Posted by jstevrtc on June 8th, 2011
- Bob Knight described the rule that a bunch of Ohio State football players broke when they sold some memorabilia for cash and tattoos as “idiotic” at a speaking engagement on Monday night. Listen, there’s no denying the man his rightful place on the Mt. Rushmore of college basketball coaches, but there are a few things about his bemoaning that rule that leave us unconvinced of his stance on it: 1) Coach Knight is an OSU alum; 2) he doesn’t strike us as the type of guy who prefers his players walking around with tattoos on their skin or cold rolls of cash in their pockets; 3) would he feel the same if a couple of John Calipari’s players did the same thing? Or would he preach about how players should be happy with the compensation that comes in the form of the opportunity to receive a college education, and therefore should stay away from places like pawn shops and tattoo parlors?
- In the wake of Tennessee AD Mark Hamilton’s firing on Tuesday, Mark Wiedmer of the Chattanooga Times Free Press wrote an interesting piece that got us wondering about punishment, blame, and where the truth lies within those. Hamilton departs UT with the school’s two biggest men’s sports in trouble and we assume he’d been packing up his own office for months in anticipation of getting the ziggy, but we always wonder how much policing the ADs are really able to do when they hire some of these guys. And we agree with Wiedmer’s mention of how Hamilton’s ouster a mere three days before UT stands tall before the man (“the man” being the NCAA Committee on Infractions) is an obvious move to gain favor with the COI.
- We’ve been having an enjoyable exchange over Twitter with Sporting News’ Mike DeCourcy about his article on Tuesday in which he ranked the best college hoops coaching jobs out there. We did our own writeup on the same topic about a month ago, and it’s generated a nice discussion, which is…well, sort of the point of all this. We assume you’re already following both RTC and DeCourcy on Twitter, so by all means, let us know what you think of both lists, even if you vehemently disagree. We’re all big boys, so we can take the bad with the good. And if you comment via tweet or the comments section, let’s also hear your defense for your position.
- Thomas Emma played at Duke from 1980-83 and captained the Blue Devils as a starter at guard in his final year there. Known for his long-range ability on the court and his sense of humor off of it, he also shot over 84% from the free throw line during his time there, placing him among the school’s best in that department. After graduating, he earned a master’s degree from Columbia, and was president of a company called Power Performance that helps train young athletes. On Monday morning, facing undisclosed health issues and reportedly suffering from increasing depression because of them, Mr. Emma leapt from the 12th floor of the New York Athletic Club and plunged to his death onto a second-floor landing of the Essex Hotel next door. We can’t imagine the agony his family is going through right now, but our thoughts and best wishes are with them.
- Khyle Marshall impressed a lot of people with his play last season in helping Butler get back to the national championship game, and that evidently includes the decision-makers at USA Basketball. Marshall, a rising sophomore who was the Bulldogs’ leading bench scorer and rebounder despite adding only 5.8 PPG and 3.8 RPG last year, has been invited to try out for the American team that will defend its 2009 title at the FIBA U19 World Championship in Latvia, which starts at the end of this month. He can ask a couple of his fellow Brad Stevens disciples for advice on this, if he likes; both Gordon Hayward and Shelvin Mack were on that 2009 team that took gold in New Zealand.
| morning 5, Regular Features
| Tagged: bob knight, brad stevens, butler, columbia, duke, fiba u19 world championship, gordon hayward, john calipari, khyle marshall, mark hamilton, ohio state, shelvin mack, tennessee, thomas emma
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