1. Word leaked Tuesday night that the worst-kept current secret in college athletics will finally see the light — Texas A&M has been invited to formally join the SEC beginning in the 2012-13 academic year.  The school plans to announce its acceptance of the invitation later today, but the question on everyone’s minds from California to New York is what happens next.  Will the SEC now seek to add a 14th team like Missouri or West Virginia?  Will the Big 12 quartet of Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Texas and Texas Tech migrate en masse to the Pac-12?  Will the Big East move to swallow up Mizzou, Kansas and Kansas State?   Does the Big Ten convince Maryland to jump ship?  Or will the ACC raid the Big East for Syracuse, Connecticut, Rutgers and Pittsburgh?  The possibilities are seemingly endless and nobody knows how all of this will eventually play out.  Our conference realignment expert, Andrew Murawa, will be posting his thoughts on the myriad possibilities later this morning.
2. One of the more intriguing possibilities from a basketball standpoint was reported by the New York Post‘s Lenn Robbins on Tuesday.  If the Big 12 implodes, the 17-team basketball version of the Big East is considering adding Kansas, Missouri and Kansas State to create a ridiculous 20-team hoops juggernaut that would include as many as 14 NCAA quality teams in a given year (last season’s 11 plus the additional three).  The format would divide the 20 teams into four five-team divisions, with each team playing home-and-homes within its division and rotating games among the other teams on a yearly basis.  It’s been said a million times that all of this conference realignment stuff is driven by football, but if the Big East expands as proposed here or if the ACC raids the power players in the Big East, we’re going to end up with one hell of a basketball league as a byproduct of all this madness.
3. Luke Winn loves his efficiency stats, and we can’t really blame him. The rise of KenPom-like statistics in college basketball has helped us more deeply understand how to measure and quantify the hidden parts of players’ games who we know are really good despite perhaps only marginal numbers when it comes to the traditional metrics of basketball performance (PPG, RPG, APG).  In the first of a three-part series running this week, Winn takes a look at the top ten most valuable point guards of the efficiency era, and you might be surprised with the relatively unheralded player who ends up at the top of the list.  It’ll be interesting to compare the lead guards against the other players later this week, but three of the top ten single-season performances by those players were as a part of national championship teams, lending credence to the theory that superb play at the position is almost essential to winning a title.
4. About that NBA lockout thing.  In case you haven’t yet noticed, the NBA has now been locked out of its facilities for over two months and there are no indications of the ongoing labor problems between players and management subsiding soon.  The New York Post reported on Monday that Madison Avenue firms who are accustomed to putting nearly a billion dollars worth of  annual advertising into the marketplace during the NBA season are looking for other options, and college basketball (along with the NFL) might be one of those beneficiaries.  Although college hoops and the NBA generally attract different fans, there are some demographic similarities: for example, both groups skew younger and male than they do among professional football fans, an extremely coveted group of eyeballs among the creative class.
5. It’s never too early for a preseason All-American team, and in that spirit The Sporting News released its fifteen-member group on Tuesday.  Your first-teamers: UNC’s Harrison Barnes, Ohio State’s Jared Sullinger, Baylor’s Perry Jones, Connecticut’s Jeremy Lamb, and Kentucky’s Anthony Davis.  That’s right — one year after Barnes was prematurely selected as the first AP preseason All-American in the history of the organization, TSN is staking its reputation on the extremely talented but oh-so-young Davis.  Of course, there have been seven freshmen first-teamers in the last five years, but the hard part is picking the right one.  Duke’s Austin Rivers and UConn’s Andre Drummond, for example, might end up being just as worthy as UK’s Davis.

Zach Hayes is an editor, contributor and bracketologist for Rush the Court.

The most anticipated season in North Carolina basketball history is approaching.

More than those Frank McGuire-coached teams in the 1950s. More than any of the best from the storied Dean Smith era, including the unforgettable Jordan/Perkins/Worthy triumvirate. Even more than when Roy Williams couldn’t resist the call of his alma mater or when Tyler Hansbrough returned for another go-round with Ty Lawson and Wayne Ellington.

When two lottery picks join forces with two other first-round picks, a foundation of complementary pieces and a typically loaded recruiting class, unadulterated glee in Chapel Hill seems rather appropriate.

