If you are interested in participating in our ATB2 feature, send in your submissions to rushthecourt@gmail.com. We will add to this post throughout the day as the submissions come in so keep on sending them.
General News
2011 Cougar Hardwood Classic: Washington State, Pepperdine To Play At Key Arena: “Another year, another mid-major conference opponent.” (Coug Center)
Michigan Expected to Face Arkansas During 2011-12 Season: “ESPN’s Andy Katz is reporting that Michigan is likely to add Arkansas to its 2011-12 schedule. Katz notes that the Arkansas game is expected to be lined up sometime during the Big Ten season.” (UM Hoops)
The latest on LSU transfer Garrett Green: An update on Indiana’s attempt to land the 6’11” center. (Inside the Hall)
Turgeon Will Play Four Guards “on a Consistent Basis”: “A four-guard look, ala old-school Villanova, is pretty much the only way Maryland can get five ACC-starter-level players on the floor at the same time. They’ll obviously be left with a pretty massive size deficiency, but it’s nothing Maryland fans aren’t familiar with: remember, this is the team that made the NCAA tournament with a 6-6 center. I’m assuming they’ll try to run-and-gun to make up for the overall lack of size, pushing the tempo in an attempt to tire out the bigger players.” (Testudo Times)
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General News
U of L basketball earns top academic honor: “The University of Louisville men’s basketball team has earned the 2010-11 BIG EAST Conference Team Academic Excellence Award, which recognizes the highest collective grade-point averages in each of the conference’s 26 sports.” (Card Chronicle)
Basketball Prospectus ranks Draymond Green the 14th best returning player in the country: The senior is expected to step up this year as the lone Spartan in the top 100. (The Only Colors)
Miller To Try Out For World University Games Team: “Kentucky forward Darius Miller is going to give international competition another try as the former U19 gold medalist will begin camp with Team USA Friday in hopes of making the World University Games roster. Miller is one of 22 players who accepted the invitations to the camp, which will be held in Colorado Springs and trimmed to the final playing roster August 8. The team will compete in China August 12-23 and will be coached by Purdue’s Matt Painter.” (Kentucky Sports Radio)
With the the NBA Draft concluded and the annual coaching and transfer carousels nearing their ends, RTC is rolling out a new series, RTC Summer Updates, to give you a crash course on each Division I conference during the summer months. The latest update comes courtesy of our MVC correspondent, Patrick Marshall.
The summer has been a busy one for the Missouri Valley Conference. They are hoping the 2011-12 season will be one that sees the conference become a multiple-bid league again. They haven’t had multiple bids to the NCAA Tournament since the 2006-07 season.
Reader’s Take
Summer Storylines
Coaching Changes: The MVC only had two coaching changes in the offseason. First, after leading Missouri State to its first MVC regular season title, CuonzoMartin was lured away from the Bears to Tennessee. He was replaced by Purdue assistant PaulLusk, who weeks earlier might have been in line to succeed Matt Painter had Painter left Purdue to become the new head coach at Missouri. He has Valley ties as a player at Southern Illinois in his college days, where he helped the Salukis to three straight NCAA Tournament appearances. On the flip-side, Bradley head coach JimLes was fired after nine seasons with the Braves. After taking Bradley to the Sweet Sixteen in the 2005-06 season, he had trouble getting the team back to that level. Les was replaced by Kent State head coach Geno Ford. These moves have caused a bit of a frenzy as Kent State filed a lawsuit against Bradley due to the way they hired Ford. Les has since been named the new head coach at UC Davis (where his son currently plays), and he too has filed a lawsuit of his own against his former school disputing the settlement he was paid from his dismissal. Wichita State’s GreggMarshall and Northern Iowa’s BenJacobson were speculated for many jobs over the summer, but they both chose to stay with their respective schools.
Creighton’s International Duo: Creighton’s Doug McDermott and Gregory Echenique have had a summer to remember. McDermott spent the end of June through the middle of July playing for the Team USA U-19 squad helping the team to a fifth place finish in Latvia. McDermott led the team in three-pointers made, was second in minutes, and third in scoring for the American team during the FIBA Championships. McDermott’s frontcourt counterpart Echenique is currently in Venezuela as a member of his nation’s national team. Echenique and his teammates will try to qualify for the 2012 Olympics in Argentina at the beginning of September before he returns to Creighton for the fall semester.
