1. Monday was Media Day around the NBA, and why would anyone here give a whit about what professional basketball players have to say? One clear reason is that former Duke forward Lance Thomas is a second-year member of the New Orleans Hornets, and his recent agreement with a New York City jeweler involving a $67,800 loan while he was a senior was bound to come up. First, despite a confidentiality agreement in place, Thomas said he didn’t believe he was involved in an NCAA violation regarding the transaction; he then added, “There’s more to it, but I’m not going to comment on it right now. Everything will unfold once everything is taken care of the right way.” He went on to say that he would eventually speak to both Duke and the NCAA about the incident, but kept referring to doing things “the right way.” What is Thomas talking about here? The settlement is already in place, and we’ve been told that it includes a confidentiality agreement. What does he anticipate will change that would allow him to comment on this matter, and why would he expose himself or his beloved alma mater by talking anyway? Thomas’ comments here make very little sense, but then again, very little about this entire incident does.
2. DePaul basketball has to go back a long way to find its glory days, as the program in the last two decades has largely been an unmitigated disaster (one NCAA win since 1990). Still, with a deep and rich local prep talent pool and no real collegiate rival within the Chicago metropolitan area (Northwestern, of course, has zero NCAA wins to match its number of historical appearances), the school continues to believe that better days are ahead. Mayor Rahm Emanuel said on Monday what many supporters of the program have been thinking for years — one of the school’s biggest negatives is that its home court is located in suburban Rosemont, some 15 traffic-clogged miles from DePaul’s Lincoln Park campus on the north side. A new arena near campus or even regular games at the United Center near downtown might help Chicagoans start to feel like DePaul is their college basketball team. With this idea, we’re totally in favor — to really develop great fan and student support, most campus gyms should be right on campus or as near to it as possible.
3. It appears that either dad or kids have won out in the continuing saga over the biggest package deal in college basketball since the goofy Lopez twins showed up at Stanford in the fall of 2006. After months of hemming and hawing about their announcement date (most recently: late October) and various reports suggesting that the players and father were at odds of their preference of school, it appears that someone in the (Andrew and Aaron) Harrison family has made a final decision. The top-rated point guard and shooting guard will without question infuse a backcourt with talent in much the same way that UCLA’s Shabazz Muhammad and Kyle Anderson are expected to do this year. Whether their choice will be Kentucky or Maryland is still anybody’s guess, but ESPNU will televise their decision on Thursday afternoon at 5 PM on its “Recruiting Nation” show.
4. Just yesterday we mentioned that Louisville’s Mike Marra had torn his ACL for the second time in under a year, ending his senior season before it got started, and effectively, his college basketball career. That disappointing news was followed up by the report that Utah center David Foster had broken his right foot, also for the second time in under a year, ending his season before it got started, and effectively, his college basketball career. Ugh. Like Marra, Foster was of limited usefulness offensively, but the 7’3″ big man averaged 3.5 blocks per game in his three-year career, ultimately rejecting 219 total shots and leaving the program as its all-time blocked shots leader. His return from injury for Larry Krystkowiak’s 2012-13 squad was anticipated to provide some defensive help for a team that gave up a putrid 51.3% on shots within the arc last season; Foster’s loss now leaves that up to the more offensively-oriented Jason Washburn (11/6/1.4 BPG).
5. The more we read about Kevin Ollie‘s tryout season as the head coach of Connecticut with his former coach, mentor and legend Jim Calhoun poking around the program he built, the more we believe that the interim coach may not get a fair shot there. According to this AP report about Ollie and Calhoun’s adjustment period, Calhoun seems to be having a little too much fun staying involved. What happens when the inevitable losing streak happens and reporters start asking for the venerable ex-coach’s opinions? At what point do the envelopes full of sand turn into stocking full of coal? It’s just a weird position for Ollie to suffer, and this is especially true because Calhoun knows he will need considerable help.

Seven Pac-12 schools took a foreign exhibition trip this summer. We recap them below with Drew taking UCLA, Utah, and Colorado, and Connor taking the rest.

Not Every Team Went Tropical, But All of Them Learned Something

Arizona

• Where: The Bahamas
• When: August 11-13
• What: The Wildcats swept their two games against Bahamian competition.
• Why: As Arizona transitions from an NIT one-and-done to having at least NCAA Third Round expectations, this trip was all about integrating instant-impact newcomers Kaleb Tarczewski, Grant Jerrett, Brandon Ashley, Gabe York, and Mark Lyons into the rotation. Setting lineups and seeing what groups of players meshed well together was much more important than the actual play against less than stellar competition.
• Who: Lyons and fellow senior Kevin Parrom were the stars of the trip, each averaging 18.5 PPG. The most anticipated freshman to don the cardinal red and navy blue in a while, Tarczewski, scored eight points in each game on the trip. Arizona absolutely destroyed their lowly competition, winning both games by a combined 112 points.

