Notes and quotes while wondering if the NCAA men’s basketball committee will send the Jayhawks to Oklahoma City or to Indianapolis in a couple of weeks. …
Indianapolis, by the way, already has had the third snowiest winter in the city’s history with 47 inches — a fact not lost on NCAA employees, many of whom no doubt wish they had never left Overland Park. …
Drew Gooden is wearing No. 9 with the Orlando Magic instead of the No. O he wore with the Memphis Grizzlies and while playing for the Jayhawks. “I kind of like nine, though,” Gooden told the Orlando Sentinel. “It looks like a sloppy zero.” …
Fresno State officials and Fresno police are investigating a fight last weekend pitting football players and others against members of a fraternity house across from Bulldog Stadium. At least that’s one FSU incident folks around here can’t pin on Al Bohl. …
Speaking of Bohl, the furor surrounding the KU athletic director has quieted, but hasn’t subsided. It’s possible Bohl’s strained relationships with KU men’s basketball coach Roy Williams and football coach Mark Mangino will come up at Friday’s regularly scheduled KUAC board meeting, but not probable.
At Bohl’s request, board members are meeting with the AD individually this week to talk about the situation. In fact, student body president Jonathan Ng is scheduled to meet with Bohl this afternoon. …
Kansas lost starter Wayne Simien for 11 games and pretty much kept on ticking. No such luck for North Carolina coach Matt Doherty, the former Kansas aide. The Tar Heels are 7-10 since losing 6-foot-8 center Sean May to a broken foot in late December.
Check out these May-Simien comparisons: When the two went against each other late last November in the Preseason NIT semifinals in Madison Square Garden, May had eight points and 11 rebounds in 33 minutes while Simien had 11 points and eight rebounds in 32 minutes. A wash? Not exactly. May also had five blocked shots and four steals while Simien had only one block and no steals. …
According to nbadraft.net, six Big 12 Conference players will be taken in June’s NBA Draft. First-rounders, says the Web site, will be Kirk Hinrich (14th pick), Nick Collison (17), Missouri’s Rickey Paulding (19) and Colorado’s Michel Morandais (26th). Listed as second-rounders are Texas A&M’s Bernard King (50) and Oklahoma’s Hollis Price (55). …
Much has been made of Collison and Hinrich spending more time on the floor this season. In Collison’s case, it’s true. He’s logging about five minutes more per game than he did last year (31.6 minutes compared to 26.8), mainly because he is avoiding foul trouble. Meanwhile, Hinrich’s minutes played have climbed from 30.9 to 33.2. That’s only a little more than two minutes, hardly a dramatic rise. Still, both have increased their points production markedly — Collison from 15.6 last season to 18.7 and Hinrich from 14.8 to 17.9. …
Fordham reportedly is considering making a $1 million settlement with basketball coach Bob Hill, who has six years left on a 10-year contract. Hill, a Kansas University assistant coach under both Ted Owens and Larry Brown from 1977 to 1985, has struggled at the Bronx, N.Y., school. The Rams are 2-22 this season. …
Former Kansas University baseball coach Bobby Randall has taken over the baseball program at Perry-Lecompton High. “I’m excited about it,” Randall said. “They needed a coach and they asked me and I said, ‘Why not?'” The Kaws are a small Class 4A school in the Kaw Valley League. …
Item: San Diego State’s football team is placed on two years’ probation by the NCAA because an assistant coach held summer workouts for offensive linemen in 1998-01. Comment: Aha, now we finally know why the Aztecs were able to stun Kansas, 41-13, during the 1999 season. …
If Nebraskans were mumbling and grumbling about the Cornhuskers’ sub-par football season, how do they feel about basketball? It will take a miracle to prevent both the NU men and women from finishing in the Big 12 Conference cellars. …
And then there was one. Howard Englemann, a member of KU’s 1940 NCAA Final Four team, will be the last of several former Jayhawks to have his or her jersey retired this season. Now a spry 83-year-old living in Salina, Englemann will be honored during Saturday’s home finale against Oklahoma State.
