As reported by AOL Fanhouse (is just Fanhouse now?), South Florida’s basketball program is under NCAA investigation based on multiple accusations of impropriety that the same outlet reported two weeks ago.  The allegations mostly derive from excessive transportation, tickets to NBA games and ‘open’ practices during dead periods held under strength coach Terrelle Woody’s purview.  Woody came to USF as part of a package deal with the well-traveled and much-maligned Gus Gilchrist, whom we still haven’t forgiven around these parts for using the tragic Virginia Tech shootings as an excuse to bail from his prep commitment to that school.  Comedy springs from tragedy, though, and how funny would it be if Gilchrist’s handler ended up with his star player suspended and his employer put on probation?  Of course that’s unlikely, because as often happens in these situations, at the first sign of trouble the traveling circus of Woody/Gilchrist will bolt for greener pastures leaving the angry townspeople of Tampa holding the bag.   

In other encouraging news out of Stan Heath’s program, transfer guard Anthony Crater, who was set to begin play on December 13 against Central Michigan, has reportedly failed his second drug test at the school and will have to sit out 4-6 additional games, depending on how USF interprets their internal substance abuse policy.  The article also notes that Crater failed a drug test while a freshman at Ohio State last year, which means that the talented but troubled point guard who has also been arrested for possession (later dropped) and suspected of involvement in theft of $8000 of property while in Tampa (but never charged) has failed three drug tests in just over a calendar year.  Heath is on the record stating after Crater’s arrest for possession last January that players such as he only get so many chances: “You get chance No. 1, you get chance No. 2; at some point in time you’ve got to make adjustments that the program is bigger than what you are.”

Where does the adjustment/program size threshold start again, Coach Heath?  Because, by our count, this is chance #5. 

1. Failed drug test at Ohio State (allegedly)
2. Failed drug test at USF (definitely)
3. Arrest for marijuana possession (definitely)
4. Primary suspect in theft of $8000 of property, with an on-record admission of an earlier theft (definitely)
5. Failed second drug test at USF (definitely)

Of course, we shouldn’t be surprised.  Heath also allowed another basketball vagabond/troublemaker, Mike Mercer, back onto the team this season even after he was arrested twice last year for public consumption and marijuana possession.  The reason?  He graduated in August.  Well that… and the fact that he provides defense and depth at the guard position for his 7-1 Bulls. 

Rob Dauster of Ballin is a Habit is the RTC correspondent for the Big East Conference.

Give me an honest answer. What do you think is a more impressive accomplishment? Winning the Big East regular season title, winning the Big East Tournament, or reaching the Final Four?

Me? I’m going with the Big East regular season title. Every single time you step on the court in this league, it is a dogfight. It’s ridiculous what these teams go through. Take a look at the next six days for Syracuse: they head to DC on Wednesday to take on Georgetown, return back to Syracuse to face Notre Dame on Saturday, then travel to Pittsburgh to face the Panthers for Big Monday. Three games against top 15 teams in the span of six days culminating in a date with the #1 team in the country. And that isn’t an uncommon occurrence this year. Every team does it at least once (Running the Gauntlet, we’ve gone over this kiddies). The only conference that can match a run like that is the ACC, and that would have to mean one of Wake Forest, Clemson, Duke, or UNC plays the all of the other three. Tennessee playing Kentucky, Florida, and Arkansas in the span of a week just isn’t quite the same thing.

What I love about this year’s version of the Big East is the unpredictability. I could legitimately see four different teams winning the regular season title and three others that, if they get hot, could reel off six or seven straight wins and end up on top. Before league play started, it was UConn. Then they lost to Georgetown on opening night, and the Hoyas became the team to beat. Then Pitt rolled through DC to become the new and current favorite. Who is next? Pitt plays Louisville and Syracuse this week. If one of those two knocks off the Panthers, are they the favorite of the week?

The more I think about it, winning the Big East tourney title may be a tougher feat than reaching a Final Four as well. For the first time, all 16 teams will be headed to Madison Square Garden to participate in the conference tournament, which just so happens to be the number of teams that play in each regional in the NCAA’s.

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Rob Dauster of Ballin is a Habit is the RTC correspondent for the Big East Conference. 