Navigating an unimpressive ACC this season, a far cry from its heyday as the premiere basketball league in America, renders the trek significantly less treacherous. Although he couldn’t have foreseen Harrison Barnes remaining in college more than one season, Williams knew 2011-12 would be special and challenged his team adequately in the non-conference.

Team Outlook: Last November, it was arch-rival Duke topping the preseason rankings with Kyle Singler and Nolan Smith as seniors. One year later, the Tar Heels take their turn. Carolina’s journey from NIT to Elite Eight was aided markedly by the freshman duo of Barnes/Kendall Marshall plus the development and maturation of John Henson and Tyler Zeller.  Carolina returns their entire starting lineup of Marshall, Strickland, Barnes, Zeller and Henson, adds two potential impact rookies in James McAdoo and P.J. Hairston and features enviable depth off the bench. The lesson here: rebuilding projects at renowned power programs don’t last very long. A third national title for Williams next April doesn’t seem so far-fetched.

Non-Conference Schedule Rank: 8. Only five non-conference contests away from Chapel Hill, but three of the five will pose sizable challenges for the Tar Heels. The season-opening bash on an aircraft carrier in San Diego pits Carolina against a Michigan State team that, contrary to last season, we may be seriously underestimating. Tom Izzo will rely heavily on the versatile Draymond Green, rising star Keith Appling and Valparaiso transfer Brandon Wood. A Las Vegas tournament is also on the docket with a likely win vs. South Carolina preceding a possible final against UNLV in a true road game. The Rebels are pegged by most as the second-best team in the Mountain West under new coach Dave Rice behind their guard duo of Oscar Bellfield and Anthony Marshall. UNC draws rebuilding Texas and Jordan Taylor’s Wisconsin Badgers to the Dean Dome. We’d be surprised if Carolina stumbled once at home this season. Of course, the December 3 showdown with Kentucky in Lexington is the highlight of Carolina’s schedule and could be the most anticipated non-conference game in recent memory.

Cupcake City: Don’t think Williams skipped out on the buy games just because of their lofty status. Carolina faces off with UNC-Asheville, Mississippi Valley State and Tennessee State prior to their Las Vegas trip and are granted a long reprieve after the Wisconsin/Kentucky back-to-back with nine consecutive home games December 6 to January 10. Texas and two ACC duels with Boston College and Miami are mixed in with a number of cupcakes, including Nicholls State, Elon and Monmouth.

Toughest Early Season Test: Prepare yourself, North Carolina vs. Kentucky is going to receive an unprecedented amount of hype for a game in early December. That was made possible when Terrence Jones and Harrison Barnes simultaneously stunned the college basketball world and returned for their sophomore seasons. Other important cogs fell into place, and the recruiting-savvy coaching staffs securing loaded freshmen classes only exacerbated the potential. We just don’t envision a trap for either school that would deny fans a #1 vs. #2 showdown at Rupp Arena. As many as six first-round picks will lace up the sneakers in this one.