Colorado

• Where: France, Belgium and the Netherlands
• When: August 11-22
• What: The Buffaloes went 2-3 in five games against European professional teams.
• Why: With CU breaking in six scholarship freshmen, the trip gave head coach Tad Boyle a chance to build camaraderie between the talented new guys and their six returnees from last year’s Pac-12 championship team. The trip also gave the freshmen a chance to build an identity of their own, evidenced by the fact that Boyle sat out the core returnees from last year’s squad – Andre Roberson, Askia Booker, Spencer Dinwiddie and Sabatino Chen – in one of the games, allowing five of the freshmen to start the game together.
• Who: While Roberson was his usual magnificent self – he averaged 14.4 points and 13.8 rebounds – freshman Josh Scott eliminated any doubt that he could be an immediate impact player. Scott led the Buffs in scoring in four of the five games, coming up a point short of the leaders in the opening game; he averaged 17.4 point per game for the trip. His classmate Xavier Johnson also made a statement, averaging more than ten points to go with seven rebounds for the game.

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It’s been three months since we started this series, but with Utah last week we’ve now wrapped up our in-depth offseason look at all the teams in the Pac-12 Conference. In case you’ve missed anything, below we’ll link to the wrap-up posts we cobbled together, featuring links to all of the content for each team. For each school we’ve taken a look at the state of the program, we’ve tried to ask the big questions about each team, and we’ve run down all the changes to the rosters since the end of last season. Hopefully this can be a useful resource for you as we get closer to the season (can you believe Midnight Madness is just over a month away?) — want to find out about USC incoming transfers or Utah’s remade roster? Need a run-down on the Stanford schedule or want to refresh your memory of Oregon State’s returnees? How big of an impact can the Colorado freshmen have this season and who’s going to be the leading scorer for Washington this year? We’ve got you covered below. Click away.

• Arizona State Wrap-Up
• California Wrap-Up
• Arizona Wrap-Up
• USC Wrap-Up
• Washington Wrap-Up
• Stanford Wrap-Up
• Colorado Wrap-Up
• Washington State Wrap-Up
• Oregon Wrap-Up
• UCLA Wrap-Up
• Oregon State Wrap-Up
• Utah Wrap-Up

We’ve reached the end of our look at Utah basketball (for now), but in case you missed anything, it is all right here:

1. Evaluating the Recent Past
2. Players Not Returning
3. Running Down the Returnees
4. Ten Newcomers Breathe Life Into The Program
5. Breaking Down the Schedule
6. What to Expect
7. Burning Question: Is Larry Krystkowiak The Right Guy?
8. State of the Program

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” So Charles Dickens began A Tale of Two Cities and a long series of lazy writers lining up to steal that quote. Never one to shy away from a good theft every now and then, I’ll, um, “borrow” Dickens’ line to sum up the current state of the Utah basketball program. The second half of that line clearly applies to Utah at present as it comes off of its worst season in more than 100 years of basketball, but at the same time, with the Utes now members of the Pac-12 and all the boatloads of television money and exposure that comes along with it, Utah basketball is in completely uncharted waters. In a good way. Never before has the basketball team been this bad and never before has it been this profitable. Gotta love capitalism. So, when we go to sum up the state of the Utah basketball program, we’ve got to at least pay heed to the fact that while, yes, wins and losses are really the bottom line for sports fans, there are administrators in Salt Lake City who think last year, regardless of a 6-25 record, was one great accomplishment for the Utes regardless of the fact that the basketball program didn’t do any of the heavy lifting.

Show Utah the Money?

The Utah basketball program really is in a situation where there is a little bit of good to go with everything bad happening. Sure, it is probably more a credit to the football program’s recent success that Utah was invited to join the Pac-12 (after all, football is all that matters, right?), but as the saying goes, a rising tide lifts all boats, and good god, is that Utah athletic department about to be buoyed by a river of money with plenty sure to trickle down through the basketball program. Sure, the Huntsman Center, which was once a fearsome homecourt advantage, is now a 40-something-year-old venue which was regularly half-empty and whisper-quiet last year. But hey, at least this year fans across the nation – and perhaps more importantly recruits across the nation – will get to see any game the Utes play (assuming the Pac-12 Network distribution plans come to fruition at some future point). Sure, in basketball-mad Utah, the Utes are arguably running third in terms of momentum, behind BYU (UU has lost six in a row to BYU by an average of more than 17 points) and Utah State, but, um, insert the image of a fat cat in a suit and tie greedily rubbing his fingers and thumb together in anticipation of a large windfall here. Or to steal another cliché, “show me the money!”

