As RTC heads into its 11th season covering college hoops, it’s time to begin releasing our annual compendium of YouTube clips that we like to call Thirty Reasons We Love College Basketball. These 30 snippets from last season’s action are completely guaranteed to make you wish the games were starting tonight rather than 30 days from now. Over the next month you’ll get one reason per day until we reach the new season on Friday, November 10. You can find all of this year’s released posts here.

#17 – Where Intrastate Controversy Happens.

We also encourage you to re-visit the entire archive of this feature from the 2008-09, 2009-10, 2010-11, 2011-12, 2012-13, 2013-14, 2014-15, 2015-16 and 2016-17 preseasons.

1. The news that North Carolina senior point guard Joel Berry is expected to miss four weeks recovering from a broken bone in his right hand after he punched a door following a video game loss has widely been viewed as a major hit to the defending champions. While we won’t argue that it will adversely affect them in the short-term, we tend to agree with Andrew Carter who argues that it offers the Tar Heels with the ability to develop other players such as freshman Talek Felton (Raymond’s cousin) and sophomore Seventh Woods rather than relying on Berry early in the season. Berry’s presence would have been invaluable to a team filled with players trying to replace departed stars early in the season, but his absence early in the season might be more valuable to them down the road.
2. We haven’t heard much discussion about Virginia hiring Carla Williams to be its new director of athletics. Typically these announcements do not merit much attention, but it does seem newsworthy to us because Williams is the first African-American woman to be named an athletic director at a Power 5 school. Some might argue that these distinctions are nothing more than winning the press conference, but having more diversity in the field or at least a broader pool of candidates to pick from seems like a good thing. Hopefully, this will encourage other schools to look beyond the typical retreads we usually see hired and instead pursue more promising candidates.
3. Most of the media’s attention on the FBI investigation has been focused on another ACC school (more on that in a bit), but it appears that Miami may have its own issues as Jim Larranaga has stated that he believes that he is “Coach-3” in the FBI investigation. According to the FBI report, that coach was involved in trying to get Adidas to give $150,000 to convince a recruit (widely believed to be Nassir Little, who later signed with UNC) to commit to that school. For his part, Larranaga denies any wrongdoing and the school appears to be standing behind him for now, which is more than we can say for other schools.
4. Speaking of other schools, the fight between Louisville and Rick Pitino/Tom Jurich does not appear to be lightening up as Jurich’s attorneys are claiming that the board of trustees failed to explain the cause of Jurich’s firing and are trying to “smear him.”  Without going into too much detail the school basically accused Jurich of not maintaining proper oversight of the department while Jurich’s team says that he kept a close eye on everything and the men’s basketball team was the only part of the athletic department that has had any issues. Our guess is that similar to most cases like this the only people who will end up winning are the lawyers and their bloated billable hours.
5. The NCAA is an easy target for people particularly lately with the FBI investigation and the never-ending debate about financial compensation for student-athletes. As Sam Mellinger points out, the one thing that the NCAA should not have any problem doing is using its platform to give to the less fortunate (and generate some positive publicity for itself), but it seems to have a hard time doing that. Most people will point to concerns that schools will use charity events as a way to promote themselves (like Houston was supposedly going to do by giving out apparel for different schools to Hurricane Harvey victims), but it seems like inertia is the biggest obstacle. The powers that be are just too comfortable sitting back and waiting for individual schools to make the case to them rather than being proactive.

This preview is part of RTC’s Big 12 preseason coverage.

Will the new-look Cyclones gel in Steve Prohm’s first season without any holdovers from the Hoiberg era?

Iowa State’s 2017 graduating class of Monte’ Morris, Naz Mitrou-Long, Matt Thomas and Deonte Burton was one of the most decorated in program history. There weren’t any surefire NBA players in the bunch, but together, they helped former coach Fred Hoiberg revitalize the program and made it possible for successor Steve Prohm to maintain that success in his first two seasons. Now that core is gone and it’s time to see what Prohm can do with a roster composed completely of his own recruits. The Cyclones return just three scholarship players from last season’s rotation, and of the group, only big man Solomon Young started. The freshman was inserted into the lineup during the stretch run, with the Cyclones going 10-2 during that period — the only two losses coming against West Virginia in the regular season finale and against Purdue in the NCAA Tournament Round of 32. Of course, all of that success isn’t fully attributable to the insertion of Young into the starting lineup, but he was a clear upgrade from the pair of Merrill Holden and Darrell Bowie and should bring the same stability to this season’s rotation.