There are a lot of people out there that will call themselves college basketball experts, myself included (although I may be the only one to think that way). And these so-called experts keep telling you how good the Big East is this year. Once again, myself included.

If the Big East is so good, then where are all the marquee wins?

The Big East only has three really good wins – Notre Dame beating Texas in Maui, Syracuse beating Kansas in a de facto home game, and Georgetown beating Memphis at home. Even in those three, Georgetown won at home and Kansas is, well, not all that good right now.

It isn’t like they aren’t getting the chances either. West Virginia and Villanova lost to Davidson and Texas in the Jimmy V Classic. Marquette lost to Tennessee. So did Georgetown. Seton Hall lost to Memphis. Cincinnati lost to Xavier. Notre Dame lost to Ohio State and UNC.

As far as I’m concerned there are two schools of thought on this. One is that the Big East is actually even better than we expected. As a result, they are beating good teams, which in turn knocks those teams down in the rankings. Case in point, Wisconsin. The Badgers have two losses on the season (UConn and Marquette) which is part of the reason they aren’t ranked. Along those same lines, when lesser teams actually do get an upset of the Big East teams, they end up getting ranked too high.

The other is that the Big East is just a really big conference chock full of pretty good, but not great, teams. Look at the facts – UConn and Pitt are undefeated, but Pitt hasn’t played anyone and UConn has been so inconsistent; Villanova, Louisville, Georgetown, Notre Dame, West Virginia and Marquette all have fatal flaws as a team; Syracuse has been playing well, but struggles to keep their focus at times and will most likely be losing Eric Devendorf for the season.

So what does this mean? Are the ACC and the Big XII creeping up? No, not just yet. Let me ask you this question – if a healthy West Virginia team (Alex Ruoff and Joe Mazzula sat) beat Davidson and a healthy Luke Harangody helped knock off UNC and/or OSU, who we even be having this conversation?

Probably not. Now that is done, let’s get on to the good stuff.

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Big East/SEC Invitational. This is so ridiculous.  Tonight was the opening night of yet another conference challenge series invitational that theoretically is a great idea, but is executed all wrong by the powers-that-be.  Why don’t the Pac-10, Big 12, SEC and Big East realize that interest will be much greater in these things if they’re made into week-long EVENTS, similar to the way the ACC and Big 10 do it, and they let ESPN carry all the games throughout the week.  The Pac-10/Big 12 Hardwood Series is bad enough, considering nobody even knows about it; but this Big East/SEC thing is an abomination.  It only involves four teams from each conference, and somehow a team like South Florida gets invited.  South Florida… most people don’t even realize that USF is IN the Big East or even carries a basketball program!  Furthermore, they’ve decided to have doubleheaders in semi-neutral venues, which only serves to confuse people and create situations where half the stands are empty, even though two top 25 teams are playing (see: UT-Marquette tonight in Nashville).  How cool would it be to have three legitimate made-for-tv challenges between all the power conferences in the first three weeks of December, leading into Bowl Week?  Make this happen.  FYI – the much-maligned SEC went 2-0 tonight, but who wouldn’t beat South Florida?

• Tennessee 80, Marquette 62. The score was Marquette by 2 with just over ten minutes remaining.  Then Tennessee and, more precisely, Mr. Headband as Yarmulke Wayne Chism, took over the game.  The Vols scored on eleven of their next twelve possessions, and Chism was involved in seven of them.  Game pretty much over.  Chism, incidentally, set a new career-high with 26 pts and 11 rebounds, and it was clear that in the second half he was feeling it.  The Vols didn’t get a huge amount of production from anyone else, though, (Tyler Smith had 14/3; Bobby Maze 10/6 assts) but their long arms and athletic defense did force Marquette into its worst shooting performance of the season (38%).  Wesley Matthews continued to show his value, as he dropped 30 (15 from the line) on a myriad of drives and scoop shots in the lane.  Matthews is #2 in the nation in FT attempts (97), behind only Blake Griffin, which shows just how frequently he gets into the paint and absorbs contact.
• Vanderbilt 71, South Florida 52. We’re not going to spend too much time on this turd of game, but one interesting aspect of it was that the much-ballyhooed Mike Mercer (transfer from Georgia) and Gus Gilchrist (transfer from Maryland, sorta) made their tv debuts.  Mercer had 10/3 assts, while Gilchrist added 12/8 off the bench.  Anyone expecting these two players to turn USF into a Big East contender should have their heads examined.  AJ Ogilvy and Jermaine Beal had twenty each for the Commodores.

