Tonight’s Lede. It wasn’t just any other Tuesday night, as a number of ranked teams were in action and there was more than enough intrigue around the country to keep everyone interested. Whether it was a team few people seem to believe in slowly swaying hearts and minds, or a much-maligned former prep star bringing forth the game of his life, or an acerbic coach showing his true colors in a postgame interview, there was a lot to cover tonight. Let’s jump right in…

Will Some Pundits Begin to Take Baylor Seriously Now? (AP/C. Riedel)

Your Watercooler Moment, Part I. Baylor Stakes a Claim of Legitimacy. One of the knocks against Scott Drew’s Baylor Bears to date has been its lack of exceptional road wins this season. Apparently the non-believers did not take seriously wins at BYU and Northwestern, although neither the Marriott Center nor the Welsh-Ryan Arena these days are the easiest places to escape victorious. Still, Kansas State’s Bramlage Arena is universally regarded as a tough-as-nails venue, borne out most recently by K-State’s dominant weekend victory over an unbeaten Missouri squad. Baylor’s mid-second half run to come back from seven points down behind several eye-popping defensive transition dunks, along with its ability to hold K-State to a single bucket in the last four minutes of the game, showed America how things have changed. Last year, Drew’s Bears hardly played defense, generally preferring to use that end of the court to rest before another wild LaceDarius Dunn field goal attempt. This year, long green-and-yellow-clad arms and legs seem to cover all four corners of the court, and in fact, the two game-saving plays on this night resulted from a strip from behind of Angel Rodriguez with three seconds remaining, and a deflected pass on the ensuing inbounds play. The Bears are not going to win every game this season, but they’ve already won 16 and have survived one of their four toughest road tests on the schedule. With Pierre Jackson (10/11 assts) running the show, Brady Heslip (13/4 stls) providing scoring punch, and an elite corps of forwards in Quincy Acy, Perry Jones, III, and Quincy Miller wreaking havoc defensively, it’s time to stop questioning Scott Drew’s team and take the Bears seriously as a national title contender.

Your Watercooler Moment, Part II. Brandon Paul Hits Everything, Leads Illini Over Ohio State. In two-and-a-half seasons at Illinois, Brandon Paul has been better defined by what he is not rather than what he is. The former Chicago-area prep star who came to Champaign with sky-high expectations has largely disappointed, gradually improving his scoring output over three years but never shooting the ball efficiently (career 37.2% shooter) nor becoming an effective distributor (2.0 APG). Paul must have eaten a full bowl of his Wheaties this morning. The 6’4″ junior literally took over tonight’s game against OSU, scoring his team’s last 15 points en route to a career-high 43 points on 8-10 shooting from behind the arc. Unless you saw the game, you cannot comprehend just how ridiculous a couple of the late threes that Paul hit were, perhaps none more so than his final trey which gave Illinois a four-point lead with 43 seconds remaining.

Read the rest of this entry »

This Weekend’s Lede. Saturday was one of the wildest afternoons of college basketball in recent memory. Within a five-hour window from around 2:30 PM to 7:30 PM EST, we experienced one of the ugliest incidents in the modern history of college basketball, followed by both the nation’s #1 and #2 teams losing their first games of the season on the road. The afternoon’s action had the feeling of March in the intensity and drama of the games played, but the added bonus of insane home crowds hungry for key December victories over a bitter rival or, just because. Let’s jump into a busy weekend of storylines…

Your Watercooler Moment. Malice in the Cintas.

We will have much more to say on this in our sister ATB focusing exclusively on the events that occurred with 9.4 seconds remaining in the Crosstown Shootout on Saturday (the post will go live at 6:45 AM EST). Look, we all know that fights sometimes happen in sports, and they’re more likely to happen in volatile situations involving bitter rivals who don’t like each other. The fight was bad enough — in our view, Cincinnati’s Cheikh Mbodj should face criminal battery charges for his stomp to Kenny Frease’s head while the player was already lying on the floor — but the real shame in all of this was the aftermath. Not only did Xavier completely embarrass itself as a school and program in allowing Tu Holloway and Mark Lyons to get on the dais and act like they were representing XU straight outta Compton, but both schools failed to step up Sunday and properly punish the players involved — the most any player was suspended was six games (UC’s Yancy Gates, Octavius Ellis and Mbodj). We hate to say it, but the image-conscious NBA would have been much harsher in its punishments of these players, and given that all of the adults at both schools went to great pains afterward to suggest that such an out-of-control incident was unconscionable, this appears to be yet another example of actions speaking louder than words.