Steve Prohm will forge his own path after Iowa State graduated the last remaining players from the Hoiberg regime. (USATSI)

Senior guard Donovan Jackson didn’t play much at the point guard slot with the workhorse Morris standing in front of him, but he showed some intriguing offensive potential off the bench, especially in league play. Jackson played just 41.9 percent of the available minutes against Big 12 opponents, but his offensive rating (120.5), turnover rate (9.5%) and three-point shooting (44.5%) during those opportunities were top-notch. If this year’s Iowa State offense is to have any hope of matching its benchmark from the last few seasons, Jackson will have to increase his production with more playing time. The Cyclones’ other returning scholarship player is Nick Weiler-Babb, a wing whose role is still a bit hazy, but a player who possesses some versatility with an ability to make athletic plays and move the ball. Read the rest of this entry »

By any measure, the 2016-17 Texas A&M basketball season was a colossal disappointment. After being picked by virtually everyone to finish near the top of the SEC standings and easily make a return trip to the NCAA Tournament, the Aggies struggled to an 8-10 finish in league play and missed out on postseason play altogether. Last year’s disappointing outcome has not, however, tempered expectations for this year’s team. Once again, the Aggies are expected to challenge for a league championship and easily qualify for the Big Dance. And those expectations are just fine with two of A&M’s stars — Robert Williams and Tyler Davis — who talked about the upcoming season last week in Nashville. When asked about his goals this year, Williams did not mince words: “San Antonio” — the site of the 2018 Final Four. Davis, for his part, was more measured, instead discussing the need to focus on getting better each day. Regardless of how each player answered that question, both know that expectations are high in College Station, and with good reason.

Robert Williams showed his excitement about the upcoming season at SEC Media Days. (RTC Staff)

Davis also talked about improved team chemistry this year, hinting that some members of last season’s squad were not on the same page with head coach Billy Kennedy. “I know he was limited [by] his resources, when it came to game time,” Davis said. “That obviously puts pressure on you as the coach. This year, he’s the same guy every single day; expects the same things out of us. It’s just, are his players willing to give it to him every day in practice.” Last season’s finish aside, it appears there is good reason for high expectations. Texas A&M returns all five of its starters, including Williams and Davis, who could combine to form the best big-man tandem in the SEC. The former, the reigning SEC Defensive Player of the Year, credits his maturity for a decision to return to school despite being projected as a likely lottery pick. He also thinks another year battling against Davis in the post during practice should improve his game. “We are awesome with each other,” Davis said. “We’ve gotten to the point where we know what each other’s going to do. We try to memorize each other’s games and help each other.” Read the rest of this entry »

As RTC heads into its 11th season covering college hoops, it’s time to begin releasing our annual compendium of YouTube clips that we like to call Thirty Reasons We Love College Basketball. These 30 snippets from last season’s action are completely guaranteed to make you wish the games were starting tonight rather than 30 days from now. Over the next month you’ll get one reason per day until we reach the new season on Friday, November 10. You can find all of this year’s released posts here.

#18 – Where LONZO Happens.

Lonzo Ball from wayyyyyy downtown. #SCtop10 pic.twitter.com/fzvnbJkdUe

— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) February 10, 2017

We also encourage you to re-visit the entire archive of this feature from the 2008-09, 2009-10, 2010-11, 2011-12, 2012-13, 2013-14, 2014-15, 2015-16 and 2016-17 preseasons.

This team preview is part of the RTC ACC microsite’s preseason coverage.

Burning Question: Can Pittsburgh avoid the ACC basement?

After suffering an inordinate number of player defections last spring, Pittsburgh head coach Kevin Stallings is now left with only two players who scored in a game last year — and that pair combined to produce a grand total of only 179 points all season. The Panthers finished the year with a 15-16 record, the first losing mark for the program in nearly two decades (1999-2000). It’s difficult to be overly optimistic about this squad either, a group that will almost certainly be picked near the bottom of the league. For some measure of hope, Stallings can look to the achievement of Josh Pastner at Georgia Tech just one season ago. Pastner’s first team in Atlanta likewise featured no returning starters and an unheralded crop of newcomers, but somehow, he turned that bunch into a surprising bubble team by the end of the year. Those Yellow Jackets featured a former role player who became an all-ACC caliber center (Ben Lammers) and a rookie (Josh Ogogie) who well surpassed his high school ranking. For Pitt to pull off that kind of season in Stallings’ second year at the helm, it will need to find similar production from several unexpected sources.

