10.12.08 Fast Breaks

Posted by rtmsf on October 12th, 2008

Have a Happy Rape & Pillage Day, everyone!

  • If Rick Barnes and his one career F4 appearance merits a Legends in Coaching award, we’re wondering just how legendary this award must be.  Well, Gene Keady and his zero F4s won the award in 2007, so whatever.  Katz, for one, believes that Barnes deserves this award. 
  • SEMO fired its AD and put their head coach Scott Edgar on administrative leave this week immediately following the NCAA imposing probation on the men’s and women’s basketball programs.  Good to see the NCAA’s investigative arm is going after the big boys here.  In the last seven years, the SEMO Bears have won 12, 11, 7, 15, 11, 11, and 6 games, respectively.  Awesome.
  • Here’s a quick-and-dirty recap of the ten Cinderellas to keep an eye on this season. 
  • This is a good idea – if you’re interested in knowing what recruits are going to which Midnight Madness – Making the Dance has the list. 
  • Looks like former Hawg Patrick Beverley will not be returning to Fayetteville next season. 
  • The Darrell Arthur grade-changing thing just won’t die.
  • Monty seems to be settling into his new digs across the Bay.
  • USC’s Daniel Hackett:  UCLA does “anything to win” and OJ Mayo breaking his jaw last year was a “bad episode.” 
  • What else can you say about this title of an article dealing with a Minnesota assistant coach being voted most eligible bachelor in Minnesota? – dude doesn’t mince words, that’s for sure.
  • We’re really not sure what to make of this article about Cal St.-Northridge’s Matadome and other things, but we like it.
  • Finally, a trip down memory lane with the 1996-97 Providence Friars
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Midnight Madness Part 1

Posted by rtmsf on October 11th, 2008

Ed. Note – fuel the outcry over these early Midnight Madness celebrations as a recruiting tool.  Kentucky got a commitment from Top 25 player Daniel Orton after he attended the celebration on Friday night.  Orton credited the fan support as a key reason for his decision.  Would he have attended if UK’s Madness was on the same night as everyone else?

Some Kentucky and West Virginia coverage from their Madness celebrations tonight…  Illinois and Marshall, you’re on the clock.

Apparently UK’s MM festivities involved disco lights…

… and new unis

Here’s a link to UK’s coverage (we have no idea how to rip that video)…  we’re loving Patrick Patterson’s mini-fro…

More UK pics…  (photo credits:  Lexington Herald-Leader)

And we can’t even find a single photo of the WVU celebration (yet).  C’mon Mountaineers, do you guys have digital cameras out there yet? 

We’ll try again tomorrow. 

Ok, here goes, there are some WVU photos up on Facebook (photo credit: Andrew Ashley).  Devin Ebanks looks sicknasty. 

Hopefully more from Illinois later today…  of course the football team lost, so nobody stuck around for “the world’s biggest practice…”

(Photo Credit: AP)

 

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Well, It Kinda Sorta Starts Tonight

Posted by rtmsf on October 10th, 2008

Yep, Midnight Madness is upon us.  Well, at least at the few schools who have flouted conventional wisdom and are using their 2-hr window of practice time this week to get Midnight Madness out of the way earlier than everyone else.  It’ll be interesting to monitor whether this recruiting “advantage,” according to the NABC, will actually translate into anything substantial.  Here’s the weekend schedule. 

We’re interested to see in particular how this Illinois practice in the end zone of their football stadium turns out. 

In Champaign, Ill., the men’s and women’s basketball teams will head onto a court set up behind one of the end zones Saturday at Memorial Stadium after the conclusion of Illinois’ game with Minnesota. The basketball practice, to be held on a donated court, will be canceled if it rains.  “This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for our players to be on this type of stage,” Illinois basketball coach Bruce Weber said.

Nevertheless, we shouldn’t get used to this early start.  Word is that the NCAA will enact emergency legislation later this month to put an end to the practice of early practice.  We’ll try to get some photos up as these things happen over the weekend.   

