1. It was a scary weekend at Indiana after sophomore Devin Davis was run over by a car driven by freshman Emmitt Holt early on Saturday morning. The details of what exactly transpired are unclear, but it appears that Holt dropped off Davis and soon afterwards Davis walked onto the road where Holt ran him over. Holt, who is 18, was charged with illegal consumption of and operating a vehicle with a blood alcohol content above 0.02  (the Indiana legal limit is 0.08, but 0.02 for those under 21 even though it is technically illegal for anybody under the age of 21 to have alcohol–yes, we know underage kids drink). After initial concerns about how serious Davis’ injuries were it appears that he is doing better as he is able to talk and use all of his extremities. It is way too early to speculate about when or even if Davis can return to the court, but we wish him the best of luck in his recovery. As for Holt, we are not sure what the future holds for him in Bloomington, but we doubt we will be seeing him playing a game for the Hooisers any time in the near future.
2. Arizona may have picked up a big piece in its quest for a national championship late last week when the NCAA announced that Dusan Ristic had been cleared to play this year. Ristic had played in the Adriatic League and Eurocup, which led to questions about his amateur eligibility, but never signed a contract. The Wildcats who were already loaded now add a 7′ center who was the MVP of the Nike International Junior Tournament in 2013 after averaging 17.7 points and 9.5 rebounds per game. Even if he doesn’t replace Kaleb Tarczewski in the starting lineup he will add depth to a frontline that will be one of the best in the country.
3. On the surface, the announcement that Conner Frankamp is transferring from Kansas might seem like a minor issue (and it probably is), but as Brian Goodman points out it does raise some issues with the Jayhawks’ backcourt depth early in the season. Frankamp, who was actually the #34 recruit in his class according to Rivals, left due to concerns about playing time. After averaging just 2.5 points and 0.6 assists per game as a freshman last season at a program that loads up on talent like Kansas does, we can understand his concern. As for Kansas, although there are certainly some questions regarding that backcourt we know better than to question Bill Self.
4. On Friday, Syracuse completed its initial hearing with the NCAA Committee on Infractions regarding allegations of violations of internal drug policy and academic issues. While the school offered very little in the way of clarity about the allegations or what was discussed/revealed at the hearing, the school did point out that no current student-athletes are part of the investigation. The school is expected to hear from the NCAA in 30 to 60 days, which is probably the next time we will hear anything about this story. Now if only that other big investigation in the ACC could move to this stage.
5. We are not sure what the big deal about preseason polls is other than to serve as bulletin board material and fodder for message boards (yes, we will have one out pretty soon too), but the AP released its preseason poll on Friday and as expected it did not contain any surprises. Kentucky, Arizona, and Wisconsin topped the poll taking all 65 available first-place votes. While these are interesting at some level they serve even less purpose than the useless college football ones that at least used to affect the BCS system. The one purpose they do serve is that they offer writers an easy reference for a column when a team is a surprise or disappointment.

nvr1983 (1398 Posts)

This entry was posted on Monday, November 3rd, 2014 at 6:22 am by nvr1983 and is filed under morning 5, Regular Features. Tagged: arizona, Devin Davis, dusan ristic, emmitt holt, indiana, kentucky, syracuse, wisconsin. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.