- Seminoles.com: Florida State has posted a list of current alumni playing professionally. After going down the page, looking at all the different places around the globe with ex-Seminoles on pro rosters, one notices that there is a fairly prominent league that currently features no former players from Florida State. In a bit of a surprise, despite having put together a solid ACC program over the last decade, Leonard Hamilton has no former Seminoles on NBA rosters right now. I thought for sure Al Thornton, just 32 years old now, would still be in the league and when he wasn’t on this list, I figured it was a mistake. After a quick search it was found that the former 1st Team All-ACC performer recently signed with a club in Puerto Rico. Perhaps this shows that the difference between having a solid college program and one that is a national title contender is having future NBA talent on your roster. Interestingly, the only other current ACC member with no current NBA players is Notre Dame, a similar program success-wise. Like Florida State, the Irish have been pretty consistent winners, but never have had enough star power to make a deep NCAA postseason run. At least in Notre Dame’s case, the Irish have a likely future NBA-baller this year in Jerian Grant.
- Clemsontigers.com: While Mike Krzyzewski is getting plenty of attention on his approach to 1000 wins, Clemson’s Brad Brownell just recently reached a coaching milestone of his own. Saturday’s 71-62 Tiger road win over Pittsburgh was Brownell’s 250th career victory. That brings his record at Clemson to 83-64, and while he is well regarded by the media and fellow coaches, eventually Brownell needs to get Clemson back to the NCAA Tournament, where they haven’t been since 2011, Brownell’s first year at the school. Despite’s Saturday’s upset win over the Panthers, making the Big Dance this year may be a reach for this Tiger team, which would be four straight seasons with no NCAA bid. Just ask Steve Donahue and Jeff Bzdelik how that same streak worked out for them.
- Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: This article looks at a surprising weakness of this year’s Pittsburgh squad: rebounding. Toughness on defense and on the boards have been the cornerstones of Jaime Dixon’s program for years, but that has certainly not been the case this season. In Clemson’s aforementioned win Saturday, the Panthers were thoroughly whipped on the glass by a margin of 17, the most of Dixon’s tenure at Pitt. On the season, the Panthers now rank #236 in the nation in defensive rebounding percentage. Undoubtedly, that has a lot to do with Pittsburgh’s current #162 ranking in adjusted defensive efficiency, which is eerily similar to the performance of Pitt’s 2012 defense, which ended up #149, the only season that Pitt’s defense was not ranked in KenPom’s top 65. Not coincidentally, that was the only year Dixon’s team missed out on the NCAA Tournament.
- Louisville Courier-Journal: In this piece, the consequences of Rick Pitino’s short bench are examined, namely in the form of late game fatigue. Against North Carolina, three Louisville starters played almost 40 minutes and possibly wilted down the stretch in the Tar Heels’ 72-71 comeback win. It’s certainly not Pitino’s preferred way to play, but at this point in the season he obviously just doesn’t trust his young reserves enough to give them meaningful minutes. One wonders if this means the Cardinals will have to dial back some of their famous pressure defense just to keep their core guys fresh. Pitino certainly isn’t coddling his young players and perhaps is trying to send them a message with his public comments, saying, “This is a very unusual group because they’re weak physically, they’re weak emotionally and they’re weak basketball-wise.” Coaches know that the players hear every public word spoken by their coach, but it remains to be seen if they are capable of earning Pitino’s trust anytime soon.
- Ramblinwreck.com: Georgia Tech is trying what they call an innovative pricing program for their final two home games this season. They call it the Ramblin’ Rates program, and describe it as a descending-price auction that makes sure that fans pay the lowest market price for the games. The two games in question just happen to be versus Louisville and North Carolina, obviously the two biggest drawing events of the season to be held at McCamish Pavilion. While the plan tries to paint itself as a great benefit to the fans, it’s pretty obvious that the school thinks the demand for tickets for those attractive opponents will drive the “lowest market price” above normal game pricing and bring in extra cash by getting their patrons to bid-up the cost. I don’t think it’s a scam and if the tickets all sell, then the market will have been responsible and that’s OK. But one could legitimately ask, why doesn’t the market get to decide things when Alabama A&M comes to town?