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10.08.08 Fast Breaks

Posted by rtmsf on October 8th, 2008

We’re less than 48 hrs from the quasi-official start of practice (at least at Kentucky, Illinois and a few others)… 

  • The Class of 2009 will definitely be keeping an eye on Brandon Jennings’ experience in Europe this year.
  • So we can have D2 games on tv, but getting some good mid-majors on the ESPN Full Court package is damn near impossible?
  • The Big West signed a new deal with ESPN, but unless you get the U, you’re pretty much out of luck.  Note to ESPN – put ESPNU games on the Full Court Package this year!  Find a way to watch Fullerton’s Josh Akognon anyway this year – trust us.
  • STF pegs Purdue and Oklahoma as its breakthrough teams in 2008-09, and Baylor and Tennessee as its tipping-point teams.
  • Talent = Title Contender.  Thanks, Gary.  This was a fun idea, but we don’t really trust DraftExpress for evaluating NBA talent that far out, do you?
  • The Big 12 coaches like Oklahoma, Texas, Kansas/Baylor in that order.  Over in the Horizon League, Butler is picked fifh?!?!
  • Tom Crean to NCAA on further penalties:  Enough is Enough!  Meanwhile, Kyle Taber goes on record stating that Indiana will no-way, no-how, finish last in the B10 this year.
  • One jewel from Goodman’s blog – wait, Georgetown recruited a white kid?
  • Insert Rick Pitino isn’t walking through that door joke here
  • Speculation on where the top prospects in the Class of 2009 will end up.
  • Dickie V. should stay away from MLB Playoffs predictions.   
  • We must say, as an unabashed fan of God Shammgod, this is completely awesome.
  • One man’s take on the top NCAA program of all-time.
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The Harassment of Billy Gillispie by that Coward the NABC

Posted by rtmsf on September 30th, 2008

For the second time since last spring’s Mario Miracle, the NABC has put out a statement that squarely fixes its crosshairs on Kentucky’s second-year coach, Billy Gillispie.  Certainly you remember the June directive the NABC made to stop recruiting junior high players in the wake of the media firestorm over Gillispie’s recruiting of 8th grader Michael Avery.  We wrote at the time:

Luckily, this may be a situation where coaches were doing it because they felt they needed to avoid a competitive disadvantage.  Now that the NABC has effectively disavowed this as a strategy (although it is still legal), coaches [including Gillispie] appear to be supportive of the line-drawing.

(Ed Note:  apparently another Billy, as in Billy Donovan, didn’t get that memo from the NABC.)Andy Katz now reports on his blog today that the NABC put forth a new statement yesterday that admonishes coaches for using their early autumn ‘skill development’ time (2 hours/week) prior to full practices for recruiting purposes.  More specifically, they don’t want schools to bump up their Midnight Madness festivities to a preceding weekend so as to take advantage of a more favorable recruiting scenario (i.e., big football game on campus, local stripper convention, the fact that nobody else is having Midnight Madness that weekend).  Why is this important now?  Because Kentucky and Illinois (with its gimmicky outdoor practice) are planning on having their Midnight Madnesses a week prior to the ‘official’ start of practice.  The NABC statement (via Katz):

The NABC board of directors said that “skill development events should not be open to the public.” The NABC said the initial intent was for coaches to assist their players in skill development and create stronger relationships. But by “making such skill development sessions public events, they appear to be geared more for recruiting than skill development sessions.”

Coach Gillispie, godlovehim, just cannot resist pushing the envelope when it comes to the NCAA rulebook.  We’re not saying that he’s breaking any rules – hell, we’re not even saying that he’s bending them – but like any fastidious attorney, he manages to consistently find the gray nether-regions where legislative intent meets bright-line rule, and he forces those in charge to make decisions.

Bring It On, NABC!  (photo credit: AP/Ed Reinke)

Our take on these early Midnight Madness celebrations is such: we tend to like orderliness when it comes to college hoops, as in…  we’d like to know with assurance when Opening Night will be or when the Final Four will be.  So we’re 100% in agreement with the NABC on this one – can’t we just all agree to have Midnight Madness on the same night, and preferably, AT MIDNIGHT?  If the NCAA has to mandate this, so be it – add another page to the 17-lb rulebook.   

Update (10/1): Jeff Goodman weighs in with this background information about the NABC:

Word is that there were numerous coaches on a conference call who were less than thrilled with Gillispie’s decision. They feel that the NCAA allows the coaches the two hours per week for skill development and Gillispie is taking advantage of the rule.  It was the unanimous decision of the Board that skill development events should not be open to the public.