Grab a Coffee While You’re At It. #1 Kentucky Loses at the Buzzer.

Rules for rushing the court are mostly general guidelines that come down to whether it feels right given the specifics of the situation. There are few scenarios that will feel better than Indiana’s buzzer-beating win over #1 Kentucky on Saturday evening. All of the following boxes were checked: 1) IU beat the #1 team in America; 2) on a buzzer-beating shot; 3) after it appeared the Hoosiers had blown the game; 4) versus a bitter rival; 5) in a statement win for the program that announced its status as a national player again. You simply won’t find many more perfect situations for an RTC, and Hoosier fans responded appropriately, filling the court from all corners of the arena with exalted jubilation. It was an outstanding game, and an even more outstanding RTC. For some great reactions recorded around the interwebs, check out some of these: a real-time call by IU’s play-by-play radio guy, Don Fischer;  an IU dad goes crazy in his house; a Bloomington bar called Nick’s explodes when Watford’s shot goes down; the scene at floor level for the final play and the ensuing RTC.

Perhaps the best thing we’ve seen from this weekend is this mash-up put together by an IU student (@dbaba12) which shows clips from the camp-out, the game itself (including his halftime prediction of an RTC), the final play, and the aftermath. It’s stuff like this that reminds us why we love college basketball.

Read the rest of this entry »

Jesse Baumgartner is an RTC columnist. His Love/Hate column will publish on Mondays throughout the season. In this weekly piece he’ll review the five things he loved and hated about the previous seven days of college basketball.

Five Things I Loved This Week

I LOVED….a game so good that you’re left wondering if you just saw the National Championship preview. There was plenty of hype involved with Kentucky-North Carolina, and it would have been easy to see the game devolve into a sloppy, up-and-down affair. But instead we got everything we asked for and more. Fans and scouts alike were able to salivate over matchups like John Henson-Terrence Jones, and while lightning fast, the pace was still in control. One point on a non-neutral court certainly doesn’t give us any lasting conclusions, other than we’d all be happy to see these two powers square off again in April.

I LOVED….seeing something new. Every year we witness moments that are absurdly unthinkable, and I’m pretty sure I’ve never seen one like this shot from Detroit’s Ray McCallum, Jr. When in doubt, use the bounce.

I LOVED….seeing a well-balanced attack this early in the year. It’s not shocking that I’m talking about Ohio State, with how much experience and chemistry they have on the court. But still, their dismantling of Duke last Tuesday was a clinic on offensive balance. They may have arguably the best player in the nation in Jared Sullinger, but the Buckeyes spread the ball around so well that it even overshadowed Sullinger’s brilliance on the block.

Read the rest of this entry »

