- We are usually disappointed when a basketball game is not played, but when that game/event is the previously mentioned four games at one time concept championed by Michigan State athletic director Mark Hollis we have to applaud. As we have stated before we appreciate the work that Hollis has done to make early season college basketball more visible, but in this case that proved to be his undoing. According to reports the primary road block to putting on the event was the lack of a television network or more specifically group of networks willing to broadcast the four games at the same time. At some level we are disappointed that college basketball could not generate enough interest to get this to happen, but in the end we are glad that the sport was not made in to a circus.
- After a rough start, UCLA has started to show signs of becoming a solid team, but just as you would expect with any good Hollywood drama the Bruins cannot have a dull moment. With a big home game against Missouri looming tonight, the team now has to deal with rumors that yet another player–this time it is freshman Tony Parker–is considering transferring based on a series of tweets he posted (and then deleted) about how unhappy he was at UCLA. To be fair, the rumors that Parker might be the third Bruin in a little over a month to leave the school are based on some pretty extreme conjecture, but it does not reflect well on the program and Ben Howland that another player is even reported to be considering transferring even if those close to Parker deny the rumors.
- Providence may not turn out to be the threat in the Big East that they were expected to be before they were hit by injury and eligibility issues, but they will get a little help when Vincent Council returns to action tonight. Council, who was sidelined just four minutes into the season after injuring his hamstring, will give the Friars a veteran presence at point guard. Council may look “very, very rusty” as Ed Cooley reported, but when paired with Kriss Dunn they could form a very formidable backcourt by the end of the season.
- At this time, you could make a strong argument that Kansas coach Bill Self is the best in the business with his incredible run of conference championships and his ability to regularly produce national title contenders. Yesterday, Self turned 50 yesterday and dismissed a recent column from SI.com that stated that he was the coach most likely to challenge Mike Krzyzewski and his all-time wins record he said this of his chances: “Zero. Whoever [Ed. Note: That would be this guy.] wrote that, doesn’t know me very well. I don’t think that I’ll want to coach near that long.” To be fair to Glockner, he said that Self was the most likely to do it although it was more likely that none of the current crop of coaches would do it. Although Self’s ten-year, $52 million contract would be finished well before he approaches whatever total Krzyzewski ends up at it we have a hard time believing he would not chase it if he were close particularly with the amount of money that Kansas would probably put up for him to chase it.
- Earlier this week we linked to some of the first 2012 retrospective posts that we had seen and now we have the first 2013 prospective post courtesy of Luke Winn, who tries to provide us with ten predictions for 2013. This may not be the type of column you are used to seeing from Winn (or at least not the kind that we usually link to here), but Winn does cover many of the big topics that we expect to be addressed in the next calendar year. Some of them are nothing more than pure speculation, but there are a couple of interesting educated guesses including one potential job opening that could lead to a huge swing of the coaching carousel.