League Talent: There have been several different examples of decisions made by the league’s top talent this offseason. First off is the 2011 MVC Player of the Year, Kyle Weems. Weems earned his degree from Missouri State, and with a year of eligibility remaining, he could have easily decided to transfer to a different school to play right away, especially with a new coach coming into town. Instead, he decided to stay in Springfield for his senior season. In an opposite move, Bradley’s SamManiscalco was a senior last season for the Braves, but he spent much of it recovering from an ankle injury. Early last season it was decided that he would shut things down and apply for a medical redshirt, which he received. Then came the firing of Les. During Maniscalco’s redshirt season, he was able to complete his degree. With a year of eligibility still remaining and a new coach coming to town, the all-MVC player decided to transfer and finish his college career at Illinois. Finally, you have Drake’s RavonteRice. A runner-up for the MVC Freshman of the Year last season, Rice has not kept it secret that he isn’t necessarily happy at Drake, but that he isn’t going to transfer… at least not yet. This is a pivotal year for the Bulldogs, as two years worth of the conference’s best recruiting classes are now sophomores and juniors that have had marginal success. How Drake does this year could determine whether Rice stays or goes.
Despite a coaching transition going into his senior year, 2011 MVC Player of the Year Kyle Weems will stick it out for the Bears. (Missouri State University)
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General News
When Jim Calhoun says he doesn’t want to see anyone get fired, he probably means he wants to see Jeff Hathaway get fired: An update on the ongoing turmoil at UConn. (The UConn Blog)
Vitale ranks Louisville ninth: “Dick Vitale, in his infinite wisdom, has pegged the 2011-2012 Louisville Cardinals as the 9th-best team in the country.” (Card Chronicle)
World University Games 2011 — USA Announces Training Roster: “Late last week USA Basketball identified the 22 college players who will tryout for the USA World University Games men’s team, the training sessions to begin July 29 in Colorado Springs, CO. Two, Tu Holloway of Xavier and Jordan Taylor of Wisconsin have declined their invitations as of late last week. The twelve who are selected will represent the USA and should depart for Shenzhen, China, site of this year’s games, on August 8.” (Villanova by the Numbers)
With the completion of the NBA Draft and the annual coaching and transfer carousels nearing their ends, RTC is rolling out a new series, RTC Summer Updates, to give you a crash course on each Division I conference during the summer months. Our latest update comes courtesy of our Sun Belt correspondent, Danny Spewak.
Reader’s Take
Summer Storylines
Staying Put: Not a single head coach in the Sun Belt changed jobs this summer. That fact is especially noteworthy in Bowling Green, a city that nearly chased Western Kentuckycoach Ken McDonald away during a mid-season losing streak. Athletic director Ross Bjork chose to retain McDonald, and he gave a fascinating interview to Nick Baumgardner about his decision. Down south in the state of Texas, Johnny Jones will return to North Texas after rumors linked his name to a few power-conference job openings. The folks over at ESPN Dallas saw asilver lining to UNT’s underachieving regular season and loss in the finals of the SBC Tourney. Jones interviewed at Auburn prior to last season, so although he’s in Denton for now, his name may keep popping up on the national radar.
They Don’t Count: Kentucky coach John Calipari made headlines this summer when NCAA officials asked him to apologize for holding a ceremony in February celebrating his 500th career victory. After all, due to vacated wins at Massachusetts and Memphis, some of Calipari’s wins don’t count in the formal record books. Turns out, Florida Atlantic’s Mike Jarvis is getting the same message from the NCAA—just without the media coverage. Reporters at FAUOwlAccess.com did some serious investigative reporting by obtaining a letter sent to FAU, telling the school not to count Jarvis’ vacated victories at St. John’s. School officials say they have no objections to the NCAA’s request.
Big-Time Transfer: Games between Louisiana-Lafayette and Louisiana-Monroe just got a little more interesting. Vanderbilttransfer Darshawn McClellan announced in May he will transfer to ULL, and that means coach Bob Marlin picks up a 6’7″ forward who averaged more than 14 minutes per game during his first two years in the SEC. But more importantly, it means he’ll play against his brother, Steven McClellan, a sophomore forward who averaged 5.1 points per game last season. Who will the family root for?
Solomon Bozeman shot the UALR Trojans into the NCAA Tournament before falling to Akron in the first round (Gregory Shamus/Getty Images).
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General News
The Death of Desmond Allison: The former Kentucky Wildcat, who was a high school star in Tampa before his two controversial seasons in Lexington, was shot yesterday in Columbus, Ohio. (Kentucky Sports Radio: News and Retrospective)
KFC Yum Center named one of world’s top arenas: “In its first year of existence, the KFC Yum Center (you forgot the exclamation point, bro) is already being honored as one of the world’s top arenas. Pollstar, a trade publication covering the worldwide concert industry, tabbed the Yum Center as the 24th-best arena in the world and 10th best in the United States in its 2011 mid-year rankings.” (Card Chronicle)
Ricky Kreklow reportedly chooses Cal: “For the past few weeks, rumors have been swirling that Missouri transfer Ricky Kreklow would be the newest addition to the Gonzaga Bulldogs. He visited campus a few weeks ago and most fans were simply waiting for confirmation he would join the team. Well, we can cancel all that. Kreklow has decided to transfer to Mike Montgomery and Cal.” (The Slipper Still Fits)
With the the NBA Draft concluded and the annual coaching and transfer carousels nearing their ends, RTC is rolling out a new series, RTC Summer Updates, to give you a crash course on each Division I conference during the summer months. The latest update comes courtesy of our Pac-12 correspondent, Andrew Murawa.