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09.11.08 Fast Breaks

Posted by rtmsf on September 11th, 2008

It’s been a while since we’ve done one of these, and we’re trying to get back into gear here…

  • Reason #73 to love college basketball – apparently, us.  Sweet. 
  • How about reason #70 – Duke is All Things Evil and Sweaty.  We thought that was Sarah Palin, no?  Politically speaking, Washington insider and Terp fan Robert Novak says he will no longer inveigh against Duke after he had his successful cancer treatment at their medical center.
  • Kentucky is using an NCAA rulebook loophole to get a leg up on Midnight Madness this year.  Apparently you can use 2 hrs/week for instruction prior to the traditional mid-October practice starting date, and UK will use their 2 hrs on Oct. 10 to get going early
  • Dickie V. is in the Hall of Fame!  Supposedly his bust will be enshrined perilously close to the Coach K wax figure anus. 
  • Patty Mills is back at St. Mary’s enjoying his lavish praise from the Olympic experience, unless you ask this writer.  Editing, people!
  • All the BracketBuster information you could ever want…  including 102 teams and nine conferences sending their entire rosters this season (MAC, MVC, OVC, CAA, Horizon, Big West, WAC, MAAC). 
  • Kevin Love is the cover boy of 2009 NCAA Basketball (formerly March Madness) for all you gamers out there.

Some older stuff you might have missed…

  • American’s Jeff Jones parlayed the school’s first ever NCAA appearance into a nice contract extension through 2014. 
  • Tom Crean can’t catch a break (other than his new bitchin paycheck).  His only returning scholarship player, Kyle Taber, injured his knee and will be out of action for 10 weeks.   
  • Ty Lawson confirmed that he “probably” would be in the NBA right now had it not been for his “drinking while driving” arrest in June.  If Lawson had left, would Danny Green and/or Wayne Ellington have stayed too?  UNC fans should be thanking their lucky stars for Lawson’s (mis)fortune this season. 
  • Wow, do you think the NCAA micromanages much?  Arkansas recently self-reported six violations, and some of them just seem silly.
  • Oklahoma’s Mr. Dub-Dub, Blake Griffin, was ticketed for outraging public decency, also known as the piss-and-walk
  • Thanks to the SEC’s new comprehensive tv package deal ($2B!!!) with ESPN, there will be two more nights of SEC coverage (in addition to Super Tuesday) on the network starting in 2009-10.  In related news, Time Warner Cable has picked up the Big Ten Network (whew!  glad we’ve got Comcast at the RTC abode!!). 
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10.16.07 Fast Breaks

Posted by rtmsf on October 16th, 2007

An absolute ton of newsworthy stuff to catch up on from the weekend…

  • 2008 #1 player Greg Monroe committed to Georgetown after his visit there this weekend.  It couldn’t have had anything to do with that now-ubiquitous Jerry Rice dance, could it?  “Hoops” Weiss has the definitive take on how Monroe will impact the Hoyas.  Above the Rim writes that Duke (who was hot-n-heavy for Monroe) isn’t used to losing out on these guys. 
  • Making the Dance reports that after Georgetown (who obviously had the best MM weekend), Illinois (Bruce Weber can recruit after all?!?!), Indiana, Louisville and several others had good weekends. 
  • Lots of Midnight Madness and practice coverage from the weekend…
    • Huggins taking over the reins at his alma mater.  (there’s an amusing wmv file floating around where Huggins is giving a speech to some WVU booster club – it’s longwinded and rambling, but the DerMarr Johnson payoff is funny) 
    • A general roundup of MM from Lexington to Lawrence.
    • Catching up with Tubby in Minnesota. 
    • Pat Forde takes in the scene at UK with Billy Gillispie.  Apparently Goodman did the same.   
    • Andy Katz checks in on the hype surrounding Memphis. 
    • Goodman also took a road trip to Saluki country to report on the best mid-major not named Gonzaga, while en route to seeing Pitino in Louisville
    • Wake’s first practice without Skip Prosser
    • Dave Odom tries to save his job with transfers at South Carolina.
    • Pitt has XXXL expectations for DeJuan Blair
    • The defending champs (2x) start the rebuilding process.
  • Sad news that former Georgia star and current surgeon Alec Kessler died of a heart attack last weekend. 
  • Injuries, suspensions and dismissals:
    • Gonzaga’s Josh Heytvelt was reinstated on Friday but will miss the first week of practice due to shroom farming foot pain.
    • Louisville’s Juan Palacios injured his ankle and may have to redshirt his senior season. 
    • Brandon Rush reports that he’s on target for his Dec. 1 return to Kansas.
    • Georgia suspended three players for not attending classes, including top two scorers Takais Brown (9 games) and Mike Mercer (15 games).  Seriously, fellas?  SEC Hoops:TGTBTD has the take on how this will affect the Bulldogs.
    • Northwestern’s best player Kevin Coble is taking a leave of absence to be with his sick mother. 
    • Ball St. coach Billy Taylor booted two more players off the team, making a total of six since he was hired in August. 
  • More Preseason goodies:
    • Gary Parrish and Ben Howland converse about whether the Pac-10 will have the most first round picks ever this year.
    • Pitino bitches about the difficulty of the unbalanced league schedule Louisville is being forced to play. 
    • MMAS continues its comprehensive review with its non-BCS top 25
    • Seth Davis asks us 20 questions, then he answers them. 
    • Gary Parrish lists his start-of-practice top 26.  Memphis, eh?
    • The Fanhouse wonders if Memphis is even the best team in its own state.
    • Jeff Goodman takes a realistic look at Duke’s expectations for this season.
    • ESPN plans on showing a grand total of TWO Pac-10 games this year!  Up from zero last year. 
    • The Big 12 handed out its preseason awards – DJ Augustin is the projected POY. 
    • Shawn Siegel lists his top 25 Big 12 players and top 25 Big 10 players for 07-08. 
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Midnight Madness v. 2.0

