I know you are tuning in for your edition of hot links this morning and unfortunately Greg is preoccupied the next day or so. I can’t presume to fill his shoes, so I won’t try, but I will throw a couple of links your way and move my normal 10AM slot a bit earlier to appease his ravenous fans.
First off, Mike DeCourcy of the Sporting News talked with Larry Vaught recently and had some interesting thoughts on the Kanter situation and Kentucky basketball as a whole. I generally like DeCourcy. He is generally fair with Kentucky and Calipari and he does not go after the hits with outrageous Calipari slamming stories and headlines like most national writers do. Here’s a brief snippet of DeCourcy’s talk with Vaught:
"Question: How do you feel about what you have read and heard about Enes Kanter’s situation? DeCourcy: “I’ve been disappointed that so few in the media have critically considered the issues here. Obviously, UK wants Kanter to play. And apparently Kanter wants to be in the States. But the Turkish club has obvious motivation to paint him as a pro, and nobody is looking at that.” Question: Where would you rank UK with Kanter and without Kanter in March, not November? DeCourcy: “UK with Kanter is potential top 10. Without Kanter, probably a 6-7 seed in the NCAA. Without Enes, you’re essentially playing with a backup big man, a converted 3-man at power forward and five guards. Show me the team that has held up physically with that rotation and pulled a top four seed.” Question: How good do you think Brandon Knight will be? DeCourcy: “I don’t think Brandon is at the same level as Rose or John Wall, but he enters with a better sense of the position than Tyreke Evans did. I think it’s expecting too much for him to be at their level. He’ll be a very good college point guard to start, more if he’s smart enough to stick around as a sophomore.”"
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Get your tent and dust off that Coleman cooler from the garage as Kentucky has announced the details on ticket distribution for Big Blue Madness. It’s next weekend, so the weather should hopefully cooperate. Here are some of the details from UKAA.
"Tickets for the 2010 Big Blue Madness at Rupp Arena will be available Saturday, Oct. 2, at 7 a.m., at the Memorial Coliseum ticket windows on Euclid Avenue and online at UKathletics.com and Ticketmaster.com. Madness, the first open practice opportunity for Kentucky’s 2010-11 men’s and women’s basketball teams, is Friday, Oct. 15 and will be part of ESPNU’s coverage of Midnight Madness across the nation."
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Need your NCAA investigation fix? Well sorry, there is no news on any current investigations into Kentucky athletics (despite what most “journalists” would have you think, but there is more news on our neighbors to the south and the apparent demise of the Vol’s basketball program:
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"One document reveals that associate head coach Tony Jones made 39 impermissible phone calls and Bruce Pearl made five more to one recruit alone. That athlete is currently on the Tennessee roster.In addition to the phone calls, the university admitted that assistant coach Jason Shay approved lodging expenses for the parents of three recruits, who were en route to Knoxville for official visits, and that those three recruits each were allowed visits that extended beyond the NCAA mandate of 48 hours"
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