This Sweaty Vol Fan Was Outworking Wayne Chism Tonight

It’s Hard Out Here For a Pimp.

• LMU’s Bill Bayno is taking a leave of absence due to a “serious medical condition” related to coaching-related stress.  Maybe the 0-10 record with a trip scheduled to Pauley on Wednesday had something to do with it.
• Mississippi State’s Rick Stansbury was hospitalized yesterday with migraines and flu-like symptoms, although further tests were being done.
• Mike Davis lost half of his team today, as former Hoosier Armon Bassett decided to transfer (whereabouts unknown), and three other players were found academically ineligible for the spring semester.   UAB is now down to six scholarship players.
• RIP, Pete Newell.

Scores that Have Us Wishing For Saturday.

• Clemson 76, North Florida 36. In the past seven years, Clemson has had starts of 10-0, 17-0, 11-0, 9-0, and now in 2008-09, 11-0 again.  In those other four unbeaten starts, the final result was two NITs, one NCAA first round loss, and one losing record.  Woo.  Hoo.
• Texas 88, Texas Southern 72. We’ve said it before, but if Dexter Pittman (19/5) gets going, Texas is a whole different animal.  One troubling aspect of tonight’s game is they allowed 0-9 TSU to shoot 58% against them – Rick Barnes cannot be happy about that.

On Tap Wednesday (all times EST). Nothing like a Duke v. UNC-Asheville game (w/o Kenny George) to keep us warm at night.  We’re actually very intrigued with how Syracuse responds 48 hrs after losing at home, whether Pitt will dominate a good Siena team, and if St. Mary’s can go into Mac Court and beat a young Oregon team.

• NC State (-9.5) v. East Carolina – 7pm
• Syracuse (-25) v. Canisius (ESPNU) – 7pm
• Duke v. UNC-Asheville (ESPN2) – 7:30pm
• LSU v. Nicholls St. (ESPN FC & 360) – 8pm
• Memphis (-22) v. Arkansas-Little Rock – 8pm
• Arkansas (-6.5) v. Austin Peay (ESPN FC & 360) – 8pm
• Ohio St. v. Jacksonville (ESPNU) – 9pm
• Pittsburgh (-18.5) v. Siena (ESPN2) – 9:30pm
• St. Mary’s (-2.5) @ Oregon – 10pm
• UNLV (-10) v. Santa Clara – 10:30pm
• UCLA (-30.5) v. Loyola Marymount – 11pm

Rob Dauster of Ballin is a Habit is the RTC correspondent for the Big East Conference. 

The Big East lost three of their four marquee games this week as Notre Dame lost to Ohio State and West Virginia and Villanova were swept in the Jimmy V Classic (Marquette did pick up a win at home against Wisconsin). Even teams like UConn (four point win over Buffalo) and Syracuse (came back from down 16 against Cornell) barely avoided being upset. Right now, the only team that is playing well and has played well through out the season is Pitt.

If the first quarter of the season taught us anything, it isn’t that the Big East is weaker than expected as much as the rest of the country is not as far behind as it seemed. Look at those three losses listed above. Notre Dame, a team that is not quite as good as they were expected to be, lost to a better-than-expected Ohio State team in Luke Harangody’s first game back from pneumonia (yea, he had 25 and 16, but you have to factor in the adjustment other players – i.e. Kyle McAlarney, who was 3-11 for 6 points – have to make when he comes back). West Virginia, playing without Joe Mazzulla and Alex Ruoff, lost to Davidson. Villanova lost to a very good Texas team.

While the teams may be a little different than expected, the numbers still break down basically the same way. Four teams look like Final Four contenders, three teams are all but locks to make the tourney, and another four have put themselves in excellent position to earn an at-large bid.

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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.