1. Luke Winn‘s Power Rankings are back this week with a bit of a surprise team at the top. Ok, not really, but his choice for the #1 spot is different than the pollsters have anointed this week, including our very own RTC Top 25 released on Monday. His rankings release on Thursday, though, and can anyone blame him after the beatdown that Ohio State put on Duke in Columbus Tuesday night? That is, until we see how Saturday’s little tilt between Kentucky and North Carolina goes. From our view of the world after three-plus weeks of action — Ohio State and Kentucky are the only two teams this year that have a chance to be great, while UNC, Syracuse, Duke, Wisconsin, Connecticut and a few others have a chance to be very, very good. Whether any will actually reach their potential is quite another story, but that’s why we do what we do.
2. A new Rupp, same as the old Rupp? Apparently not, suggests a preliminary study from a Lexington task force that pushes a $110-$130M renovation of Kentucky’s venerable old barn, Rupp Arena, as the appropriate course of action over building an entirely new arena at a cost of three times that amount. The size and noise in that building is second to none in college basketball when at its peak, but even including some recent fan-friendly renovations in the last decade, the place isn’t as instantly gratifying to outside observers as some of the other venues around the country. Maybe these proposed renovations would help to eliminate some of the multi-purpose 70s feel of the place, which is probably what it needs to truly become a college basketball cathedral for the next 50 years.
3. If the reports are accurate (and PJ Hairston himself would seem the best source), the freshman shooting guard for North Carolina who injured his wrist during the Heels’ hard-fought victory over Wisconsin Wednesday night will not play against Kentucky this weekend. This presents an issue with the perimeter shooting of the Tar Heels, who will come in to Lexington with only three players who have connected on four or more treys this season. Hairston, a 6’5″ wing with a nice stroke, has 14 of UNC’s 37 makes this year, which leaves Reggie Bullock (11-25) and Harrison Barnes (7-18) as the only other realistic perimeter threats. If UK goes long defensively on the perimeter and shuts down UNC’s three-point shooting Saturday, the Heels will need to have monster games from Tyler Zeller, John Henson and Barnes inside to have a good chance to win.
4. While we’re on the subject of the biggest early-season game of the year (and perhaps the season), Kentucky’s Anthony Davis dropped a ridiculous line of 15/15/8 blks against St. John’s last night. After the game, he told Adam Zagoria that he’s “looking forward” to facing up against John Henson from North Carolina. He added that Henson “plays just like [him]” and no doubt believes that he will create just as much defensive havoc against the Heels as he has with everyone else this season. An NBA scout told Zagoria that he expects ten first round picks to be in uniform at Noon ET Saturday, with a couple more second rounders in the mix as well. While we’re resistant to the excessive hype machine of the modern 24/7 media environment, there’s no question that this game will be a doozy. Must-watch television for any sports fan this weekend, regardless of other obligations.
5. Everyone feel free to rest their heads. There will be no third Plumlee taking the court for Duke this season, which means the gravitational pull that would no doubt result from nearly 21 feet and 7o0 pounds of Plumlee on the floor at one time will be averted. At least this season. Freshman Marshall Plumlee, equally as tall but a bit slighter than his older brothers Mason and Miles, will take a redshirt year and still have four years of eligibility remaining beginning next fall. Coach K already said in the preseason that he had no intention of playing “three 6’10” guys” for the sake of a novelty, but maybe the Plumlee dream will come through for us at some future point in the NBA next season.

