Rice Owl Arsalan Kazemi to transfer, has Kentucky Wildcats among six teams

Remember a couple of weeks ago when it was announced that walkons Sam Malone and Brian Long would receive scholarships for the upcoming season? It was noted then that even with that, Kentucky would still have a free scholarship available. Well, it is just September 18th and we already have a possible player for that scholarship. Jeff Goodman tells us that Arsalan Kazemi has received his release and requested that it be sent to six schools: : Kentucky, Texas, Oregon, Ohio State, Florida and Cincinnati. I’m not really sure what is going on at Rice but Kazemi is the sixth player to leave recently and I would assume no waivers are being applied and that Kazemi would have to sit this year before being eligible in 2013.

To be honest, I’m not sure how Kazemi would fit in, but he is a 6’7 banger and has been very productive at Rice. He has averaged a double double over the last two seasons (15.2 ppg/11.0 rpg in 2010-11, 12.1 ppg and 10.3 rpg last year). Kazemi almost had a double double his first year with 10.3 ppg and 9.1 rpg. It will be interesting to see if there is any mutual interest from John Calipari.

 

Chalk up another scholarship offer for 2013 6’9 forward Marcus Lee. Lee was offered Sunday night by Calipari and according to his brother, Kentucky made quite an impression:

 

“It’s just unbelievable how far this recruitment has come in the last year,” Lee’s brother, Brian Lee, told SNY.tv. “To go from low mid-majors to Kentucky is surreal. Marcus is still trying to wrap his head around what’s happening, but he’s very excited. They definitely solidified why they were in his top 3 with this visit.”

 

Calipari will be in New Jersey tonight and is meeting with 6’8 forward Tyler Roberson.  Roberson is ranked as the 29th best player in the 2013 class and does not have an offer yet, but may get one tonight.

 

If you are reading this, you are too late, but at 8:00AM today, former Wildcat coach Joe B Hall is being honored with a statue in front of the Wildcat Coal Lodge. It’s great to see Hall, once again, get some recognition and it seems like we have seen more of Hall the past three years under Calipari than in the past fifteen years. Calipari has done a fantastic job reconciling the Wildcats storied past with the present. The UKAA site has more on the statue:

 

The sculpture is meant to honor and commemorate Coach Hall and all his contributions in helping to bring about the idea of the Wildcat Lodge.

The Joe B. Hall sculpture is cast in bronze and weighs roughly 400 pounds. It began as a clay sculpture, which was executed based upon photos of the coach taken from 1972-1985. The sculpture was produced over a period of eight months and was then cast in bronze using the lost wax method.

The sculpture was created by J. Brett Grill, a figurative sculptor currently residing in Columbia, Mo.