Posted by rtmsf on October 13th, 2007

Midnight Madness went off at several venues around the country tonight, and as a result the message boards and blogs have been buzzing all night long with news about how players looked and speculation on what to expect this season. Since ESPN was typically worthless no help whatsoever in letting us see how some of these teams looked, we decided to try to piece together some fan commentary and photos (and in a couple cases, video footage) of opening night impressions.

We start with Indiana, where expectations are sky high with the unveiling of uber-frosh Eric Gordon in a Hoosier uniform. From The Hoosier Scoop blog:

Kelvin Sampson walked out to the middle of the court, microphone in hand. It took a minute, at least, for him to actually be able to say anything. The fans kept chanting his name.

Sampson is thanking the fans for being here, and telling them how excited they are to start a new season.

He’s called Holman out to the middle of the court, and has congratulated him on being eligible. Crowd loves that.

Now DeAndre Thomas has been called out to mid-court. Sampson is discussing his weight, opening with the line “I don’t want to make a big deal of his weight . . .” I think it’s already become a big deal, with 14,000 people watching. Thomas has gone from 356 to 299.

Now Sampson is talking football, saying that he’s looking forward to watching the Hoosiers beat the Spartans tomorrow. And he’s saying “Why not a BCS bowl?”

What will happen when Gordon faces a little adversity? When his shot doesn’t fall, or he’s fouled four times in a row by a team trying rattle him?

Well, Gordon missed his first dunk attempt during this drill — which is nothing more than the guys running up and down dunking. But then he came back with a behind-the-head slam that was so utterly resounding I only hope somebody got it on video.

After the dunk practice, Indiana ran a transition drills, with three players breaking down the court against two defenders and then, following a possession, those two defenders breaking the other way again one player. Sampson has stated that this team will score more in transition, and here’s early proof.

Oh, and the passes made by Eric Gordon in this video sequence are pretty sick.

What about Billy G. over at Kentucky? 23,000+ filled Rupp Arena to greet the new coach and rooks Patrick Patterson and Alex Legion. Gary Parrish has the take:

Jody Meeks MM

We’re Diggin the New Nike Warmups, Mr. Meeks

And then the curtains dropped.

And right there behind them, there he was, the person who made this always wild atmosphere even wilder than normal. Standing and waving and flashing that big old goofy smile, Billy Gillispie received an ovation fit for, well, fit for the new basketball coach at Kentucky. And when the chant died down and the clapping finally ceased, this Texas man who was an assistant at Illinois just six years ago was handed the microphone and asked for his first impressions.

“I can’t talk,” Gillispie said.

Ahhh, (Wild)cat got your tongue, Billy?