1. The biggest news Tuesday wasn’t Ohio State’s methodical dismantling of Duke in the ACC/Big Ten Challenge; rather, it was Jim Boeheim‘s press conference after his Orange destroyed an overmatched Eastern Michigan team, 84-48. The discussion afterward was, as you might imagine, almost exclusively focused on the termination of assistant coach Bernie Fine for allegations involving sexual abuse of boys during his long tenure at the school. To his credit, Boeheim took the initiative to face direct questions about his relationship with Fine and previous statements he had made supporting his longtime friend. If you stumbled into the Syracuse coach’s diatribe at a certain point, you may have thought the venerable coach was channeling Allen Iverson with the number of times he said the phrase “on my watch.” Of course, Boeheim set himself up for such criticism with his staunch previous statements of support of Fine, but we refuse to fault the guy completely for publicly expressing loyalty to someone he knew for nearly 50 years, even if he clearly should have softened his language. Let’s be clear — the previous statement is true only to the extent that Boeheim had no actual or potential knowledge of Fine’s alleged proclivities involving young boys, but we ultimately believe that he did not, and he will survive this imbroglio at SU with his reputation intact. [note: a couple of minutes from the presser is at the bottom of the post, but because ESPN never ceases to be annoying and has yet to join the 21st century in allowing embeddable links from YouTube, this is all that is currently available. For the entire thing, click here.]
2. Our opinion on the Boeheim/Fine matter is far from universal. Sexual victims’ advocacy groups have been very critical of Boeheim’s response and remain so. His chancellor at Syracuse, Nancy Cantor, has publicly supported him, though, and SU fans gave him a standing ovation upon introduction at last night’s game. Pat Forde, who attended the press conference, rather compellingly argues that Boeheim, like Joe Paterno, does not seem to recognize that there is a much larger world outside of their collegiate sports bubbles where their larger-than-life personalities at the local level can get eaten alive in the mainstream media. His jocular/snide remarks and defensiveness in the press conference last night is certainly suggestive of that insularity, and if things eventually turn badly for Boeheim at Syracuse, it will probably be in large part related to his portrayal beyond the sports world. Regardless of how the next week, month, or year turns out for Boeheim and his program in relation to this nasty situation, this picture taken by US Presswire tells it all.
3. Moving on to basketball, North Carolina’s Harrison Barnes is expected to be in uniform and at full strength for tonight’s game against Wisconsin in the second night of the ACC/Big Ten Challenge in Chapel Hill. Coming off a loss at UNLV where Barnes rolled his right ankle and left the arena on crutches, there was considerable concern that the preseason All-American would not be available for two of Carolina’s most important games of the year — vs. the Badgers tonight, and at Kentucky on Saturday. It will be worth watching tonight to see how he looks in the opening few minutes — sometimes the mental hurdle of anticipating pain can be a worse outcome than the actual pain.
4. Speaking of the ACC/Big Ten Challenge, remember when the ACC used to dominate this event to the point where it was a complete joke? From 1999 to 2008, the ACC won ten annual events in a row before the Big Ten finally broke through in 2009 and notched a 6-5 victory. Another 6-5 win last season brought us to the first night of this year’s Challenge, where the Big Ten used road victories by Northwestern (@ Georgia Tech) and Illinois (@ Maryland) to join Ohio State’s romp over Duke and Purdue’s win over Miami to get to a quick 4-2 lead. Heading into tonight, even if NC State, BC, and UNC all protect home court (not likely), the league will still have to grab two road wins at Michigan State, Minnesota or Nebraska to win the event, 7-5. The best-case scenario is that those three win at home and either Virginia Tech or Florida State earn an unlikely road win to tie things up at 6-6 this year. It says here that the Big Ten repeats last night’s path to a 4-2 victory and takes the Challenge, 8-4.
5. Some unfortunate injury news to report today. USC center DeWayne Dedmon, a promising seven-foot sophomore who has already dealt with one injury this season to his hand, will miss the next four to six weeks with a stress injury in his right foot. Even though Dedmon was only contributing 8/6 per game in the first few weeks of the season, the Trojans at 3-4 have proven that they can use all the help they can get. The athletic big man expects to be back in time for the Pac-12 conference season.

Kellen Carpenter is an ACC microsite staffer and an RTC columnist. Behind the Numbers will publish weekly throughout the season.

Preseason rankings are a funny thing and once real basketball begins, these guesses about the season grow increasingly meaningless. People forget who was ranked where in the preseason by January, if they haven’t already forgotten by December. This, for what it’s worth, is probably a good thing.  Preseason polls can turn out to be pretty embarrassing, highlighting how little journalists and coaches actually know about how the basketball season is going to turn out. Remember Kansas State and Michigan State last season? They weren’t exactly huge factors in the postseason despite being almost unanimously ranked in the top five at the beginning.

Ron Morris Was Certainly On To Something

Gary Parrish’s “Poll Attacks” column is devoted to critiquing what he feels aren’t well-considered ballots. It’s an interesting idea and is usually very fascinating, but since Parrish can’t see the future, the columns have a tendency to not age all that well. What seems like understandable ridicule in November can seem less well-founded when the championship game is being played in April.  Here is a particularly infamous  passage from last year’s pre-season column:

Same dude voted Connecticut 18th.

This would’ve made sense three years ago, but it makes no sense now given that the Huskies have a coach who can’t seem to stay healthy, and a roster that looks nothing like your typical UConn roster. That’s why Big East coaches picked UConn 10th in the league, and why somebody needs to shoot me Ron Morris’ email address. With little effort, I can get him added to the official Big East email list, at which point he’ll start receiving announcements, and then this sort of stuff can probably be avoided. I don’t mean to be pushy.

