- Sports Illustrated‘s Andy Glockner wonders if Kansas State head coach Bruce Weber can be successful in Manhattan after being fired from Illinois after nine seasons there. Weber proved he can win with another coach’s players, as he took an Illinois team full of Bill Self’s talent to the 2005 national championship game. He didn’t inherit the kind of talent at K-State that he walked into at Illinois, but former Wildcat head coach Frank Martin left enough pieces on the roster for his team to be competitive in the Big 12 this season. Senior guard Rodney McGruder is averaging 12.6 PPG and the Wildcats rank seventh in the country with 44.4 RPG. Whether Weber can find any success when on the recruiting trail remains to be seen.
- Texas Tech interim head coach Chris Walker was as upbeat as anyone could be in his position at Big 12 Media Day in October. He didn’t seem to care about the precarious situation that former coach Billy Gillispie had left him in Lubbock, and if he did, he hid it well. So it wasn’t a surprise to read this article by Nick Kosmider in the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal after the Red Raiders were blown out by Arizona at home on Saturday, 85-57. Walker was rather upbeat after the loss. “It gives me a chance to get my players’ attention,” Walker said of the lopsided loss, adding, “If you hang your head, now Tuesday could become a worse loss.” The Red Raiders are 4-1 but have only played one decent team at this point. Wins will be hard to come by this season and anything higher than a ninth place finish in the Big 12 would be shocking, but don’t expect Walker to change his positive tune throughout.
- Iowa State junior forward Melvin Ejim had a funny quote in this article from Rob Gray of the local Ames ABC affiliate, something you’d normally only hear from a coach. “Going into the season I thought, ‘Man, we’d better rebound or we’re going to get killed,” Ejim said. Well, after seven games, the Cyclones lead the nation with 46.9 RPG and Ejim is spearheading the way with 8.9 RPG of his own. The most surprising part of those stats is that Ejim is listed at only 6’6″, meaning he’s probably much closer to 6’5″ and severely undersized at the collegiate level. Additionally, his 10.6 PPG nearly give him a double-double average and he has grabbed double figure rebounds in four games this season.
- Rustin Dodd of the Kansas City Star had a good writeup on Kansas center Jeff Withey yesterday. Withey’s defensive dominance has been well publicized so far this season, but an impressive stat that might have been overlooked is his corresponding lack of foul trouble. He leads the country with 6.66 blocks per foul and has committed two fouls in just one game this season, in the 67-64 loss to Michigan State last month. You’d think Withey’s presence down low would encourage the Kansas guards to pressure the perimeter more, but Bill Self isn’t happy. “If we haven’t figured it out, we’ve got a pretty good guy behind blocking shots,” Self told the Lawrence Journal-World‘s Tom Keegan recently. “So why wouldn’t we get out and pressure our guy?” The perimeter D is still a question mark, but Withey should continue to put up All-America numbers.
- The Battle 4 Atlantis preseason tournament wants to be big time and knows exactly how to get there: cash. What started as a double-header in 2010 grew to an eight-team field in 2011 featuring Connecticut. It then became one of the only preseason tournaments to offer prize money, with teams receiving up to $200,000 towards their school’s athletic scholarship fund. It worked, as this year’s field included Memphis, Missouri, Louisville, and Duke, among others. Next year, Bill Self will take Kansas to the island. Watch out, Maui, as the Bahamas are coming strong.