But in all seriousness, it’s difficult to blame Gillispie for being totally overwhelmed. Because regardless of all the games he’s won and lost in his still relatively young career (featuring stops at UTEP and Texas A&M), there’s nothing in Gillispie’s 47 years on this planet that happened before Friday night that could’ve possibly prepared him for what it’s like to stand in the middle of Rupp Arena and give other humans goosebumps.

No, I’m not exaggerating.

Over in Lawrence, RTC’s preseason #1 Kansas Jayhawks put on a show in the Phog.

Kansas MM

Sherron Collins led all scorers with 13 points coming on 6-of-13 shooting. He hit only one of his six three-point attempts, but that’s no big deal because, well, no one ever looks all that sharp in Late Night scrimmages.

More important on Collins is that he looks like he did in mid-season as a freshman. He drove to the basket in a smart manner, only recorded one of the game’s 14 turnovers and looked noticeably lighter and bouncier.

He put on a display of mid-air acrobatics before the game in layup lines. When asked after the game if he could have done all that a year ago, his answer, with a smile, was simple: “Absolutely not.”

He was also a pretty good dancer, to boot.

Jeremy Case led the Red team with 12 points on 5-for-5 shooting, including a pair of threes. Now, of course, nothing concrete in terms of Bill Self’s rotation can come from tonight’s scrimmage, but Case looked at ease on the Fieldhouse floor. That, too, could be because he’s entering his fifth season as a Jayhawk.

Case said he’s playing right now with no pressure on him, which could do nothing but help his basketball endeavors. It’ll be interesting to see how having his degree out of the way already helps Case as he tries to work himself into the rotation. He could be this year’s feel-good story, I would predict if solely based on what we saw tonight.

Elswewhere… Sasha Kaun had a workmanlike nine points and six rebounds for the Red team, though should probably stay away from wearing top hats, which he donned as a backup dancer during Russell Robinson’s ‘New York, New York’ performance. With his fledgling afro, it wasn’t the greatest of looks…Darrell Arthur was third on the red squad with eight points, while Mario Chalmers paced the offense up and down the floor repeatedly, notching five points, five assists and two steasl in 15 minutes on the floor…Conner Teahan, Brady Morningstar and Darnell Jackson each had six points for the Blue team. Jackson also registered six rebounds, three assists and three steals, giving him the most balanced line of any Jayhawk on the night.

An enterprising and informative Memphis Tiger fan had this to say about his Blogpoll #1 squad:

Joey Dorsey MM

Rose: Looked confident running the team. You can just tell that this kid has “it.” He showed freakish athleticism on his one dunk in the dunk contest. He is very fast and seems to play under control. He probably will get lost during the season as most freshman do, but once he figures it out. Dorsey: Just a physical freak. He dunked anything he could get his hands on. Douglas-Roberts: CDR always looks uncoordinated, then he just puts the ball in the basket. His upper body looked bigger. He had a sweet stroke on one three pointer. If he improves from behind the line, how do you defend him. Anderson: Didn’t really notice Antonio much, but he always does the dirty work that doesn’t get noticed anyway. Dozier: Definitely looked bigger. Rob showed some fire when dunking the ball, which seemed to be lacking last year. Maybe going up against Taggart every day will turn Dozier’s potential into improved stats. Kemp: Willie looked good. He shot the ball well from behind the line. I think he will do well backing up Rose at the point this year. Probably will play some two guard with the way he can shoot. Mack: I think Doneal hit 12 or 13 three pointers in the three point contest. His shot looked really good. I liked how he dunked the ball during the scrimmage. He has the hops to turn drives into highlight dunks. It is incredible the amount of talent on this roster. No offense to guys on past teams, but it amazes me that we used to start guys like Chad Allen and Michael Brittain in the post.

JTIII and friends had a roaring time in McDonough Gym on the campus of Georgetown, as one fan who got a coveted seat (only 2000 available) reports:

Roy Hibbert MM

I think it was well received by the recruits, at least the couple I was sitting upstairs with. They were into it and yelling along. I thought the crowd inside was great, loud and much better behaved than last year and Athletics did a great job getting folks in the gym. Some quick hits:

Step team’s routine was 5 minutes too long and way longer than any other performance (wife-beaters, really?). Dance team … well, I’m gonna leave it at that. Groove Theory awesome as usual. Two new male cheerleaders, so now a total of three. Cheerleaders still look as though they are in Junior High. A lot of Soulja Boy, and extended dancing this year (more dancing then anything else): each of the players as they were introduced; men’s vs women’s team; and both teams with AKD’s little brother.