Reader’s Take #1
Summer Storylines
The More, The Merrier: The Pac-10 is dead. Long live the Pac-12. The conference welcomes in Colorado and Utah for their first season in the conference, the first expansion in the West Coast’s premier conference since Arizona and Arizona State were added 33 years ago. Along with the new teams comes a new schedule – gone is the full home-and-away round robin. While there won’t be divisions in basketball like there are in football, each team will play an 18-game schedule with home and away games against its traditional rival, with six other rotating home-and-away series and four additional single games against the remaining teams. For instance, Colorado and Utah will only play the Southern California schools and the Washington schools once each, while they will play the remainder of the conference twice. While neither of the new schools are expected to make a big splash immediately in the conference, their arrival, coupled with other changes around the conference, such as the huge new $3 billion TV deal with ESPN and Fox that begins in the fall of 2012, makes it an exciting time to be a Pac-12 fan.
Is There A Draft In Here?: Last summer, a big story around the conference was the dearth of Pac-10 players picked in the NBA Draft, as just two players from the conference were selected by NBA teams in 2010. After the 21 players that were picked in the conference between the 2008 and 2009 drafts, that was a precipitous fall. And, back before the season started, there didn’t seem to be a whole lot of future high draft picks on the horizon. However, the conference had six players picked in the NBA draft, including three first-rounders and two lottery picks. Derrick Williams, the 2010-11 conference player of the year, led the way, getting snapped up by Minnesota with the #2 overall pick. Unfortunately for teams around the conference, 12 seasons of eligibility were left on the table between those six picks and the two early entries who went undrafted: Stanford’s Jeremy Green and Washington State’s DeAngelo Casto. And as a result, what had looked like a potential big-time bounce-back season for the conference now sees somewhat diminished expectations. Perhaps no team was hit harder by early defections than UCLA, who had Tyler Honeycutt and Malcolm Lee leave a total of three years of eligibility behind to go get second-round NBA draft picks (and the absence of guaranteed contracts that goes with them) at a time when the NBA labor situation is highly in doubt, but Washington State’s loss of Casto and lottery pick Klay Thompson also leaves the Cougars’ situation fuzzy at best.
Replacing Production: Between the early entries to the NBA Draft and departed seniors, the Pac-12 loses its top seven scorers from last season, and 11 of its top 20. Likewise, ten of the top 20 rebounders are gone. However, as always, a new batch of youngsters is ready to show up on campuses this fall and begin contributing immediately. While the Pac-10 inked only nine of the ESPNU top 100 recruits, seven of those players are exciting young guards, all ranked in the top 60 on that list. Arizona leads the way, signing point guard Josiah Turner (#14 overall, according to ESPNU) and Nick Johnson (#21), to go with a couple solid frontcourt signees (Angelo Chol and Sidiki Johnson, #60 and #91, respectively). But Washington (Tony Wroten, Jr., #16), Oregon (JabariBrown, #25), Arizona State (Jahii Carson, #49), UCLA (NormanPowell, #51) and Stanford (ChassonRandle, #59) all have their own big backcourt recruits ready to provide a burst of energy.
Derrick Williams' performances were one of the highlights of the 2010-11 season.
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General News
Moe Harkless cleared to play for St. John’s: “It looks like the first big eligibility hurdle for the Red Storm has been cleared. Zach Braziller reports on Twitter that sources tell the New York Post that Maurice Harkless is cleared to play for the Red Storm.” (Rumble in the Garden)
More details emerge in Bruce Pearl NCAA Scandal: An update on Pearl and the allegations against him. (Kentucky Sports Radio)
News on Garrett Green to Indiana: Some updates on the potential transfer. (Inside the Hall: His potential impact and Q & A)
Former UK Legends to Play Game vs. Dominican Republic in Rupp: “Calipari is organizing an exhibition game between former UK players and the Dominican Republic National Team on August 15th in Rupp Arena. Rosters have yet to be finalized.” (Kentucky Sports Radio)
Throughout the summer RTC contributors Zach Hayes and Brian Otskey will discuss the hot topics — or whatever comes to mind — around each major conference in college basketball. This week, they tackle the expanded Pac-12. For the entire summer series focusing on each of the six power conferences, click here.
