Dick Vitale's Cancer Crusade

ESPN's Dick Vitale has been a passionate advocate for cancer research ever since his good friend Jim Valvano died in 1993. These days, Vitale is being motivated by another good friend lost to the disease: Payton Wright, a 5-year-old girl from Vitale's Florida neighborhood who succumbed to brain cancer in May.

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After attending Payton's funeral, Vitale promised her parents that he would raise $1 million in Payton's name for pediatric cancer research. At every game he attends this season, Vitale will pass out leaflets for his annual Dick Vitale Gala, which will be held next May 16 in Sarasota, Fla (Bob Knight and Pat Summitt will be the honored guests). Now 68, with a voice gone raspy from three decades spent shouting into a headset, Vitale is still overcome with emotion when he tells of how Payton deteriorated after first complaining to her parents of a mysterious pain in her knee. "I promised her parents I would not let her spirit die," Vitale told me. "If you can't use your celebrity to do something good, then it's not worth anything."

If you're interested in making a donation in Payton's honor or otherwise contributing to the V Foundation, you can visit Vitale's Web site here.

Other Hoop Thoughts

• It was interesting to see USC coach Tim Floyd bench O.J. Mayo and Taj Gibson at the start of the Trojans' game against Southern Illinois Sunday night. It's a little early to be pushing those kinds of buttons, but it apparently worked because USC throttled a pretty tough Salukis team by 25 points.

• It may appear that Jim Boeheim has used primarily man-to-man defense in three of Syracuse's first five games just because I suggested as much in my Twenty Questions column last month. But Boeheim told me he did it because his team is too young to know how to play his zone properly. He anticipates going back to the zone full time soon, but I've got a feeling this team is going to be playing man-to-man a majority of the time the rest of the way.

• I realize this is akin to fretting over the tiny pimple above Pamela Anderson's left eyebrow, but I am still mystified as to why North Carolina's Tyler Hansbrough never even attempts a face-up jumper outside of six feet.

• It looks like UConn may have solved its Jeff Adrien problem. When Adrien was a freshman, he was more than happy to do the dirty work inside on a team that included numerous first-round draft picks. Now, however, Adrien wants to be one of the top scorers, and he has gotten away from what he does best. He grabbed just one rebound in the loss to Memphis, but he has since bounced back with 14 and 15, respectively, in wins over Gardner Webb and Florida A&M. We'll see how long it lasts.

• It's a little early to say for certain, but it's entirely possible that Vanderbilt has the best freshman (A.J. Ogilvy), player (Shan Foster) and team in the SEC. How many of you were saying that a month ago?

• I don't know that there's a team in the country that crashes the offensive glass as well as Texas A&M does.

• Too many people have reported at face value that Gus Gilchrist, a power forward at Progressive Christian in Temple Hills, Md., reneged on his commitment to Virginia Tech because he felt unsafe there after the tragic shootings of last April. That logic is a little suspicious given that Gilchrist elected to go instead to the University of Maryland, which is just a few miles from where the sniper shootings of 2002 occurred. I'm not a mind reader so I can't say for 100 percent certain that Gilchrist's stated reason was false, but can we at least greet it with a healthy dose of skepticism?

• Talk about your crippling injuries: UAB losing Paul Delaney and LSU losing Tasmin Mitchell. Both are gone for the season.

• I know we're all in lockstep saying the Pac-10 is the best conference in America, but at the end of the day I'm not so sure it isn't the Big East. Sometimes I think the Big East doesn't get as much love simply because it has so many teams.

• The thing I really like about Duke guard DeMarcus Nelson this year is that he's sticking to what he does well (drive to the basket) and staying away from what he does less well (shoot threes). Nelson is averaging 6.4 rebounds but has attempted just 16 trifectas in seven games.

• I just think it's really silly when coaches get all control freaky and make their freshmen off-limits to the media. If the kids can't handle a few microphones and notebooks, how are they going to handle high-level competition?

• I heard ESPN is finally going to take my advice and give Doris Burke a bigger slate of games to work as a color commentator during conference season. Now I'm just waiting for some forward-thinking athletic director to hire a woman to coach a Division I men's basketball team.

• Reason No. 4,837 why college hoops is far superior to the NBA: You never see NBA players lock their arms on the bench when one of their teammate is shooting free throws at the end of a close game.

• Aaron Bruce gets most of the hype down at Baylor, but I spoke to an NBA scout recently who saw the Bears play and came away very impressed with 6-1 junior guard Curtis Jerrells.

• If I were Oregon coach Ernie Kent, I'd show my team video of the Illinois team that made it to the 2005 NCAA championship game. That group, which featured the backcourt trio of Dee Brown, Deron Williams and Luther Head, moved the ball around extremely well in their halfcourt offense. When the Ducks move the ball like that, they're tough to beat. But when they stand around and watch one guy dribble and hoist (usually Tajuan Porter), they're pretty easy to beat.

• If I were writing my sophs-to-watch column this week instead of last week, I would seriously consider including Villanova guard Reggie Redding.

• You see all this parity, folks? Now you know why I've been saying for years it's only a matter of time before a No. 16 seed beats a No. 1. Hey, it's at least as likely as Missouri playing West Virginia for the BCS title.

• While Louisville tries to soldier on despite injuries to David Padgett and Juan Talacios, it's critical that sophomore guard Edgar Sosa gets out of Rick Pitino's doghouse. Sosa ended his freshman year by scoring 31 points in a NCAA second-round loss to Texas A&M, but he returned this year with the wrong attitude, focusing on getting his own shot more than setting up his teammates and playing defense. That's why he hasn't been starting.

• Man, it is going to be a lot of fun watching Gonzaga and St. Mary's battle it out for the WCC crown this year.

• When a team has guards that kill you with with penetration but are spotty long-range shooters, the obvious counter is to play zone. So until Marquette's guards prove they can drill shots consistently, the Eagles can expect to see a lot of zones. Heck, even Duke played some zone against them out in Maui.

• I'm not saying it's a huge deal that Billy Gillispie hasn't signed a contract yet at Kentucky. But the revelation that he hasn't sure won't do anything to quell the whispers that Gillispie and athletic director Mitch Barnhart aren't getting along.

• Here's one you don't see every day: Tennessee guard Ramar Smith went 0 for 12 from the foul line during the Volunteers' win over Prairie View A&M on Nov. 16.