It sure is boring without basketball on the tube…

• Alabama PG and former all-american Ronald Steele made the smart decision and is heading back to Tuscaloosa for his senior campaign.  Oops – maybe not yet. 
• Arizona’s Nic Wise has decided to stick it out at UA – he had previously said he was transferring.  Since Lute finally got to the end of his divorce fiasco, maybe the good folks in the desert can get back to worrying about basketball this year. 
• More OJ Mayo scandal – getting an Attorney General involved is never a good thing (unless Elliot Spitzer is springing for the booze and hos). 
• Gary Parrish points out that former Iowa St. reject and D-League star Mike Taylor’s solid week at the NBA Predraft Camp in Orlando last week fashions him a sort of trailblazer for knuckleheads who can’t stick with college programs but still want a direct route to the NBA.  Um, good luck with that. 
• How similar is this year’s draft class to the 1996 class? 

Taking a break from NBA Predraft Camp news…

• Notre Dame got another major transfer pickup to go along with Ben Hansbrough (from Mississippi St.) – Scott Martin – a freshman forward who averaged 8/4 for the Boilers will be heading north on US 31 to ND.  Suddenly the Golden Domers are looking really good for the 2009-10 season.
• UConn coach Jim Calhoun is reportedly facing skin cancer on his neck for the second time, and will undergo six weeks of radiation therapy this summer to remove it. 
• Syracuse’s Donte Greene has decided that he’s a 1-and-done player, as he recently signed with an agent and will not be eligible to return to the Orange next season.
• Joey Dorsey made the claim in Orlando this week that he has the inside track on who the Bulls will select as the #1 overall draft pick, and he says Michael Beasley.  Jeff Goodman writes about the maddening mind that is Dorsey.
• Clemson’s head man Oliver Purnell got an extension to 2014 and a raise to $1M per annum.  Still significantly below Tommy Bowden ($1.8M), but hey, who’s counting. 
• Luke Winn has a nice piece on Chris Lofton’s tumultuous senior campaign, as he is now finally starting to get his legs back after beating testicular cancer. 
• In his first public interview since the Rodney Guillory scandal hit, OJ Mayo was more upset that the news hit on Mother’s Day than the fact it made him look like a cheat and a liar. 
• In some sad news, Louisville center Clarence Holloway was diagnosed with Marfan Syndrome, which has effectively ended his basketball career.  We wish him all the best fighting this disease. 

Some post-Memorial Day items of interest…

• Former Georgetown guard Jeremiah Rivers will transfer to Indiana (perhaps he sees immediate PT awaiting in 2009-10?).
• Who’s coming back? Memphis guard Antonio Anderson, Marquette guard Jerel McNeal and Alabama guard Alonzo Gee declared their intentions to return to school, ensuring that Memphis will have at least one starter back from its national runner-up team. One intriguing name who is still undecided, WVU’s Joe Alexander, described his daily routine in Vegas getting ready for the pre-draft camp.
• Speaking of which, the Orlando Pre-Draft Camp begins tomorrow. Here is the list of players invited.
• Frank Burlison at Scout.com has an interesting rumors/tidbits report on where players are likely to land in the NBA Draft – his most interesting takes were questioning Michael Beasley’s true size (6’8ish?) and Robin Lopez getting selected before his more accomplished brother, Brook.
• It’s official – Mike Jarvis will take over as the head man at Florida Atlantic.
• There will be no payout for Bill Duffy Associates, the agency allegedly supplying OJ Mayo with money through street agent urchin Rodney Guillory, as Mayo has “restructured” his inner circle by parting ways with his BDA agent, Calvin Andrews.
• Will the Class of 2008 produce far fewer 1-and-dones than the last two years?
• We always thought there was something bizarre about the NCAA F4 ticket-request process. Looks like we weren’t the only ones.
• We’ll end with Joakim Noah’s completely unsurprising evening in Gainesville Saturday night.

An abbreviated version of Fast Breaks today. . .

• If you thought nepotism was dead, think again. Mike Krzyzewski promoted his son-in-law to director of basketball operations. Nothing keeps your in-laws on leash like having the power to fire them.
• As we mentioned almost two months ago, Arizona is going through some tough times with the transition from interim coach Kevin O’Neill back to living legend Lute Olson. However, it looks like things are more of a mess there than we previously thought. Lute has his work cut out for him and he might want to try to erase any record of his previous prediction that the Wildcats would contend for the 2009 national title, which was before Jerryd Bayless left and Chase Buddinger left and Kevin O’Neill left and Emmanuel Negedu backed out of his national letter of intent and Brandon Jennings failed to qualify academically and Nic Wise brought up the possibility of transferring. . .

