misses as a team?!? Both of those are staggering figures, and just part of the reason you should check out this article from SI.com’s Luke Winn as he crystal balls the Big East. Six days until the first games, people…
View Comments (2)
Luke Winn's article is probably good (haven't checked it out yet), but a 12% Offensive Rebounding % is NOT a staggering figure.
http://kenpom.com/leaders.php?c=ORPct&y=2010&f=BE <---That's good for 8th in the Big East last year and 142nd in the country.
I fail to see how that's staggering. (The 41.8% Team OR% IS staggering, coming in at #2 in the Country last year. But not the individual percentage.)
It staggers me in the sense that it underscores Jones' knack on the offensive glass. Of the top 8 in the Big East from the list you linked, Jones has a greater percentage of offensive rebounds than anyone else (almost 50% of his boards are offensive, 134 O to 137 D), and this is a guy who isn't always near the bucket and in the best spot on the floor to grab offensive rebounds. This means that when he makes an effort to crash the offensive glass, he succeeds an even greater percentage of the time. Then, when you put that in the context of how Jones isn't exactly talked/written about as much as he probably deserves, as much as he does for that team, I'm pretty blown away by it. I admit that I didn't get all of that into that particular Morning Five selection, but the point was to link the Luke Winn article, not necessarily to amplify Kevin Jones' achievements. Maybe that's something I and/or the guys here should do in a separate post.
Thanks for the comment. Keep 'em coming.
John S. from RTC