1. Seth Davis is back with his annual Jigsaw Man column. For those of you who are not familiar with the concept, Seth adopts the persona of “The Jigsaw Man” to pick out players who if they switched teams would fill significant voids and does so while speaking in the third person. He tries to avoid picking out obvious targets like Anthony Davis who would make any team better even if they didn’t have a deficiency at that position. We are not sure if we are just getting cranky in our old age, but it seems like Seth is cheating a bit with some of his picks. Stealing players like Terrell Stoglin (the leading scorer in the ACC), Scott Machado (maybe the best point guard in the country), and Mike Moser (a potential All-American and a long-time crush of Andy Glockner and Ryan Greene) seems to be too easy. Obviously, adding the best point guard in the nation would make Duke a better team. So if you are reading this Seth Jigsaw Man (and we know that you are), step it up a little bit next year. Pick someone like Alex Oriakhi who is wasting away on the bench, but could and should be a double-double guy in the right situation instead of picking a potential All-American who is the best player on a top 10 team like Moser.
2. Whenever we hear someone talk about how unsavory recruiting is for top football recruits we hear someone else talk about how it is worse in basketball. We now have found at least one example where it is not. According to some media reports, one five-star football recruit who chose to attend Alabama over LSU was influenced by a promise that the former would give the recruit’s girlfriend a job. Interestingly, according to the NCAA bylaws, this appears to only be an infraction if it was committed for a basketball recruit, but for a football recruit apparently is it ok. The NCAA never ceases to amaze us.
3. Last week, the National Coordinator of basketball officials in Division I, John Adams, posted a memo urging officials to pay a closer attention to sportsmanship and call technical fouls on coaches and players who violate this principle. After the officiating over the weekend, Adams decided that he needed to respond to the criticism of officials. While he did not discuss the atrocious officiating in Philadelphia or the missed goaltending call in upstate New York, Adams did discuss the role of officials in dealing with unsportsmanlike acts. Adams essentially believes that the controversial sportsmanship fouls were correct and hopes that these moves will help rebuild college basketball’s image after a rough past few months. While legislating the trash talking more effectively may reduce some of the unseemly incidents we have seen, we would also like to see Adams work on improving the officiating of all areas of the game.
4. With his team on its way to a second straight solid season and a potential NCAA Tournament bid that it did not get last year, Iona coach Tim Cluess was given a contract extension through the 2016-17 season. Cluess, who came to the school without any prior Division I head coaching experience, is actually in the last guaranteed year of his initial contract. Thanks to a 25-win season to start his coaching career and what appears to be an even better second season, Cluess has a well-deserved contract extension, which should only help him with recruiting although we cannot imagine that any recruit thought Cluess was in jeopardy of losing his job.
5. His team is currently on the wrong side of the bubble, but that did not stop VCU coach Shaka Smart from making a bold proclamation that the “the best programs in the state are in the CAA. It’s really not even close.” When you look at the numbers over the past ten years, the three programs he is referring to (VCU, George Mason, and Old Dominion) have put up much better numbers (detailed in the article) than the the ACC programs (Virginia and Virginia Tech). So technically Smart is correct even if he does come off as untactful, but it is more amusing to hear new George Mason coach Paul Hewitt talk about this when he guided another ACC program (Georgia Tech) right into the ground.

When the season began, it was taken for granted that Florida State would be the third-best team in the ACC. On the cusp of conference play, I am beginning to wonder if Florida State is even in the top half of the conference. Despite lining up some decent challenges in their non-conference schedule, the Seminoles haven’t been able to prove they even belong in the conversation. Until last Friday, FSU had basically beaten bad teams and lost to very good teams and remained an enigma. Losing to Harvard, Connecticut, Michigan State, and Florida on the road isn’t shameful. Nearly every team in the country would lose to those teams under these circumstances. On the other side of the coin, when your best victories are against Massachusetts, Central Florida, and Charleston Southern, you haven’t really demonstrated anything either. These teams, while talented, should be handily beaten by a team that is supposed to be the third best in the Atlantic Coast Conference.

Then, on Friday, Florida State loses by two points at home to Princeton in triple overtime. What do we make of this loss? Princeton isn’t great (with losses to Elon, Siena, and Drexel already), but they are pretty good. What conclusion can be reasonably be drawn from this performance? Is Leonard Hamilton’s team anywhere close to last year’s tournament team?

Leonard Hamilton Has Won With Bad Offensive Teams Before, But Can He Do It This Year?

