1. College basketball finally got underway, but once again the big news was off the court. Fortunately, this time it was good news (at least for the first part of the Morning Five) as the NCAA cleared TaShawn Thomas to play immediately. Thomas, a transfer from Houston who averaged 15.4 points and 8.1 rebounds per game last season, had been waiting for the NCAA’s decision for six month. His presence makes Oklahoma a legitimate Final Four threat and a threat to end (at least temporarily) Bill Self’s dominance of the Big 12. Thomas’ performance yesterday (four points, three rebounds, and four turnovers) won’t exactly make anybody in Lawrence nervous, but we would give him a pass since he just found out that he was eligible less than 24 hours earlier.
2. Not all the off court news was positive as Pittsburgh announced that junior Durand Johnson will not play this season due to a suspension for as yet undisclosed reasons. Johnson, who averaged 8.8 points and 3 rebounds per game last season, was expected to play an increased role this season due to losses from graduation/injury. We are not sure what Johnson did to merit the suspension, but we assume it was something recent as beat writers said they had heard nothing of a potential suspension and Johnson was actually featured on the team’s opening game ticket. The situation at Akron is not much better where they suspended All-MAC senior forward Demetrius Treadwell indefinitely for a violation of the school’s code of conduct. Treadwell averaged 15.2 points and 8.6 rebounds per game last season so obviously this is a huge loss and puts the team in limbo until the matter is adjudicated.
3. Florida has its first test of the season later today as Miami comes up to Gainesville, but they have already had  some significant developments as Dorian Finney-Smith will be playing with a hairline fracture in his left, non-shooting hand and Dillon Graham announced that he will be transferring at the end of the semester. The significance of Finney-Smith’s injury is unclear as we will need to see how he adapts to the injury. In the long-term, Graham’s decision to transfer (Billy Donovan said his “heart wasn’t into it”) likely won’t matter, but the Gators have a depleted roster early in the season and will only have seven scholarship players available for tonight’s game and that includes an injured Finney-Smith. Once the Gators get back Chris Walker and Alex Murphy from suspension/transfer waiting period, they should be fine, but it could be dicey for the first few games.
4. Drake suspended seniors Gary Ricks Jr and Karl Madison for three games each for accepting impermissible benefits during the 2012-13 season. What these benefits were remains unknown and since it is Drake basketball (and the Charles Robinsons said of the world probably have no interest in digging into it) will probably remain so. Madison is a role player who averaged just 2.2 points in 16 minutes per game, but Ricks is the team’s top returning scorer at 12.3 points per game while adding 3.8 rebounds per game. The Bulldogs already lost the first of these three games (against Bowling Green) with two more games coming up against DePaul and Western Michigan then they should have the duo back for a home game against IUPUI on November 25.
5. It might seem early to start thinking about the 2015 Final Four, but the NCAA is already looking well beyond that as they announced the sites for the 2017-2021 Final Fours on Friday. None of the group–Phoenix (2017), San Antonio (2018), Minneapolis (2019), Atlanta (2020), and Indianapolis (2021)— is particularly surprising, but the omission of New Orleans (a favorite of many fans and writers–probably more the latter) and North Texas (aka Dallas-Jerry World, an area too spread out to make it practical) were notable. Otherwise the big take-home was the NCAA’s continued refusal to put the Final Four in the Pacific Time Zone. The last time they did so was 1995 (Seattle) and it has not been west of the Central Time Zone since then.

nvr1983 (1398 Posts)

This entry was posted on Monday, November 17th, 2014 at 7:01 am by nvr1983 and is filed under morning 5, Regular Features. Tagged: akron, demetrius treadwell, dillon graham, dorian finney-smith, durand johnson, florida, oklahoma, pittsburgh, tashawn taylor, uf. 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.