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Surprise leaders Preseason favorites are nowhere to be found herePosted: Tuesday February 11, 2003 2:25 PM
I love it when things get turned upside down -- or right-side up, depending on your perspective. Take the Big Ten, for instance. All of us preseason prognosticating pundits figured Indiana, Michigan State and Illinois would be duking it out for the top spot by this point of the season. But check out the standings, and you'll see it's Purdue and Michigan ruling the roost with 7-2 records. When I asked Gene Keady recently what he would have said last November had I told him he'd be in first place in mid-February, he replied, "I'd have told you you were crazy." Here's a quirky quintet of other teams who have caught the craze: Wake Forest (6-2 in the ACC). Maryland and Duke were supposed to be the juggernauts, but the Deacs upset the Terps at home and have beaten the teams they were supposed to beat. Meanwhile, the favorites have stumbled. Dayton (8-1, Atlantic 10). The Flyers are tied with Xavier for the best record in the league, and they nearly beat Xavier last week in Cincinnati despite a monster 47-point performance from David West. Dayton's roster is flush with juniors and seniors, which usually bodes well for postseason success. Louisville (8-0, Conference USA). Rick Pitino has gotten more ink lately than Hans Blix, so you know the Cards are on a roll. Their game at Marquette on Saturday will be the truest test yet of their might. Brown (6-0, Ivy). The Bears haven't won an Ivy League title since Bob Hope was in grade school, but their weekend of reckoning at Princeton and Penn is up next. Kent State (10-2, MAC). The Flashes lost three starters and their head coach from last year's Elite Eight squad, but 6-foot-5 senior forward Antonio Gates has them at the top of the heap again, with an RPI ranking of 35. Other Hoop ThoughtsMail CallNot surprisingly, I received a lot of e-mails about LeBron James, who has since been reinstated to finish out his high school season. Many of you picked up on -- and took issue with -- my comment that it was only a matter of time before he slipped up. Robert Baldacci of Carmel, Calif., wrote: "This statement leads one to believe that [you think] he was going to slip up no matter what he did." First of all, I preceded that comment by saying LeBron's actions in the past year have become increasingly brash, culminating in Hummergate last month. If you keep pushing the envelope, at some point it's going to tear. That said, I do think LeBron was set up to fail, and while that is not all his fault, he must bear responsibility for what has happened. The fact that his lawyer argued -- with a straight face, apparently -- that LeBron thought the jerseys were rewards for outstanding academic performance further proves that the kid knew he was doing something wrong by accepting them. Many of you also pointed out the obvious disparity between a system that allows the school and other businesses to profit from LeBron, but doesn't permit LeBron to cash in. From Mike in Boston: "Instead of castigating LeBron, people should be focusing on the institutions that make a mockery of so-called 'amateurism' and talk about changing the system." Russell from Jacksonville, Fla., made an ironic point when he wrote: "I think it is stupid that his punishment is harsher than it would have been had he been caught stealing the jerseys." That may be true with respect to his eligibility, but to be fair, accepting the jerseys didn't put LeBron in any kind of criminal jeopardy. Not all of the e-mails were pro-LeBron. Many of you took his mother, Gloria, to task. From Tyler in Eugene, Ore.: "For his mother to say she just wants this to be over so poor LeBron can go back to enjoying his friends and high school experience was almost laughable!" And Randy from Rochester, N.Y., had this to say about James Williams, the Summit County judge who issued the temporary restraining order against the Ohio High School Athletic Association: "I am so frustrated with the judge in this case, more so than LeBron. I mean, he is just a kid, but the judge is supposed to be upholding the law." Incidentally, the operative word here is "temporary." LeBron will have to face another hearing in Williams' courtroom on Feb. 23 to see whether that order will be made permanent. The question now is, How many players in other counties and other states will begin taking their cases to court if their school or high school association rules them ineligible? Not a pretty scenario to picture. As for non-Lebron queries, Michael Wright of Dale City, Calif., notes that the very week that I led my Inside College Basketball column in Sports Illustrated with the surging California Bears, Da Bears summarily lost their next two games to Arizona State and Arizona. Writes Wright: "Is the SI jinx confined strictly to the cover subject?" Actually, we at Inside College Basketball do have our own jinx history. The prime example was Joel Przybilla, the former center at Minnesota. Two years ago, I did a Spotlight in the column on Przybilla. Between the time the magazine closed on Monday and the time it hit newsstands on Wednesday, Przybilla was kicked off the team for blowing off class and immediately dropped out of school. I also received a good question from Dusty Howard of Raceland, Ky., who wrote, "Is Kentucky's Gerald Fitch ineligible for the All-Glue team for all of 2003? Last year is in the past." I did mention Fitch's attitude problems as a reason for leaving him off my All-Glue team this year, but if I were putting together a late-season edition, I would certainly have Fitch on it. Kids are allowed to make mistakes as long as they learn from them -- and Fitch has. I also want to give a nod to Jewish sports expert Brian Schiff of Philadelphia, who provided a few more MOTs (Members of the Tribe) currently working sidelines in college hoops: South Florida coach Seth Greenberg, plus assistants Josh Oppenheimer (DePaul), Bernie Fine (Syracuse) and Dan Leibovitz (Temple). Finally, time for our weekly Radiators roll call, your favorite songs from America's greatest band and the pride of New Orleans, site of the 2003 Final Four: Suck the Head (Charlie Singleton, Tucson, Ariz.); All Meat (Darryl K. Dugan, Alexandria, Va.); Spider's Nest (Thomas Larson, Minneapolis); Fountains of Neptune (Mike Olson, Madison, Wis.); Songs From the Ancient Furnace (Kevin Hogan, Baltimore); Ace in the Hole (Scott Kravetz, Mequon, Wis.); River Run (Josh Levy, Milwaukee); Texas Chainsaw Massacre (Ryan Richardson, Schererville, Ind.). And our Reader of the Week award goes to Michael Mathis from Arlington Heights, Ill., who in citing Law of the Fish as his favorite Rads tune provided, unwittingly or not, a lyric that could also be called the Law of the NCAA Tournament: "Big ones eat the little ones, little ones got to be fast." Sports Illustrated staff writer Seth Davis covers college basketball for the magazine. Hoop Thoughts appears Tuesdays during the regular season on SI.com.
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