Pittsburgh needs Ryan Luther to make a big leap in production as a senior (Pittsburghsportsnow.com)

Of the Panthers’ two returning scholarship players, only one has the potential for a breakout senior year. Forward Ryan Luther has battled through some injuries —  he missed 12 ACC games last year with a stress fracture — but he has also shown a number of spurts of good play. The 6’9″ Pennsylvania native has contributed nine career double-figure scoring games and has proven to be a capable rebounder and defender — with greater usage, he could easily double last year’s season averages of 5.7 PPG and 3.9 RPG. The other holdover from last year, guard Jonathan Milligan, has not yet proven that he can play at this level — he went a ghastly 29 percent from the field in 27 games last season. Stallings also added another experienced player via the graduate transfer route in small forward Monty Boykins (Lafayette), who missed all of last year with an injury. But don’t expect the newcomer to add much — in 2015-16, Boykins posted just a 91.3 offensive rating for a terrible (6-24) low major team. Read the rest of this entry »

As RTC heads into its 11th season covering college hoops, it’s time to begin releasing our annual compendium of YouTube clips that we like to call Thirty Reasons We Love College Basketball. These 30 snippets from last season’s action are completely guaranteed to make you wish the games were starting tonight rather than 30 days from now. Over the next month you’ll get one reason per day until we reach the new season on Friday, November 10. You can find all of this year’s released posts here.

#19 – Where Love and Basketball Happens.

We also encourage you to re-visit the entire archive of this feature from the 2008-09, 2009-10, 2010-11, 2011-12, 2012-13, 2013-14, 2014-15, 2015-16 and 2016-17 preseasons.

As RTC heads into its 11th season covering college hoops, it’s time to begin releasing our annual compendium of YouTube clips that we like to call Thirty Reasons We Love College Basketball. These 30 snippets from last season’s action are completely guaranteed to make you wish the games were starting tonight rather than 30 days from now. Over the next month you’ll get one reason per day until we reach the new season on Friday, November 10. You can find all of this year’s released posts here.

#20 – Where Magic of March Happens.

We also encourage you to re-visit the entire archive of this feature from the 2008-09, 2009-10, 2010-11, 2011-12, 2012-13, 2013-14, 2014-15, 2015-16 and 2016-17 preseasons.

As RTC heads into its 11th season covering college hoops, it’s time to begin releasing our annual compendium of YouTube clips that we like to call Thirty Reasons We Love College Basketball. These 30 snippets from last season’s action are completely guaranteed to make you wish the games were starting tonight rather than 30 days from now. Over the next month you’ll get one reason per day until we reach the new season on Friday, November 10. You can find all of this year’s released posts here.

#21 – Where A Special Homecoming Happens.

We also encourage you to re-visit the entire archive of this feature from the 2008-09, 2009-10, 2010-11, 2011-12, 2012-13, 2013-14, 2014-15, 2015-16 and 2016-17 preseasons.

This team preview is part of the RTC ACC microsite’s preseason coverage.

Burning Question: Can Boston College cobble together a winning season?

We’re nearing put up or shut up time for Boston College head coach Jim Christian. Last year’s Eagles lacked both talent and experience, a deadly combination. They stifled any possible early momentum with an atrocious loss at home to Nicholls State right out of the gate, but a 4-1 December stretch that included wins over Auburn, Providence and Syracuse built hope for a breakthrough after the new year. Alas, the whole team hit a freshman wall in ACC play, finishing the year on a 15-game losing streak.

Ky Bowman needs to make a sophomore leap for Boston College to sniff .500. (Photo: Keith Carroll / BC Heights)

What’s the upside? First, nearly all of Boston College’s talent is back. Jerome Robinson and Ky Bowman were Christian’s best players last season, and it wasn’t really close. Nik Popovic is an intriguing player who could make a big leap during his sophomore season (admittedly, his best games last year were against poor competition), and throw in Illinois State graduate transfer Deontae Hawkins along with four consensus three-star freshmen. That’s a much better team — at least on paper — than what the Eagles brought to bear last season. They should be one of the better perimeter shooting teams in the ACC, and more experienced teammates should relieve some of the pressure from Robinson, possibly further boosting his efficiency. Despite shooting very well from the floor last season, Boston College’s poor offensive efficiency was because of a high number of turnovers, poor rebounding and an inability to get to the charity stripe. The last two pieces are related and unlikely to improve dramatically if the team ends up spreading the floor as much as anticipated. Minimizing turnovers should be a very high priority this season (along with loads of practice in team rebounding).

Read the rest of this entry »