Read the rest of this entry »

SPONSORED: Rush the Court is pleased to bring you a one-day fantasy college basketball league courtesy of FanDuel.com to tip off the season. The league, which is completely free to enter, starts TONIGHT involving several teams — Kentucky, Kansas, Michigan State, Duke, Florida, Ohio State, Miami (FL), Rutgers — and features $200 in prizes. Even better, if you beat our trained monkey that we’ve assigned to make our picks (username: RTCmonkey), you’ll win even more. Test your college hoops knowledge to win! Click here to enter.

1. Maybe you’ve forgotten or maybe you’re just dropping by, but today is pretty much a national holiday around these parts. One of ESPN’s better ideas, the 24-Hour Tip-Off Marathon, tipped off at Midnight ET last night in Spokane and is currently plowing its way through sunrise in the eastern time zone after stopovers in California and Hawaii overnight. Of course, the late night and morning games are mere appetizers to a $50 steak dinner coming up this evening when we’ll be rewarded with two games from the Champions Classic (Duke vs. Michigan State and Kentucky vs. Kansas) and a Top Ten matchup between Florida and Ohio State in Columbus. From Coach K’s pursuit of win #903 to the fascinating development of Cal’s young Cats to the return of OSU’s Jared Sullinger for a second season, storylines abound on this day. If you’re lucky enough to not have to work on a random Tuesday in November (hint, hint), strap yourselves in for a smorgasbord of college basketball a full week before you’re legally allowed to stuff your face.
2. Of course, the top storyline of the day remains Mike Krzyzewski‘s chance tonight to become the sport’s all-time wins leader in Division I men’s basketball. Coming into the Champions Classic game against Michigan State this evening, Coach K sits tied with his former coach and mentor, Bob Knight, at 902 total wins, and if you believe in Vegas odds, he has a 72% chance of doing the trick tonight in Madison Square Garden. We’re sure that the testimonials for K’s greatness will come fast and furious all day long, but here’s two good interviews to get you started.  Former Duke superstar and all-around good guy Grant Hill spoke with TSN’s Ryan Fagan recently about K’s far-reaching positive influence on him, and recent graduate Nolan Smith spoke with TSN’s Mike DeCourcy about some of the life lessons K imparted to him as a father figure. Expect to see many more of these in the next 24-48 hours.
3. What UCLA head coach Ben Howland needs is more attitude problems on his team. Let’s recap recent events, shall we? After the vaunted Class of 2008 recruiting class nearly brought his program to its knees through various busts, poor attitudes and problem children, it appeared that the Bruins may have been turning the corner by shedding itself of most of those players (Jerime Anderson, currently on suspension, remains). Then, over the weekend, sophomore center Joshua Smith tweeted that his team had lost to a bunch of “bums” after an opening night loss to Loyola Marymount — but perhaps worse than that, he ‘lol’-ed about it, suggesting an alarming irreverence from a player whom Howland needs to stay on the floor (he contributed a paltry 5/4 in only 16 minutes of action). The latest kerfuffle involves UCLA’s leading returning scorer and rebounder, Reeves Nelson, a player whom an ESPN report alleges is causing problems within the UCLA team as a result of his attitude. After skipping practice Monday, he has been suspended for tonight’s game versus Middle Tennessee State and his long-term future with the team appears in doubt. What in the name of the Wizard is going on in Westwood?
4. Seth Davis gives us his Hoops Thoughts for the opening weekend of college basketball and his first point about the ridiculous (and slippery) decals stuck to the floors of the various pre-conference events around the country is a salient one.  As he points out, Michigan State’s Branden Dawson is only the latest of disasters averted, as his right knee buckled on a Quicken Loans decal for the Carrier Classic, and for a few minutes it appeared as if the injury may have been much worse than it was. What’s amazing about this phenomenon is that college athletics has all kinds of rules meant to protect players in its various sports from injury, and yet even after years of complaining from coaches and media alike, the decals stay. Here’s an idea that seems a reasonable compromise — use the yellow-line first down technology in football to digitally layer the advertising images onto the floor. That way, the dollars that support these events remain secured, but not at the expense of potentially losing a player to severe injury. What are we missing here?
5. Perhaps not since Damon Bailey was recruited to Indiana in the late 1980s has a single player held so much hope and promise for the Crimson and Cream denizens of the Hoosier State.  But freshman Cody Zeller represents a new beginning to many IU fans wishing for a return to the glory days of Indiana basketball under the General and even before him, Branch McCracken. Basketball Prospectus takes a closer look at the enormous expectations that are being placed on the young player, effectively (and graphically) showing that he faces perhaps more homegrown pressure than any other major recruit in the last four years. Can’t say we disagree with the premise, but it’s a little unfair that so much is riding on a young man who may need some time to develop into an effective player at the Big Ten level.