Coach’s dance moves were old school smooth. The appearance of Jeff Green’s mom and dad was great (the unveiled his jersey). The seniors unveiled the 2007 Final Four banner … in fact, they now have new Final Four banners along with a Championship banner on the opposite wall of the jerseys (main entrance side).

Lay-up line turned dunkfest (Tyler Crawford is gonna be a beast this year, you already see the aggressiveness … him, Wallace and Sapp had some solid dunks). A nasty scoop behind the back dunk by Ewing Jr was best dunk of the night. Coach said they probably dance better, so he stopped the drill and they started dancing again: both teams together; both teams vs the crowd; and Ewing Jr. tutoring Mr. Rice for the Soulja Boy.

They did the five man weave full-court drill as well. But it seemed that the program was running long and the team seemed to tucker out a bit towards the end. Gotta say, it was a shame not to see the women’s team get a little bit of time to run drills (they basically sat around and watched the men, was kinda awkward). I know ESPNU was covering the men’s team but some time would have been nice.

Overall I thought the event inside the gym was great and the teams represented Georgetown in a great light for the recruits (recruits busted up at some of the dancing on the women’s team and a few of the guys as well).

We have to go to Yahoo for a report on USC and OJ Mayo:

OJ Mayo MM

 

Southern California has got Mayo, as in O.J. Mayo, and the Trojans showed off their star recruit when he and the rest of the team scrimmaged for fans Friday night.

The Midnight Madness session kicked off the start of practice for the Trojans, who open the season Nov. 10, at home against Mercer.

Introduced next-to-last, Mayo jogged onto the court with the index and middle fingers on both hands signaling the Trojans’ V-for-victory sign. He wore a No. 32 jersey in tribute to his favorite player, Magic Johnson.

Mayo teamed with a female fan in a 2-ball game, with each of them trying to make as many shots as possible in 60 seconds. He tossed up an air ball on his first attempt and smiled as he chased after the ball.

Mayo made four of nine shots, mostly from the perimeter, capped by a miss on a half-court attempt.

Late Night with Roy in Chapel Hill was another exercise in weirdness, but the Heels fans were generally pleased with what they saw, as a fan reports:

UNC MM

I was very pleased with Graves. I believe that we did not look quite as explosive as last year. I will kind of run down the players for you. I will put them in order as to the way that I thought that each player played with an emphasis on expectations.

1. Tywon A+ I thought that he looked a little winded/slow to start, then he settled down, and he was slap awesome!!!! I think this will be his last year.
2. Tyler A+ His usual self!
3. Graves A+ I was very pleasantly surprised. I will preface the rest of my reports to say that I was in the nose bleed section, and much of my view was heavily obstructed by everyone leaving. It seemed that halfway through the scrimmage, half of the audience was gone. It seemed that 1/4 left at the beginning of the scrimmage, and they just kept filing out one by one. I was most surprised at his intensity and tenacity on the defensive effort that he put out there. Then he was equally effective on the offensive side of the ball. Some one needs to tell him that he is not McCants. He even guarded Bobby pretty well.
4. Danny A I will bet that we play a lot of small ball this year. Danny did very well rebounding, and he played under control. His shot was also falling.
5. Marcus A Great job did very well.
6. Bobby A steady, ran the team, knocked down a few shots.
7. Wayne B It was very obvious, he is intent at taking it to the rim, but not great at it yet, and probably to the detriment to his shot. I don’t think he hit any jumpers. I was pretty disappointed with him. I would say that he def. looked like a 4 year player. I hope that his shot returns. His will to drive might well pay off if he can get his shot back on.
8. Alex B about what I expected. I think that he was trying to tear the rims off. He will be a defensive force!! He bobbled the ball some on offense.
9. Deon B- He was kind of transparent in that I did not notice him do very much, except one steal and ran the break. Other than that, I am not sure he was even on the court. He ties with Wayne as the two biggest disappointments of the night.

Over all, I think that we will have a slightly worse regular season, but may actually make it to the final four, because we should have last year. I think that we will def. play small ball a lot. From what I could tell tonight, Deon and Alex were not ready. Of course it was pick up style, and one bad game does not a season make, unless it is in March.