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1. Yesterday we mentioned the piece by SI.com’s Andy Glockner listing five teams that finished near the bottom of Ken Pomeroy’s luck statistic and why they should be in for some better fortune in the upcoming. Who, you may ask, finished dead last in that stat? Who was the unluckiest team in college hoops in 2010-11? The answer: the same team that finished last in luck in 2009-10! In fact, they did it under two different coaches. On Tuesday (not sure how it got by us), Mr. Glockner examined what exactly the luck statistic is and how this squad can avoid a three-peat of ill fate.
2. Whatever happens, DeQuan Jones at least knows that his family and friends have his back. The mother, high school coach and AAU coach of the Miami (FL) senior swingman released an understandably spiky response to “friend of the program” Nevin Shapiro’s allegation that a family member of Jones’ asked for $10,000 to insure Jones’ commital to the Hurricanes from high school. The most compelling part of their story is the timeline; Jones had already verballed and signed his letter of intent to attend Miami a full seven months prior to the time Shapiro says the payola request was made. Certainly not the end of the matter, but the linked article by the Miami Herald‘s Michelle Kaufman will bring you up to speed.
3. If you’re reading a college basketball blog, you’re likely aware that there are many players who are not just student-athletes but also innocents abroad from their foreign homes. There’s a pretty big international competition called the Summer Olympics in about a year, and a couple of fellows recently learned that they may find themselves in London playing for their respective national teams. Saint Louis’ Rob Loe was called up to New Zealand’s national side for a best-of-three series against Australia next week for the right to go to the Olympics, and College of Charleston’s Andrew Lawrence — a native Londoner — made the final cut for the national team from Great Britain, meaning he’ll get to play in the Olympics in his hometown. This seems like as good a time as any to remind you that, because of their uniforms, the formidable NZ national rugby team is called the All Blacks. Playing off that, New Zealanders call their basketball team…the Tall Blacks.
4. College basketball fans have seen the occasional boon resulting from this whole NBA lockout nonsense, and another one just came to fruition. We didn’t get to see a Jimmer Fredette vs. Kemba Walker matchup last season, but the two have agreed to participate in a pair of games in Utah featuring two teams comprised of NBA rookies, presumably a bunch of guys trying to understandably stay in playing shape. BYU head coach Dave Rose will lead Fredette’s team, while San Diego State boss Steve Fisher will coach the Walker side. We don’t know who else will be involved, but we wouldn’t mind if Kemba and The Jimmer just ended up playing what would amount to a full-court 1-on-1 game while the others rebounded for them.
5. The people who run Kelley Farms in Lexington, Kentucky undoubtedly love two things: John Calipari, and — evidently less so — corn. As basketball fans, it would be difficult for them to go all Ray Kinsella and clear out crop space for a court, since that wouldn’t make quite the economic impact as Kevin Costner’s character’s baseball field, and basketballs don’t bounce well on uneven dirt. Instead, they decided on a John Calipari corn maze, open for the public to get lost in on September 23. We’ll be waiting to hear if any ghosts from Kentucky’s glorious past emerge from the stalks. Perhaps farm owner John Kelley heard a voice telling him, “If he comes, you will build it.” Yeah, we know — enough with the Field Of Dreams references.

It was one of the worst kept secrets in all of sports, but earlier today Connecticut announced that Hall of Fame coach Jim Calhoun would be returning for his 26th season as head coach at the school. While there were some questions late last season as to whether Calhoun would return and serve his suspension (missing the first three games of Big East play this season) as the Huskies progressed through the NCAA Tournament those thoughts diminished although there was a sizable minority that felt that he still might retire at the top of college basketball following the Huskies’ improbable run to the NCAA title.

Calhoun Made It Official Today: He Will Return to Defend His Title (Credit: Andy Lyons/Getty Images)

As the summer wore on it became increasingly clear that Calhoun was coming back based on what UConn recruits were saying and when Calhoun reportedly won an well-publicized albeit behind-the-scenes power struggle that led to Jeff Hathaway’s dismissal as athletic director at the school nearly every college basketball pundit assumed that Calhoun was coming back. Friday’s night surprise announcement by Andre Drummond that he would be going to UConn this year was viewed as icing on the cake. As we said the night that Drummond committed the Huskies are far from prohibitive favorites to repeat as they will have to learn to adapt to playing without Kemba Walker, but rising sophomore Jeremy Lamb has shown flashes of star potential last year as a freshman and over the summer playing for the US National Team and they will have one of the best interior defenses the country to go along with a handful of talented supporting players.

While Calhoun has a few more obstacles to overcome (like his suspension for the first three games of the Big East season–against South Florida, St. John’s, and Seton Hall) he has the Huskies in position to contend for another national title although UNC, Kentucky, and a handful of other teams all appear to be legitimate contenders. If Calhoun is able to get this new team to mesh and integrate a dominant big man to replace a dominant perimeter player, we may find ourselves in a similar situation next April as to whether or not Calhoun will return to defend another championship.