There are a few newsie items floating around out there today…

• It looks like Iowa will have to turn to someone else for offense as last year’s leading scorer Tony Freeman announced he is transferring to Southern Illinois. Apparently Iowa didn’t value his ability while SIU gave him the respect he wanted. It should be noted that Freeman averaged 13.8 PPG on 37.6% FG shooting and isn’t even ranked in Chad Ford’s Top 100 prospects or any other draft site’s projections.
• Jeff Goodman is reporting that the nation’s top recruit, Brandon Jennings, still hasn’t officially qualified for enrollment at Arizona.  Well, there’s always the D-League, eh, Brandon?
• IUPUI coach Ron Hunter gives us reason to believe in humanity again. 
• Andy Katz listed the results of his polling of various NBA scouts, GMs and other dignitaries, and since it’s Insider, we have no problem stealing it (see below).  There were 26 responses, and each response got one vote as to whether a player would be in the lottery.

Unanimous selections (6)

Jerryd Bayless, Fr., G, Arizona — 26
Michael Beasley, Fr., F, Kansas State — 26
Eric Gordon, Fr., G, Indiana — 26
Brook Lopez, Soph., C, Stanford — 26
Derrick Rose, Fr., G, Memphis — 26
O.J. Mayo, Fr., G, USC — 26

Near-consensus (4)

Danilo Gallinari, F, Italy — 25
Anthony Randolph, Fr., F, LSU — 24
Darrell Arthur*, Soph., F, Kansas — 22
Kevin Love*, Fr., C, UCLA — 22

Last four spots

Russell Westbrook*, Soph., G, UCLA — 21
D.J. Augustin, Soph., G, Texas — 18
DeAndre Jordan, Fr., C, Texas A&M — 17
JaVale McGee, Soph., C, Nevada — 13

Also receiving multiple votes (11)

Nicolas Batum, F, France — 9
Joe Alexander*, Jr., F, West Virginia — 6
Chase Budinger*, Soph., F, Arizona — 5
Donte Greene*, Fr., F, Syracuse — 3
Kosta Koufos, Fr., F, Ohio State — 3
Robin Lopez, Soph., C, Stanford — 3
Chris Douglas-Roberts, Jr., G, Memphis — 2
Roy Hibbert, Sr., C, Georgetown — 2
J.J. Hickson*, Fr., F, NC State — 2
Brandon Rush, Jr., F, Kansas — 2
Marreese Speights*, So., F, Florida — 2

*Still hasn’t officially signed with an agent.

Hope everyone had a superb weekend…

• Former GW and St. John’s head coach Mike Jarvis is reportedly resurfacing at Florida Atlantic University, not to be confused with fellow resurfacer and former FAU coach Matt Doherty (toiling his wares at SMU (24-37) the last two seasons).  And yes, we know you were wondering, but “Coach Doh” is now “blogging,” as the kids are calling it.  His posts on “Pizza and Ball” and “C-Paul” and  simply brilliant – Agent Zero has nothing on Doh.   
• Kansas Associate AD Jim Marchiony says nothing to see here with respect to the Darrell Arthur grade-changing scandal in high school.  If Arthur were returning to KU next year, he may face some kind of suspension (assuming all of the allegations are true), but Kansas’ role in validating his HS transcript probably ended when it was accepted by the NCAA Clearinghouse. 
• Scout came out with its final Top 100 Seniors of 2008 – Arizona’s Brandon Jennings is their top choice.  #71 on that list, Emmanuel Negedu, wants out of his commitment to Arizona, citing coaching confusion as the reason for his change of heart.  Gary Parrish stays in the Pac-10 to rate UCLA as his top class of 2008 (5 players in the top 50).   
• We know that Michael Beasley and Derrick Rose will be 1-2 in next month’s draft, but who will be the #3 player selected?
• Are Coach K’s Olympic Team commitments taking a toll on Duke?
• Egads, so Billy Gillispie isn’t a drunk swimming in hotel pools with topless coeds after all?!?!
• Oh my, in the Reverand Wright vein of knowing who you associate with, please tell us that Barack Obama knows about these photos of one of his top aides, former Dookie (and TeaBagged) Reggie Love.

Finishing out your week with a bunch of meaningless links – enjoy!