NBA Commissioner David Stern is calling it a “nuclear winter.” The NBA Player’s Union’s decision Monday to reject the owners’ latest offer at best means that any professional basketball played in America this year will be extremely curtailed, or at worst, will never happen. Characterizing the decision as one “hell-bent on destruction,” the four-month lockout now threatens to head into the judicial system where it will most certainly result in delays to the point where NBA basketball will remain a whisper in the wind for the 2011-12 season.

If you haven’t noticed, there is no such accompanying lockout at the collegiate level. Where the Lakers’ Kobe Bryant is busy attending sensitivity trainings, North Carolina’s Harrison Barnes is putting in work leading his #1-ranked Tar Heels to victories on aircraft carriers and brand-new opposing arenas. While the Magic’s Dwight Howard is assiduously dominating himself on NBA Live, Ohio State’s Jared Sullinger is dropping double-doubles on players foolish enough to check him inside. As Chris Paul and his family make their way to awkward Family Feud tapings, Conneticut’s Jeremy Lamb is finding a stairway to heaven on his way to a second national championship run. Why worry about SportsCenter graphics showing NBA games missed when there are plenty of good basketball games already at your fingertips?

We know… we know… it’s just not the same for you. And we understand that. The NBA isn’t the same for us either. Really, it’s not you, it’s us. But in the interest of throwing you a bone in the hopes that some of you will want to see real, live hoops action this winter, take these five tips to heart. It’ll help what you’re viewing go down a little easier, we promise.

An NBA Fan’s Guide to Watching College Basketball

Read the rest of this entry »

Today the RTC preseason All-America Team was announced, and it contains three sophomores on its first team who could have been viable 1-and-done prospects last spring had the NBA’s labor situation not been so tenuous. Those players are Ohio State’s Jared Sullinger, Kentucky’s Terrence Jones, and North Carolina’s Harrison Barnes. The second team has two more — Connecticut’s Jeremy Lamb and Baylor’s Perry Jones, III. The third team has two players who may declare for the NBA Draft after this, their freshman, season — Duke’s Austin Rivers and Kentucky’s Anthony Davis.

Battles Like These Between Barnes & Jones Could Become the Two-Year Norm (Getty/C.Trotman)

It’s no secret that the top talent in college basketball these days tends to skew younger, as our inclusion of seven freshmen and sophomores to our three preseason All-America teams clearly exhibits. In a different year assuming those five sophomores were already in the NBA, we might have included more freshmen such as Connecticut’s Andre Drummond or Oklahoma State’s LeBryan Nash on our list. But we didn’t have to, and the reason for this is that the pool of talent is deeper this season than it has been for the last five years, in the same way that the last half-decade was more talented than the prep-to-pros era of the late 1990s and early 2000s.