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

• McDonald’s Rehab Expected To Take 7-8 Months: Leslie McDonald is expected to miss the entire season recovering from his ACL injury. (Tar Heel Fan)
• Bruce Pearl hired by grocery company: “The wait is over, Bruce Pearl has a job. Pearl accepted a position with H.T. Hackney Co., a Knoxville-based wholesale grocery company that provides products to stores. The company does not have a basketball team; Pearl will be the vice president of marketing.” (Kentucky Sports Radio)
• Memphis Still Bitter About Calipari?: “According to Dan Wolken (former Memphis Tigers beat writer) ‘word is that the new Penny Hardaway Athletic Hall of Fame, which opened today on Memphis’ campus, includes no photos of John Calipari.'” (Kentucky Sports Radio)

1. We weighed in yesterday on the product-of-a-slow-news-day controversy involving the media relations department at Kentucky and the school’s student-run newspaper, the Kentucky Kernel. We won’t rehash the whole thing here, but now the AP Managing Editors Association has responded to UK, calling the behavior of the school’s Sports Information Department “reprehensible” and “abhorrent at a taxpayer-owned institution.” Seriously? Without mentioning the actions of the involved student reporter, they also “urge” UK to restore the media access of both the paper and the reporter, even though their access was denied for less than 24 hours and was probably restored in full before the APME even wrote that letter. Did they read anything about this before sending it? It comes off like a formality.
2. “2012 NCAA Tournament Champions Michigan Wolverines.” Sound good, Ann Arbor? Your boy Jordan Dumars thinks so. Not only does he think it sounds good, he thinks it should happen, and confirms that that’s what his team says — “national championship” — at the end of every workout. Dumars, a transfer who will become eligible by the holidays, is not predicting nor guaranteeing such an achievement, just saying that’s where the squad is aiming. We wholeheartedly support players taking this tack when asked to give prognostications on how they think their upcoming season will go. If a kid says something like, “Well, I think we’ll go 20-14 and hopefully do well in the Tournament,” as far as we’re concerned, he just lost 14 games and got bounced in the second (former first) round. Strong work, Jordan.
3. In yesterday’s M5 we slipped in a link about how Texas A&M’s president had, according to a report in the New York Times, sent a later containing his school’s kiss-off to the Big 12. The school denies this ever happened. A&M, however, confirms receiving a letter from the office of Big 12 commish Dan Beebe detailing the withdrawal procedures for leaving the conference. And by “detailing the withdrawal procedures,” we pretty much mean “explaining how much it will cost you” and “things we need to sign saying we won’t sue each other.” The linked article above notes that while A&M would like to have this done by the beginning of the season, it may take until week two or three. In other words, folks, get on board with this if you aren’t already.
4. Recruiting insider and (from what we hear) legendary ladies’ man Evan Daniels and the crew at Scout.com have released their rankings of schools’ recruiting classes for 2012, and we wonder how loud the alarm bells will sound within a few fan bases: North Carolina’s class is 9th? Duke 11th? Kentucky…not listed in the top 20 or the honorable mention?!? Relax, you various shades of blue. It’s hard to ascend the rankings when you don’t sign anyone. Duke’s ranking is based on one player, UNC’s on two. Kentucky hasn’t signed a single player from the 2012 class. There’s a reason Daniels entitled this list the “Early 2012 Class Rankings.” Just over half of Scout’s top 100 recruits for 2012 are unsigned, so unfortunately for a certain blueblood school that’s been rebuilding for a few years that sits atop the current Scout list, it’s not a matter of if but how far they’ll fall once prospects start making their selections.
5. Every one of the RTC compounds is lousy with recycling bins and solar panels, so we’re all about recycling and reusing and sustainability and all that stuff, and letting people know you’re proud of the measures you’ve taken to reduce your impact on the environment. To that end, Kansas State has unleashed — fanfare, please — EcoKat, their mascot for the whole green-going movement. Whoa. For the sake of the KSU senior in the costume (whose pluck we admire), here’s hoping that EcoKat is never unmasked and her true identity never revealed. Ladies and gentlemen, we ask you…how hot is this?

Late last night an article from The Kentucky Kernel and a series of tweets ignited a media firestorm about how media credentials are handled. The article, which was written by the UK student newspaper’s managing editor Becca Clemons, told the story of how the daily newspaper had its credentials revoked for today’s special media session where each journalist was allowed to speak with every player on the team as part of a series of one-on-one interviews. According to Clemons, the story began when Kentucky‘s star freshman Anthony Davis sent out a pair of tweets welcoming Sam Malone and Brian Long as new members of this year’s basketball team. Prior to these two tweets there was no public knowledge that the two had been invited to be walk-on members of the team.