• OJ Mayo claims he never took nothing from nobody!  Apparently Mayo’s HS in Ohio (North College Hill) will keep its two titles from 2005 and 2006 – the OHSAA only gives you six weeks to contest a violation of any kind! 
  nvr1983 update: I prefer the actual LA Times article/interview. Even though I know it is normal for athletes to get rather large gifts from agents before the draft (rtmsf and I witnessed it in 1998 with Vince Carter and Antawn Jamison and a tricked out Navigator), the last sentence is a classic.
• UNC’s Alex Stepheson announced that he is transferring closer to home for family reasons (SoCal). 
• USC may lose a major recruit for 09 in the fallout of the Mayo scandal.
• UConn guard Doug Wiggins is transferring to UMass – oh, to reminisce on what an uproar this would have caused ca. 1994. 
• Indiana’s former assistant coach Dan Dakich got bought out for $185k. 
• BYU’s Trent Plaisted signed with an agent and will stay in the NBA Draft.
• Here’s Shawn Siegel’s most excellent ratings of the top ten players at each position in this year’s draft class (PGs, SGs, and more to come…)
• Yes, kids, testing the waters can end up pigeonholing you and hurting your future draft position.
• Jay Bilas indicts everyone and anyone related to the stink emanating from the business of basketball (and we largely agree with him).  (insider only)
• Gary Parrish talks about how teams are stealing players from programs going through coaching changes (Duke and UCLA are the latest beneficiaries). 
• If this isn’t IRONIC in the wake of Huggins’ stint at Kansas State (one-and-done), we don’t know what is…
• Andy Glockner reports that the mid-majors are getting hit hard by the glut of early entries these days too.
• Is college basketball being unfairly singled out for additional enforcement (vis-a-vis football) by Myles Brand?

More blah on a blah day around the net…

• Doc Rivers’ kid is transferring to Indiana – too bad he can’t suit up next year. 
• Orange & Blue Hue did a nice analysis on why Jai Lucas cost the Gators an NCAA bid this season.
• Duquesne’s Kojo Mensah is staying in the NBA Draft.  Yeah, the L really values 6’1 guys from small colleges who averaged 12ppg last season.  Wait, Duquesne?
• 11 months later, Billy D. still hasn’t signed his contract extension from Florida (to be fair, neither has Billy G. at UK or Bob Huggins at WVU). 
• Too little, too late, Myles Brand.  Is this “new info” the old info that we all already know about?
• All the summer recruiting links you could ever want.  You too can find an eighth grader of your own!
• …and the obligatory Erin Andews video link.

Your weekend news and notes…

• OJ, OJ, OJ, OJ, OJ…
• In the wake of the Kelvin Sanctions fiasco, Indiana has responded to the five major NCAA allegations and believes that it has already punished flagellated itself enough.  Since IU is painting Sampson as the fall guy, he felt the need to defend himself in a separate letter to the NCAA.  
• The NCAA is proposing a change to the college goaltending rule to make it mesh with the NBA version – a ball that hits the backboard may no longer be blocked whether it is moving in an upward or downward motion.  Our biggest pet peeve, the lack of a collegiate block/charge restricted area under the basket, was merely “discussed.”  Wonderful. 
• Orchestration, or tampering, Coach Crean?  Say what you really mean.
• Kentucky’s Derrick Jasper has decided to transfer closer to home. 
• Andy Glockner writes that Davidson as the “new Gonzaga” is fraught with challenges.
• Vegas Watch breaks down odds on who will be #1 in the draft.
• Speaking of which, one Who? (Missouri’s Leo Lyons) decided to return to school, while another Who? (Duquesne’s Shawn James) decided to stay in the NBA Draft. 
• STF took a look at the 69 early entries (now 68!) and breaks each player down into a probable spot. 
• The Anxious Tar Heel has a solid breakdown of the percentages of an early entry a) getting invited to the Orlando Predraft Camp, and b) getting drafted from there. 

Today’s rantings of a wild man…

• Duke promoted former Devil (96-01) Nate James to assistant coach in Johnny Dawkins’ old spot, ensuring that K’s bench is now filled with former underachievers feisty players.
• Lots of bad things happening at Arizona these days.
• South Carolina’s Devan Downey apparently decked someone on campus last week (he has been suspended). 
• Transfers – Jeremiah Rivers (Doc’s son) is leaving Georgetown, and Indiana’s Eli Holman (of potted plant fame) is following an assistant coach (Ray McCallum) to Detroit Mercy. 
• Bob Huggins’ new contract with WVU stipulates he can be fired for habitual intoxication.  Habitual intoxication…  is that three or four times a week?
• Billy Gillispie has his eye on a few more middle schoolers besides Michael Avery for the class of 2012.
• There were 69 early entries this year, many of whom are only “testing the waters.”  Goodman says this puts coaches in a bind. 
• The Jewish Jordan (Zach Feinstein) seeks to top the NBA Draft this year…
• Alabama St. (mostly football) and Florida International show that not only the big boys are cheating these days. 
• We missed this a week or so ago, but Dan Hanner at YABB has some great data (regressions are fun, kids!) on coaches and how well they recruit and perform in the regular season and NCAA Tournament. 
• M2M is counting down the top 10 most embarrassing moments in college basketball history.  Some good stuff on there.