It’s really hard to say. The Seminoles are an enigma this year. Without a signature win or a horrible loss (Princeton is #134 in Ken Pomeroy’s rankings), the team just seems middling and undistinguished. As always, the defense is excellent, with Ken Pomeroy ranking the Seminoles as fifth best in the entire nation, the best mark in a conference that includes the other excellent defenses of Virginia and North Carolina. The difference, this year, seems to be that even an elite defense can’t make up for a truly dreadful offense. Read the rest of this entry »

Today is the day! Not only does this evening mark the opening night of college hoops, but it is also represents the unveiling of our preseason edition of the weekly Top 25. From now until the conclusion of the regular season, you can count on our editing team here at RTC to provide you with their rankings of the Top 25 every Monday afternoon. In the interest of full disclosure, we’ll be sure to show our editors’ ballots so if you’re wondering how on earth your team could possibly be ranked so low, you’ll know who the culprit is that didn’t give your guys the respect. In conjunction with the rankings, we’ll also provide our quick ‘n dirty analysis that notes any trends and interesting items each week to give the poll a little more context. To see how we did last year, check out our 2010-11 preseason poll – some good (Butler, Kentucky); some not so much (Michigan State, Villanova).

QnD after the jump…

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Who’s Got Next? is a weekly column by Josh Paunil, the RTC recruiting guru. We encourage you to check out his website dedicated solely to college basketball recruiting, National Recruiting Spotlight, for more detailed recruiting information. Once a week he will bring you an overview of what’s going on in the complex world of recruiting, from who is signing where among the seniors to who the hot prospects are at the lower levels of the sport. If you have any suggestions as to areas we’re missing or different things you’d like to see, please let us know at rushthecourt@yahoo.com.

Lead Story: Purvis Picks In-State Wolfpack

North Carolina State head coach Mark Gottfried has to be happy about Purvis' commitment.

Things Looking Good For N.C. State Head Coach Mark Gottfried. Class of 2012 shooting guard Rodney Purvis committed to North Carolina State Friday giving the Wolfpack one of the best guard combinations in any recruiting class thus far between him and point guard Tyler Lewis (to see why Purvis committed check out the “What They’re Saying” section). Purvis ended one of the more interesting recruitments in the class after he committed to Louisville last December, de-committed from the Cardinals in May, made it look like it was a three-horse race between Duke, N.C. State and Missouri, and expanded his list to eight schools that included North Carolina Central and Virginia Commonwealth. His commitment comes just a month after Class of 2012 shooting guard Torian Graham de-committed from the Wolfpack and after Lewis predicted Purvis would be N.C. State’s next commit. This year’s senior class is looking like it could shape into a top ten recruiting class for N.C. State head coach Mark Gottfried. Although Graham de-committed, the Wolfpack made small forward T.J. Warren‘s final four list of schools along with Florida, Georgia and North Carolina. Gottfried also still has a shot at small forward Devonta Pollard and power forward Amile Jefferson among many others in the Class of 2012.

What They’re Saying

• Senior Rodney Purvis on committing to North Carolina State: “After many conversations and prayers with the Lord, and visits, I came to a conclusion. There is no place like home.”