Now, imagine if the following players were also back: Duke’s Kyrie Irving, Texas’ Tristan Thompson and Cory Joseph, Kentucky’s Brandon Knight, Tennessee’s Tobias Harris, Kansas’ Josh Selby. You see where we’re going with this. And the NBA brass, always thinking about its own worldwide marketing of star players and its bottom line, does too. According to Chad Ford over at ESPN Insider, one of the few areas of consensus among the key folks in the ongoing NBA owner and labor negotiations is that 1-and-done is likely on its last legs. Two-and-Through appears to be the new standard. From Ford’s piece:

Read the rest of this entry »

1. November. Veteran’s Day, Thanksgiving, and the first month of the college basketball season.   With only six days remaining until the opening of the 2kSports Coaches vs. Cancer Classic, it’s time to get serious again, folks. If you’re the type of person who loves college basketball at your core — you possess the kind of admiration for the game that leaves you empty during its many months of summer hibernation, read this season’s first post from Kyle Whelliston at The Mid-Majority. There’s something in there that you will relate to — guaranteed. And if not, how many times will you read a college basketball article that slyly references The Sundays? Glad to have you back in action, TMM.
2. The AP released its preseason All-America team Monday afternoon, and the only surprise among the group was how completely unsurprising it was. The first team consists of UNC’s Harrison Barnes, Ohio State’s Jared Sullinger, Wisconsin’s Jordan Taylor, Connecticut’s Jeremy Lamb, and Kentucky’s Terrence Jones.  Taylor is the only senior of the five-man team; the other four are sophomores, all of whom could have been high selections in the NBA Draft had they chosen to declare last spring. Barnes received 63 of 65 votes, leading Gary Parrish to suggest that the two voters who left him off the team should account for his omission. It doesn’t bother us that much — let’s be honest, Barnes is really good, but he isn’t Ralph Sampson after two consecutive NPOYs — but keep in mind that last year at this time, Kemba Walker was largely considered a talented but inconsistent gunner not on par with preseason first-teamer Jacob Pullen. We know how that turned out.
3. The Big East‘s magical mystery tour to irrelevance is set to continue today with multiple sources reporting that the conference will announce the addition of six new members at its annual meeting in Philadelphia. Prepare yourself for this murderer’s row on the hardwood: Central Florida, SMU and Houston will accept invitations to the conference in all sports, while Boise State, Navy and Air Force are presumed ready to accept in football only. With the league on the verge of losing powerhouses Syracuse, Pittsburgh and West Virginia, consider us rather unimpressed with the league’s “replacements.” If Louisville ultimately ends up leaving for the Big 12 and Connecticut finds its way over to the ACC, the serious basketball schools like Georgetown, Villanova, Marquette, St. John’s, Providence and Notre Dame would actually be better served to make a few calls to Butler and Xavier and initiate the dream of Dave Gavitt in a post-apocalyptic way.
4. Speaking of West Virginia, the Morgantown school has filed a civil suit in state court to get out of its contractual obligation to stay with the Big East for another two years as it transitions to the Big 12. WVU would like to leave as soon as next summer, and by taking its case to the courts under a specific claim of “direct and proximate result of ineffective leadership and breach of fiduciary duties to the football schools by the Big East and its Commissioner.”  Ineffective leadership — ouch. Big East commissioner John Marinatto responded to the shot across his bow by citing the party line about his conference’s “legal options” and so forth. What the league’s insistence on keeping the three defectors around longer comes down to is that it needs to stay at a minimum of eight football schools in order to keep its auto-bid to the BCS — if the league loses Pitt, SU and WVU prior to making its replacements, then its bid becomes more tenuous (although the FBS rules state that any eight schools will do). If they all left tomorrow, the league would have five — UConn, Cincinnati, Louisville, South Florida and Rutgers. Big East football — the gift that keeps on giving… and giving… and giving…
5. Monday was a big day in the recruiting world, as we get closer to the early signing period later this month. Arizona received a commitment from seven-foot center Kaleb Tarczewski (how did Coach K not get this guy?), and the gurus are already projecting Sean Miller’s third class as the top-rated in the country. After a downswing in talent in recent years, the Pac-12 may be on the verge of a player infusion rivaling the draftable talent it had on hand in the late 2000s — as we discussed on our Pac-12 microsite Monday, Arizona, Oregon, UCLA and even new member Colorado are seeing returns on the recruiting circuit that have been missing lately. Will it pan out?