Calipari and UK featured in new EA Sports commercial
Galloway & Pilgrim Out
Two more players are leaving Lexington, according to various reports.
Matt Pilgrim (#42) transferred to UK from Hampton and had to sit out last season. He will leave town without ever playing in a regular season contest for the Cats.
Kevin Galloway, a JuCo transfer from Southern Idaho, at least was able to play one season for the Wildcats. He played sporadic minutes as a reserve guard last season. Galloway would be entering his senior season in 09-10.
Pilgrim and Galloway join AJ Stewart, Donald Williams, Michael Porter, Jared Carter, and walk-on Landon Slone to make a grand total of 7 player defections from the 2008-2009 roster. That leaves 12 scholarship players set to take the floor for the Cats in 2009-2010, excluding senior Jodie Meeks who is expected to make a decision by the end of this week whether or not to stay in the NBA Draft. Here is what the roster looks like:
F- Perry Stevenson- Sr.
F- Patrick Patterson- Jr.
F- DeMarcus Cousins- Fr.
F- Darius Miller- So.
F- Darnell Dodson- Jr.
F- Ramon Harris- Sr.
F- Josh Harrellson- Sr.
C- Daniel Orton- Fr.
G- John Wall- Fr.
G- Eric Bledsoe- Fr.
G- Jon Hood- Fr.
G- DeAndre Liggins- So.
Wednesday night nuggets
Been a bit of a slow week, but here are a few nuggets I've come across in recent days...
- Western Kentucky picked up a solid verbal on friday from junior-to-be Derrick Gordon (left), out of St. Patrick's (NJ). Gordon is a 6'3, 187-pound shooting guard.
- Northstar Basketball has an ineresting piece up right now, profiling one of the aforementioned Derrick Gordon's more well known St. Patrick's teammates, 2010 point guard Kyrie Irving. Irving's list consists of Duke, Kentucky, Indiana, Notre Dame, Florida, Virginia, Seton Hall, Texas A&M, Marquette, Georgia Tech, and UConn, noting that Indiana, Duke, and Virginia are "up there."
- Kentucky's Jodie Meeks is expected to decide by this weekend whether or not to stay in the NBA Draft, as the deadline to withdraw comes on Monday. Meeks is set to work out for the Chicago Bulls on Thursday.
- There is speculation abroad over the possibility of former UK coach Billy Gillispie being a candidate to the now vacant USC job. Doesn't seem like a good fit to me. Billy Clyde in L.A.?..... Nahhhh.
- Reports that former Gillispie assistant at UK, Jeremy Cox, has interviewed with South Florida for an assistant coaching position. He would join former Tubby Smith assistant and former UK player Reggie Hanson.
NCAA investigating Renardo Sidney's eligibility
Earlier this week, the NCAA requested bank statements from the Sidney family. Apparently the NCAA wants to verify that Renardo did not receive "undue benefits" from Reebok which would affect his amateur status and NCAA eligibility.
UCLA and USC, once considered to be Sidney's top two school choices, both backed off of their recruitment of Renardo leaving many to speculate that he may indeed be in danger of ineligibility.
Making things look even worse for Renardo is the fact that his family will not be handing over bank statements to the NCAA. While they are not legally obligated to do so, this leaves the NCAA with a possibly lengthy investigation on their hands.
NBA Finals Tonight!
The Magic have made an incredible and refreshing run to the championship, defeating the past two Eastern Conference Champs, Rajon Rondo's Boston Celtics and LeBron James' Cleveland Cavaliers.
I say that Orlando is a refreshing story because of how they came out of nowhere to defeat the perennial favorites and, despite having a superstar on their roster in Dwight Howard (photo), they made it to the Finals by spreading the ball around, playing with great team chemistry, and playing good old-fashioned team basketball - which is hard to find in the NBA these days.
I expect the Magic to play that same brand of team basketball against the Lakers and try to force mismatches as they have the entire Playoffs, using their sharpshooting big men Hedo Turkoglu and Rashard Lewis to beat L.A. from the inside and outside. While the Lakers might have the man-power to at least slow down Dwight Howard with their pair of 7-footers Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum, I believe Turkoglu and Lewis will expose and outplay Lakers' wing Lamar Odom, and their size will overwhelm Kobe Bryant if he tries to check them.
While everyone and their brother is ready to crown Bryant and "his" Lakers as the NBA Champs already, just as they were ready to crown LeBron James and the Cavs as Eastern Conference Champs, I will be pulling for the underdog Magic - and I really do believe they will pull it off.
News from the Ville
CHN's 2010 Draft Prospects
Jeff Fox of College Hoops Net recently released some player profiles for the 2010 NBA Draft.
Included were many players of local interest:
John Wall (UK)
DeMarcus Cousins (UK, photo)
Samardo Samuels (UL)
Scotty Hopson (UT)
Xavier Henry (Memphis)
JaJuan Johnson (Purdue)
Robbie Hummel (Purdue)
Luke Harangody (ND)
UK's Wall was paired with Georgia Tech's incoming freshman Derrick Favors as the only two to be given a 6-star rating, meaning they posses "Superstar/All-NBA potential"
Memphis finds no proof of SAT cheating
From the Associated Press via SI.com comes news that Memphis has announced after an internal investigation they have found no proof that a former player cheated on his SAT exam.
Because of these findings, they say they should be allowed to keep the 2007-08 season in their record books, which included a trip to the Final Four and an epic overtime loss to Kansas in the National Championship game.
From the Memphis report detailing their investigation into the NCAA allegations: "Certainly, the University of Memphis should not suffer a financial penalty or vacation of records for the 2008 NCAA tournament as a result of this allegation..."
While most names were redacted from the school report, an attorney for former Memphis point guard Derrick Rose, who was widely believed to be the player in question for allowing a stand-in to take his SAT, has come out and acknowledged that his client cooperated with the NCAA on a similar investigation while still at school.
The AP article goes on to say that Memphis will present its findings to the NCAA Infractions Committee on Saturday in Indianapolis and that former Memphis coach John Calipari is expected to participate by phone from China.
The school report also states that they have encouraged the player (Rose) to cooperate with the investigation, but that his "consistent response" is that he himself took the test and that he has had already answered these questions in 2007.
Once again, check out the full AP article here.
Will Bledsoe Qualify?