1. When Delvon Roe came out of high school he so highly sought after that his decision to spurn North Carolina for Michigan State led Roy Williams to reportedly call Roe out for having “lied” to him in Williams’ autobiography. Unfortunately, Roe never lived up to expectations in East Lansing as he battled to overcome a series of knee injuries. Yesterday, Roe announced that he was retiring due to ongoing knee injuries and his desire to pursue other interests. We wish Roe the best in his future endeavors, which appear to be geared towards acting at this time.
2. Two weeks after the ACC held a series of meetings that threatened the continued existence of the Big East, the presidents of the remaining Big East schools will reportedly meet to “talk about the future and how to go forward as a strong Big East” according to Connecticut president Susan Herbst. This meeting comes a week after the presidents and athletic directors in the Big East met to try to figure out which schools to poach from other conferences to replace Syracuse and Pittsburgh. We find it amusing that Herbst sent the e-mail informing the Associated Press of the meeting, which makes her the public representative of the meeting, since the previous person who the public viewed as the face of the Big East was Mark Nordenberg, the chancellor at Pittsburgh and one-time chair of the conference, because Herbst is widely thought to merely be a puppet acting on the wishes of Jim Calhoun and has already stated that the school is essentially looking out for its own good.
3. You can expect to see a very different Old Dominion team when the season starts as they will start the season without any of their five starters from last season as Kent Bazemore will be out for the first month of the season while he recovers from fractured left footy. So don’t be surprised if you see Old Dominion struggling early in the season especially when they could potentially play Kentucky on November 20 in a game that would normally pique our interest. You also shouldn’t be surprised if Old Dominion is in the thick of the CAA race in late February with a full strength Bazemore playing alongside two additional players–Richard Ross and Donte Hill–who may become eligible for the spring semester.
4. The recruitment of Rodney Purvis has been nothing if not interesting. The 6’4″ guard out of Raleigh, North Carolina is widely considered one of the top 20 players in the nation had previously committed to play atLouisville before backing out of that commitment and taking the Cardinals off his list completely. Purvis is set to make another commitment later today and is reportedly deciding between North Carolina State, Memphis,Connecticut, and Virginia Commonwealth. Most people are expecting Purvis to end up at UConn, but if he decides to go to NC State expect to see headlines similar to what you saw when Cody Zeller decided to go toIndiana a year ago.
5. If you want to know why we don’t get too worked up over all these verbal commitments we would like to point you in the direction of Kendrick Nunn, a shooting guard in the class of 2013, decommited from Texas A&M late on Wednesday. Nunn announced his change of heart on Twitter and stated that it was not a reflection on his relationship with the Aggie coaching staff. As we have stated numerous times, it is ridiculous to expect that teenagers won’t have a change of heart when they make a decision so early. We understand why fans get excited with verbal commitments, but they shouldn’t be shocked when that same player decommits.

1. Everybody applauded Shaka Smart a few months ago when he turned down the allure of programs with bigger names to stay at VCU with the hopes of building an elite program there. He may do that, but it looks like he will need to do it with a new coaching staff as Radford snapped up VCU assistant Mike Jones and Boston University is apparently strongly considering another VCU assistant, Mike Rhoades. As for Jones, he may have a difficult time cleaning up the mess left by former coach Brad Greenberg, who resigned after numerous irregularities were discovered within the program.
2. For much of the past year college fans have been inundated by rumors about conference realignment. One move that definitely stayed under our radar was Seattle moving to the WAC. The move that will become official in the 2012-13 academic year will allow the men’s basketball program, coached by former UCLA point guard Cameron Dollar, to compete at the Division 1 level in the first year that they are eligible for the NCAA Tournament. While most fans are not that familiar with the Seattle program, they do have an impressive pedigree if you are willing to go back nearly 50 years. In 1958, led by Elgin Baylor, they made it to the NCAA Championship game before losing to Kentucky, 82-74, and in 1966 they handed Texas Western (yes, the Glory Road team) its only loss of the season in their last game before the NCAA Tournament. The current Seattle team is significantly less talented, but should be aided by the depleted WAC, which will see Boise State, Fresno State, and Nevada leave the conference in the next two seasons.
3. When Missouri hired Frank Haith after the season ended they were widely ridiculed (ok, we were in that group), but it looks like he is making some significant moves with the addition of Auburn transfer Earnest Ross (13.1 PPG and 6.6 RPG as part of an anemic offense last season) and he is reportedly in the hunt for UConn transfer Jamal Coombs-McDaniel and Pepperdine transfer Keion Bell (yes, the guy who dunked over seven people). If Haith can land that trio, the media ridicule about the hire may soften although questions about his in-game coaching will remain.
4. When Dwayne Polee announced that he was transferring from St. John’s several weeks ago we speculated that it might have had something to do with the influx of talent that Steve Lavin was bringing to the Red Storm. Yesterday, Polee announced that he was transferring to San Diego State and was applying for a hardship waiver (his mother has a medical condition requiring surgery) that would allow him to play for the Aztecs next year. Although Polee had a disappointing freshman campaign this is a big signing for Steve Fisher and could help the team transition from Kawhi Leonard era to the future if Polee can find his game again now that he is back in California.
5. Last night we went on a Twitter rant questioning the public’s anger at LeBron James for not fulfilling his potential (or at least what we perceive it to be), but we won’t question the existence of the widespread hatred of James and his current Heat team. Even before the season began, Sports Illustrated released a list of the top 25 most hated teams of all-time and had the Heat, who had yet to play a game together as the 25th most hated team of all-time. We are sure they would move up the list if it was done again today, but we were surprised to see that three college basketball teams–1983-84 Georgetown at #23, 1991-92 Duke at #12, and 1989-90 UNLV at #9–were rated ahead of the Heat. We aren’t exactly sure where the Heat would rank if the list were done again today, but we are guessing that they would rank higher than all three of those teams.

