The Daily Skinny: Wed. August 5th

[coolhandgopher]

With the college basketball season still an agonizingly long way away, I thought I'd scrape together whatever interesting articles/opinions/blogs that are circulating out there and bring them to the Gopher Hole for perusal and discussion. Most of this news will focus on the larger world of college basketball, since Gopher news is being covered pretty thoroughly by other posters right now.

I'll begin with the fascinating tale of high school point guard Josh Selby. This news is a couple weeks old, but if you haven't heard of him, it's a pretty interesting story-Selby was committed to Bruce Pearl and Tennessee, but while Pearl was in Israel coaching, Selby de-committed; Pearl's unhappy and there are many swirling rumors with Nike, World-Wide Wes, and Kentucky thrown around liberally in the conversation. Anyway, I'll let the professionals tell the rest of the story:
from Gary Parrish:
http://www.cbssports.com/mcc/blogs/entry/6271764/16193390

from Dana O'Neil:
http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/columns/story?columnist=oneil_dana&id=4352824

Bruce Pearl's reaction:
http://www.zagsblog.com/2009/07/28/bruce-pearl-i-dont-want-somebody-that-doesnt-want-to-play-for-us/

On another note, Jeff Goodman provides an interesting snippet on Tom Izzo and the July recruiting period-it's no wonder Michigan State has been the standard bearer for the Big Ten during most of his career:
http://community.foxsports.com/goodmanonfox/blog/2009/08/03/list_of_ironman_coaches_led_by_izzo

 

[Holy Man]

Tampering with Recruits

I agree with Parrish that Pearl gets sympathy in this case. The unwritten rule of no messing with a recruit after he has committed is a good one, but coaches can't have it both ways. If they want the "rule" to exist, and it is a good rule that really protects recruits from getting nagged after they have made a decision, they also need another unwritten rule that says they won't take commitments until the summer before the recruits senior year in high school. I can't help but believe the gentlemen's agreement they had is getting buried by the increasingly early commitments of recruits and the resulting likelihood of a recruit really changing his mind between the time of commitment and the time of LOI signing.

 

[Cmich Gopher]

Questionable

"Track athletes never have leg injuries," Witherspoon said

Thats new information to me haha.