Zach: Let’s face it: it hasn’t been smooth sailing for the Pac-10 (now Pac-12) conference since the 2008-09 season when players like Darren Collison, James Harden, Jon Brockman, Chase Budinger and Taj Gibson starred, or even dating back to the year prior when a Kevin Love-led UCLA team edged the Lopez twins, upstart Washington State and O.J. Mayo’s USC Trojans for the title and a #1 seed in the NCAA Tournament. Every conference, even powerhouse leagues like the Big East and ACC, will occasionally suffer through dry spells in talent in today’s early entry era, and this league just happened to hit a lull when notable blue-bloods UCLA and Arizona struggled simultaneously. This even led to discussions regarding whether the Pac-12 could realistically be a one or two bid representative. Sure, there was actually some quality basketball played out West, but fans of this conference secretly hoped for a renaissance sooner than later.
Most had their eye on the 2011-12 season for just that moment. The plan was for UCLA to be rebuilt and reloaded, Arizona competing nationally under Sean Miller, Washington’s Isaiah Thomas entering his senior season and proud programs like Stanford and Oregon back on track. Unfortunately, this road to success has hit some potholes. Malcolm Lee and Tyler Honeycutt both decided to remain second round picks rather than continue their UCLA careers. Derrick Williams blossomed from unheralded to underrated to #2 overall pick and understandably bolted from the desert. Klay Thompson saw his stock rise and departed Pullman. In a more controversial move, Stanford’s Jeremy Green did the same. The biggest hit was Isaiah Thomas leaving Washington and ultimately being selected #60 overall. The Pac-12 had a chance to make a significant move up the conference ladder in 2011-12. While improvement is still in the cards, I’m left wondering this summer what could have been.
Miller spurned Maryland to remain in Tucson
The debate this offseason will be whether Arizona or UCLA should begin the year as the favorite to take home the conference crown. Arizona lost Williams and their enigmatic but ultra-talented point guard MoMo Jones to a transfer closer to home, but enter the crown jewel of Sean Miller’s top recruiting class since taking the gig in Josiah Turner. Turner is most comfortable in attack mode, penetrating the defense and utilizing his tremendous court vision to find open teammates. Miller is blessed with plenty of ammo both in the backcourt with Kyle Fogg, Kevin Parrom, Jordin Mayes, Brendon Lavender and four star freshman Nick Johnson joining Turner, as well as in the frontcourt with Solomon Hill and Jesse Perry back in the fold joining two more talented newcomers. The issue for Miller won’t be depth, but rather finding that one impact player that can score 17-18 PPG per night and take/make the big shots when the chips are down. Whether it’s Fogg, Parrom, Hill, Perry or another candidate, one of these former secondary cogs must make a significant leap forward or Arizona will be a collection of enviable talent, but one without the singular on-court leadership of Williams. If Arizona can’t do so, UCLA could very well bring the title back to Westwood because I firmly and confidently believe Josh Smith develops into one of the best big men in the college game next season.
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General News
McDonald Injury Update: An interview with Leslie McDonald talking about his injury. (Tar Heel Fan)
Lute Olson releases statement on David Salinas involvement, Arizona fans can breathe more easily: Olson says that he did not invest money with Salinas before his retirement. (Arizona Desert Swarm)
Johnson Sidelined for Europe Trip: “Incoming Villanova Freshman Tyrone Johnson will not be able to play during Villanova’s Summer Tour of Europe. The 6’3″ point guard sustained a broken foot during a pickup game last month and had surgery according to Joe Juliano who spoke with Head Coach Jay Wright.” (VU Hoops)
Kansas Prominently Featured As Part Of The 2012 Big 12/ESPN Big Monday Schedule: “SPN released it’s 2012 Big Monday schedule and it’s no surprise that Kansas will once again play a prominent role in one of the premier weekly matchups in conference play. For years Kansas has dominated the Big 12 Big Monday slate and with 4 of 7 slots scheduled this year, that continues.” (Rock Chalk Talk)
Calipari Thinks A Redshirt Could Work Out Well For Hood: “With the news that Kentucky junior Jon Hood tore his ACL in a pickup game Monday came the question of whether or not he would end up taking a redshirt this season while he recovered. The man that will ultimately make the decision, John Calipari, doesn’t think that’s a terrible idea. He’s not sold on it yet, but he’s definitely considering it. Calipari told ESPN’s Andy Katz, ‘We’ll see how it goes. It’s a possibility. It might help him.’ If they end up giving Hood a redshirt, Calipari thinks that it could help his career out in the long run by letting him spend this season working out with the loaded roster the Cats have in place. He would return next season with two years of eligibility remaining.” (Kentucky Sports Radio)