One of the feel-good stories of the offseason was how VCU coach Shaka Smart turned down the lure of the big money and name brand appeal of multiple job openings at schools in traditional power conferences so he could stay at VCU. This was surprising to many because the odds of Smart repeating the success of his team’s miraculous run to the Final Four are exceedingly small. Still Smart appeared to want to stay to help build a premiere program rather than just a flash-in-the-pan success story that was never heard from again. Of course, the jump in his salary from $325,000 to $1.2 million per year also helped persuade Smart to stay in Richmond.

The million dollar man

Although the VCU student body was undoubtedly pleased to retain the head coach that was responsible for the the most successful postseason performance in the school’s history there was the obvious question of who would foot the bill. The taxpayers? That’s funny. The alumni and boosters? Partly, but they are not footing the entire bill. How about the students? According to some reports they may be the ones picking up the tab on this one. Earlier today the VCU administration announced that the overall student fee would increase by $50 per full-time student for the next academic year, which would largely go towards the athletic programs and generate $875,000 in additional revenue for the athletic program. Of that $875,000 nearly two-thirds would go to the basketball program (approximately $583,000). Based on the full-time enrollment numbers from the university that would be a little over $20 per student towards the basketball program.

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Over the weekend, Duke announced that recently fired Oklahoma coach Jeff Capel had been selected to be its newest assistant coach. The announcement itself was noteworthy as Capel, who just two years ago was considered one of the hottest names in coaching, had fallen to the point where he was forced to take an assistant coaching position. The question of how Capel had fallen so quickly could be answered in several ways (most notably the departure of Blake Griffin and the disappointing performances of McDonald’s All-Americans Willie Warren and Tiny Gallon), but remains mysterious.

Capel will be returning to Duke (Credit: Bryan Terry/NewsOk.com)

Capel’s return to Durham also raises the more intriguing question of who is next in line to succeed Mike Krzyzewski when he eventually decides to retire, a possibility that was made more clear recently with the retirement of Gary Williams, one of his chief rivals in the ACC at nearly the same age as Krzyzewski. The first question is whether the Duke administration will want to pursue an internal candidate or would look at outsiders. We imagine that Krzyzewski would make a strong push to hire an internal candidate or at least someone with strong ties to the program, but the performance of most of the disciples from his coaching tree has been underwhelming to put it lightly. There have been a number of prominent head coaches (Mike Brey, Tommy Amaker, Johnny Dawkins, Quin Synder, and Capel) who have coached under Krzyzewski during his time at Duke as well as two others serving as associates alongside Capel (Steve Wojciehowski and Chris Collins).

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Over the past three weeks we have heard all kinds of speculation about why Miami opted not to pursue Kansas State coach Frank Martin. He would need too much money. A statement that Martin refuted as his base salary was essentially the same as Frank Haith‘s base salary at Miami and was only made higher due to the fact that Martin’s teams won enough to hit performance-based incentives. His demeanor turned off Miami officials at a game at this season’s Orange Bowl Classic. A fair criticism if you are looking to run a youth league team, but some of the biggest coaching names in college basketball are well-known in media circles for their foul language. Do you think that Miami officials wouldn’t love Mike Krzyzewski on their sideline (ignoring what would likely be an astronomical salary to get him to leave Duke)? He was caught cheating at Miami Senior High. Perhaps the only fair criticism as Martin’s championship team, which featured Udonis Haslem and Steve Blake, had its 1998 state championship vacated due to recruiting violations related to using players zoned outside the school’s area. It is worth noting that Martin was never formally accused on any wrongdoing, but in the eyes of many in the Miami-Dade basketball community he was culpable.

Miami opted to go the safe route with Larranaga (Credit: Nick Wass/Associated Press)

Now Miami has opted to go with George Mason coach Jim Larranga, a fine coach to be sure and one who has actually advanced further in the NCAA Tournament than Martin ever has (Final Four versus Elite Eight), but you would be hard-pressed to find a pundit who would argue that Larranaga was a better fit for Coral Gables than Martin. This is not intended to minimize Larranaga’s accomplishments at George Mason, which are laudable as he not only made the Final Four (2006), but also made the NCAA Tournament four other times including this year where his team was considered a borderline top 25 team late in the season.

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