Kentucky Has Found Itself In Another Controversy

Soon after this, Kernel reporter Aaron Smith contacted Malone and Long by cell phone after obtaining their numbers through Kentucky’s public student directory. When asked whether or not they were on the team, both players acknowledged that they were even though it had not been formally announced by the athletic department, but declined interview requests from Smith. Upon hearing of Smith’s contact with the two players, DeWayne Peevy, Kentucky’s associate athletic director of media relations, revoked the credentials he had granted Smith and the newspaper to the event, which was to be attended by only 14 media outlets including a marketing firm. In her editorial, Clemons asserted that this decision violated Smith’s First Amendment rights and cited a Louisville lawyer who represents the Kentucky Press Association who stated, “the very fact that they don’t like the way you’re exercising your First Amendment rights does not give them the right to deprive you of an opportunity you would otherwise have” and that the decision was “clearly a violation of First Amendment rights.” What followed was a late-night Twitter debate by many prominent college basketball journalists which was joined this morning by a variety of sites with a vast majority of the non-Kentucky sites supporting the newspaper.

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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

• Maryland Adds 7-2 Ukrainian Olexiy Len to 2011 Roster: “Remember those rumblings about Maryland and Mark Turgeon adding a Ukrainian big man to their 2011 roster? Well, they weren’t as wrong as they appeared; they just had the wrong big man. Per InsideMDSports, the Terrapins are adding 7-foot-2 Olexiy “Alex” Len to this season’s roster:” (Testudo Times: News and Analysis)
• Kentucky adds two walk-ons: “Coach Cal has added two new walk-ons, Sam Malone and Brian Long. Malone is a point guard from Scituate, Massachusettes. He is not the owner and bartender on Cheers. Long is from New Jersey.” (Kentucky Sports Radio: News and Analysis)

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

• Andre Drummond Commits to UConn: In a surprise Friday night announcement, Drummond elected to not enroll for a post-graduate year and instead will be heading to Storrs. (The UConn Blog and A Sea of Blue)
• Bradley to give up scholarship to pave way for Drummond: Redshirt freshman Michael Bradley will reportedly give up his scholarship to create room for Drummond. (The UConn Blog)

A little over two weeks after he decided to spend an extra year in prep school rather than go to college Andre Drummond announced that he had changed his mind and would head to Connecticut this fall. It was a shocking change of heart even by the standards of a typical teenager that dramatically changes the landscape of college basketball next season. Instead of the expected North Carolina–Kentucky showdown that college basketball writers have been hyping since the NBA Draft deadline passed we should get a national title picture that is a little less clear. While the Huskies won’t go straight to the top of the pack they may possess the most talented starting line-up in the country with Shabazz Napier, Jeremy Lamb, Roscoe Smith, Alex Oriakhi, and Drummond. Even though that group will need a little time to mesh and we expect the other four to take a while to adjust to life without Kemba Walker that is one of most talented, versatile line-ups we have seen in several years.

Drummond and Muhammad may never meet in college now

On top of adding the talent of a potential #1 pick in the 2012 NBA Draft to the defending national champions, Drummond’s decision gives Jim Calhoun (we are assuming that he is definitely coming back at this point) the flexibility to use two other less-hyped, but still very talented freshmen–DeAndre Daniels and Ryan Boatright–in more targeted action early in their college careers. Perhaps more importantly it allows Smith to move to small forward and Oriakhi, who went through maddening stretches last season where he couldn’t grab a rebound, to power forward where he should be able to overpower most of the other power forwards he faces. And when the leaner, more athletic blow by Oriakhi? They wind up facing Drummond, a player whom many NBA scouts have compared to Amar’e Stoudamire (a little premature, but if you watch the video below you will see why).

Contrary to some of the reaction online this doesn’t automatically vault the Huskies into the #1 spot and a sure-fire repeat champion like Duke appeared to be last season before Kyrie Irving‘s injury. Like the other top contenders the Huskies have their own issues to deal with. The Huskies will have to deal with the obvious issue of how their offense functions without Walker dominating the ball, adjusting to having to run more of the offense through the post, and sorting out a rotation that will rely on freshman who are unproven at the college level no matter how talented they are. What Drummond’s decision does mean is that this year’s national championship picture is suddenly a three-horse race and a year in which college basketball was expected to have its most talent in nearly a decade will get even deeper.