We conclude with Illinois for two reasons – 1) we really wanted to show this pic of Jeffrey Jordan wearing his dad’s jersey rising for a monster flush; and 2) it was kinda neat that everyone in the crowd wore pink as a show of solidarity to fight cancer. Two Illini fans gives their takes on Weber’s squad:

Jeff Jordan MM

1. shaun pruitt is GOOD. i mean GOOD. ive always been hard on the guy but he brought the ball down the court once and was doing all this ball handling and i thought it was one of our guards at first til he stood up, i was like, what the heck! looks much more mobile and better handles.
2. jeff jordan jumps OUT OF THE GYM. hes short, but good lord can he jump. he did a 360 in warm ups.
3. as someone mentioned in another thread, carlwell wearing jamars jersey was good to see. i think in the end, believe it or not, jamar will be a better person from all this.
4. besides the outside threat, we could be a very solid team. alexander and davis are both very very athletic and seem to have decent shots. mccamey has mad ball handling skills and i thought holdren looked very well too.

5 things i noticed:

1) Mike Davis is a freak of an athlete. He can jump high and far and in control.
2) I agree with Quadcities that Jeffrey Jordan inherited his father’s ability to jump.

3) I also agree with Quadcities that McCamey had some really really impressive ball handling skills

4) Rodney Alexander looks very fluid, smooth, and an overall great package

5) This team is going to be better and more athletic than last years team. I really believe that.

If you seek even more info, Andy Katz gave this report on several other places, including Texas A&M and Washington St. Also, CSTV live blogged several events tonight, although the depth of detail is a little lacking. We guess they get ESPNU on their package.

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Midnight Lameness

Posted by rtmsf on October 11th, 2007

College basketball doesn’t really have a traditional Opening Day/Night like most of the other sports. It’s more or less a mishmash of games scattered throughout early to mid-November that nobody really pays much attention to. But what we do have that no other sport has is Midnight Madness – a bacchanalia of excitement and frenzy that tips off the college hoops season in earnest. Midnight Madness is Christmas Eve come early – it feeds into every hoops fan’s hopes for the coming year, with visions of upset victories and championships dancing in our heads.

At Midnight Madness, every returner looks lean, mean and ready to have a breakout season.

At Midnight Madness, the freshmen all look like the next Melo or Shaq.

At Midnight Madness, even the walk-ons look ready to contribute this year.

Joakim Noah MM 04

Why Won’t ESPN Cover Midnight Madness Anymore?

And so, with all this excitement and the knowledge that the WWL is planning on showing over 400 hoops games on its 27 different channels this winter, what great things do they have planned for the big night? Live action from KU’s Late Night in the Phog, right? A check-in on Big Blue Madness in Lexington, perhaps? How about Late Night with Roy over in Chapel Hill? Sounds like a great night in front of the tube, right? Right?

ESPNU Midnight Madness Schedule (All times EDT)

Time – School

  • 7 – 8 p.m. – Davidson
  • 11 p.m. – 12 a.m. – Georgetown (delayed)
  • 12 – 1 a.m. – Memphis (delayed)
  • 1 – 1:30 a.m. – Southern Illinois (delayed)

Ummm… or not.

Look, we appreciate that ESPN is going to throw some mid-major love at Davidson and Southern Illinois Friday night. And sure, it’s worthwhile showing top five teams Georgetown and Memphis as well. But come on – ESPNU? We’re sure all five people who get that channel will be glued to their sets.

So what has ESPN decided to show on its other channels instead of Midnight Madness coverage? The flagship channel has college football – Hawaii vs. San Jose St. – no argument with that choice here. ESPN2, though, has NASCAR Busch Series all night – the equivalent of AAA baseball. Can’t wait for that. ESPN Classic is showing a bunch of old heavyweight fights (zzzzzzz…), and ESPN360 is showing its typical fare of the daily news shows repeats. Even the aforementioned ESPNU is wasting the prime hours of 8-11pm to show a high school football game instead, waiting until 11pm to show delayed broadcasts of Georgetown, Memphis and SIU.

The main point we’re making here is that unless you have ESPNU, and we know you don’t, there’s no way you’ll see more than a few clips on Sportscenter tomorrow night. It wasn’t that long ago when a whole night was devoted to this event – what happened? Way to step it up there, ESPN.

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Four Days Left…

Posted by rtmsf on October 7th, 2007

Four Balls

Just a little reminder. Midnight (er, 8pm EDT) Madness cometh…

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