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Each week we’re trying to get to the heart of one Pac-12 program by asking the most important question that faces that program. This week, we’ve been profiling a Utah program that is trying to bounce back from an awful season, and along with myself and Connor Pelton, we’ve asked Adam Butler of Pachoops the following burning question:

Over the course of more than 100 years of basketball history, Utah has had one of the most consistently successful programs in college basketball. But, in the last decade, a couple of misses in hiring a head coach have left the Utes scrambling, resulting in last year’s debacle, the worst season in the history of the program. Is Larry Krystkowiak the right guy to return the Utes to their winning ways? And how quickly can he reasonably be expected to turn things around?

After Hitting The Bottom Of The Barrel, Can Head Coach Larry Krystkowiak Lead Utah Back To Relevance?

Adam Butler: The Utes have fallen on some strange times and I have to say I don’t quite know what to make of Larry K. He’s like the Lane Kiffin of college basketball less the arrogance and drama (and I’m not entirely sure where he stands on the wife situation). But let me explain the Kiffin thing. K has bounced around for short stints of moderate success. His while with the Bucks was not glamorous and swift but was an opportunity awarded to a guy with two seasons of college head coaching at Montana where he was 42-20. So I feel like there isn’t a body of work by which to say, “Yes, Larry is the man to get Utah to the fat-guy-in-sweater days.” But he’s intense, he’s young, and he has only one place to go: up. I mean, they held tryouts last season. I like the pieces he’s bringing in and have heard only rave reviews of Jordan Loveridge and that’s where it begins; some recruiting success, diamonds in the rough, and then momentum rolls. Can K do it? Sure, why not, because anything is better than a six-win season.

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This ol’ crystal ball of mine may be on the fritz, but we’ve got to put it through its paces one last time as we check on the immediate future for the Utah basketball program. After a week or running down the comings and goings over the offseason, we’re ready to guarantee improvement for the Utes – not necessarily going out on a huge limb for a team that won just six times last year. But, for more specifics on how it will all go down, read on.

Utah’s Leading Scorer – Glen Dean. There is enough evenly spaced talent on this Utah roster that predicting some balanced scoring atop the statistics is the easiest bet, with guys like Aaron Dotson, Jarred DuBois, Jordan Loveridge and perhaps leading returning scorer Jason Washburn all in the mix for double-figure scoring averages. But Dean will likely have the ball in his hands quite a bit and he’s got a history of using possessions and taking shots, something that Dotson and Washburn, for example, do not. And Dean has proven himself capable of not only creating offensive opportunities for others, but also for himself. He’s an efficient scorer who can connect from deep or get into the lane and score and he should be expected to average somewhere near the 12 or 13 points he averaged in his time at Eastern Washington. On this Utah team, those 12 or 13 points may be enough to narrowly edge out two or three other teammates for the leading scorer title.

Glen Dean Is Just One Of Many Capable Scorers On The Remade Utah Roster

Utah’s MVP – Jordan Loveridge. On Utah’s recent Brazil trip, not only was Loveridge the Utes’ leading scorer over the course of the four games, there has been talk that he was the team’s best player. A true combo forward capable of rebounding with the big boys and scoring in the lane or stepping outside and converting deep jumpers, Loveridge will help give the Utes an athleticism, coupled with an ability to create offensive opportunities from the frontcourt, that was largely missing from last year’s squad.

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Coming off a 6-25 season and breaking in 10 new players, you can hardly blame the Utes for dialing their schedule back significantly. But this? Three games against non D-I opponents? Zero non-conference games against opponents from BCS conferences? Eleven of the 13 non-conference games inside the state of Utah? Well, one thing is for sure: The Utes will improve on last year’s record. Here’s the schedule, with analysis below:

Easy Stretch: If Utah wanted to ease into the 2012-13 season, they picked the right three teams to do it with. The opener on 11/2 against Simon Fraser is just an exhibition, but things don’t get a whole lot tougher when Division III Willamette visits for the official opener a week later. A week after that, Utah gets its first D-I opponent on the books when Sacramento State (10-18 in the Big Sky last year) visits. A 2-0 record out of the gates is imperative.

Early-Season Tournament: While other Pac-12 teams are traveling to exotic locations and facing highly-regarded opponents in their early season tourneys, the Utes are staying right at home over Thanksgiving weekend and hosting a trio of teams in a round-robin format. Their three opponents – Idaho State, Central Michigan and Wright State – combined to go 33-61 last season, making this a very manageable stretch for the Utes. Still, last year Utah lost at home to teams like Montana State and Cal State Fullerton. If they can take care of business in this tournament, that will be the first sign of proof that the Utes of 2012-13 have taken a step forward. A 5-0 record following Thanksgiving weekend is not out of the question.

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As head coach Larry Krystkowiak begins to remake the Utah roster more to his liking, he welcomes in 10 new players next season, including three newly eligible Division I transfers, a couple of student-athletes returning from two-year LDS missions, four freshmen, and a junior college transfer. Coupled with three returning seniors, Utah will have a significantly more experienced team. Likewise, the talent level takes a big bump up from last year’s hastily assembled roster. Below, we’ll run down each of the newcomers in our guess as to the order of their importance to the 2012-13 squad.

Jordan Loveridge, Freshman, Combo Forward, 6’6” 225 lbs, West Jordan High School, West Jordan, Utah – The 2012 Player of the Year in Utah was a huge get for Krystkowiak, the first step in proving that the new head coach can protect his back yard. As a senior, Loveridge led the state in both scoring and rebounding, notching 18 double-doubles along the way. In the Utes’ summer trip to Brazil, he scored in double figures in three of the four games and averaged 13 points and eight rebounds per game in limited minutes during that stretch, prompting even further hope for UU fans that Loveridge will be a special player. Still, Loveridge is a guy most suited to play the four, and at 6’6” that could prove to be something of a problem in the Pac-12. He’s got long arms, a great basketball IQ and the ability to extend his game out beyond the three-point line, but he still needs to prove his effectiveness against Pac-12-caliber competition. Eventually if he polishes his perimeter handles, he could shift to the three spot full-time and turn into a match-up nightmare for opposing defenses.

Jarred DuBois Leads A Trio Of Transfers That Will Remake The Ute Backcourt (AP Photo/Ben Margot)

Jarred DuBois, Senior, Combo Guard, 6’3” 180 lbs, Loyola Marymount University – A graduate student transfer from LMU, DuBois is a playmaker. Unfortunately, there have been times in his career when the number of plays he makes for the opposition are greater than the number of plays he makes for his own team. Still, if he can tighten up his handle, take better care of the ball and – this might be the toughest of his assignments – shoot a decent percentage from the field, DuBois has the athleticism and toughness to be a major asset for the Utes. His best season at LMU was his sophomore campaign where he hit 59 threes at a 40% clip while handing out a couple assists per night and keeping his turnover rate low. If he can replicate that type of line, he’ll be an upgrade in the backcourt.

Aaron Dotson, Junior, Shooting Guard, 6’4” 204 lbs, Louisiana State University –Dotson, a native of Seattle, committed to LSU as a highly regarded member of the 2009 recruiting class, ranked #45 overall by ESPNU. In two years at LSU, Dotson earned 38 starts (out of 63 games), averaging 6.8 points per game in his sophomore year, by far his most effective season. He struggled mightily as a freshman, turning the ball over regularly and shooting just a 32.6% eFG. While his turnovers remained steady as a freshman, Dotson improved his shot as a sophomore, leading the Tigers with 37.5% from deep, but with his mother fighting breast cancer, Dotson decided it was time to head back across country and play closer to home. His size and athleticism coupled with a sweet stroke from three mean that there is plenty of upside here. If Dotson is able to harness his talents, he could be a revelation in the Pac-12.

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Just three players return who have spent time in a Utah uniform before, but between the three of them Larry Krystkowiak will welcome back three seniors, hopefully destined for leadership roles. We’ll break down those three guys below in order of their most recent scoring averages.

Jason Washburn, Senior, Power Forward (11.4 PPG, 6.2 RPG, 1.4 BPG) – There is likely little argument that Washburn was the Utes’ best player last season. Their lone player who could be classified as an efficient offensive talent, his shooting percentages dipped a bit as he got more shots and saw more possessions run through him. Still, he nearly doubled his previous career high in points and bumped up his rebounding average by more than two per night. Physically, he’s certainly not the most dominant force ever, but at 6’11” he couples a nice touch on his mid-range jumper with decent post moves and an ability to disrupt opponents on the defensive end. With 7’3” David Foster expected back from a foot injury this year, the Utes should be not only the tallest Pac-12 team in the middle, but the most experienced one. Problem is, they’ll also be one of the least athletic ones.

Jason Washburn Led The Utes in Points, Rebounds and Blocked Shots And Was The Only Player To Shoot Better Than 50% From The Field Last Year (Associated Press)

Cedric Martin, Senior, Shooting Guard (7.4 PPG, 3.2 RPG, 1.9 APG) – Last year was Martin’s first in Salt Lake City after using his first couple of seasons of eligibility at Lee College in Texas. He jumped right into the fray immediately and wound up averaging more than 30 minutes per game and turned into one of the team’s better offensive players. He knocked down 49 three-pointers (at a 37% clip), filled the stat sheet in other areas and, by the end of the year, was the team’s best perimeter defender. With three newly eligible Division I transfers coming in around the perimeter, not to mention a couple freshmen guards, Martin will have more competition for minutes, but with his experience he should be able to earn minutes at the wing.

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