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Gordon and White make Wooden midseason Top 30

by in Media | January 27th, 2008

ejuconn.jpgThe Wooden Award announced its midseason Top 30 list late Saturday and both D.J. White and Eric Gordon made the cut. Here is an excerpt from the press release:

LOS ANGELES (January 26, 2008) – Midway through the NCAA regular season, and in the throes of conference action, the 30 top candidates for the John R. Wooden Award, the nation’s most coveted college basketball award, were named today by The Los Angeles Athletic Club’s John R. Wooden Award Committee. Composed of the top 30 players who will compete for this season’s player of the year award, the midseason list is based on individual player performance and team records during the first half of the season.

Heading the list are returning Wooden All-Americans Tyler Hansbrough of North Carolina and Brandon Rush of Kansas, whose teams have been ranked in the Top 10 all season. Eleven players have been selected to the midseason Top 30 who were not on the preseason list. This impressive group includes returning players enjoying breakout seasons: Brian Roberts of Dayton, Raymar Morgan of Michigan State, Wayne Ellington of North Carolina, Luke Harangody of Notre Dame and Sam Young of Pittsburgh, and freshmen James Harden of Arizona State, Eric Gordon of Indiana, Michael Beasley of Kansas State, Derrick Rose of Memphis and local stars Kevin Love of UCLA and USC’s O.J. Mayo.

Four Top 10 schools have multiple players nominated: North Carolina (Ellington and Hansbrough); Memphis (Chris Douglas-Roberts and Rose); Kansas (Mario Chalmers and Brandon Rush); and Indiana (Gordon and D.J White).

No surprise that both EJ and D.J. made the list, but I am bit surprised that no one from Wisconsin made it, given their start, and also that Drew Neitzel is nowhere to be found. Despite his slow start, you’d think a senior leader from a top 15 team would get the nod, but apparently not.

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Sampson reacts to 68-63 loss to Connecticut

by in Media | January 26th, 2008

sampsonuconn.jpgIndiana coach Kelvin Sampson met with reporters following Indiana’s 68-63 loss to Connecticut and here’s a transcript of that press conference:

Opening Statement:

First of all I’d like to congratulate Coach Calhoun and Connecticut. I thought their kids played tough. They hung together, made big plays when they needed to and that’s a great win for them. We’ve been on the other side of this enough to know that situation they were in. We told our guys, we played a game similar to this when we were without Gordon, Bassett and Crawford. Those three guys were out for a game and I thought those guys being out helped us in a way because it kind of brought us together, banded us together and made us tougher. Today the toughest team won, Connecticut was just tougher than we were.

Did Thabeet affect Indiana’s offense more than they expected him to?

Not really. We had good looks. D.J.’s 13 shots, I think maybe two of them were being really contested. He had a lot of good looks. Part of our game plan was to get Thabeet out of the paint and make him guard the pick and roll, but have D.J. picking and popping versus picking and rolling. And D.J.’s a really good 15 to 17 foot shooter. So those were the shots D.J. was getting. He just didn’t shoot a very high percentage today. Basketball is a game where you have to play it together. You can’t play it by yourself. Probably for the first time all year, and it’s uncharacteristic for this team, but there will be some games like this, you just have to learn from them. This could be a great learning experience for our team and I think it will be. We’ll bounce back.

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Huskies win rebounding battle, beat Hoosiers 68-63

by in Recaps | January 26th, 2008

whiteuconn2.jpgNo Jerome Dyson. No Doug Wiggins. No problem for Jim Calhoun and the Connecticut Huskies.

After announcing indefinite suspensions to both players on Friday night, Calhoun’s club dominated No. 7 Indiana on the glass and stunned the Hoosiers 68-63 in Assembly Hall.

The loss snapped Indiana’s 29-game home court winning streak and moved Kelvin Sampson to 27-1 at home as Indiana’s head coach.

“Today, the toughest team won,” Indiana coach Kelvin Sampson said. “Connecticut was just tougher than we were.”

The Hoosiers were out-rebounded 44-28 and shot just 37 percent from the field.

Indiana (17-2) opened the game on a 9-0 run on three-pointers by Eric Gordon, Armon Bassett and Jamarcus Ellis and looked like a team on a 13-game winning streak.

UConn (14-5), however, battled back and took their first lead at 17-16 on a three by A.J. Price. By halftime, the Huskies had built a 29-24 lead and led the rest of the way.

Craig Austrie led five Connecticut players in double figures with 15 points. Jeff Adrien and Stanley Robinson added 11 points and 11 rebounds each.

Armon Bassett led Indiana with 18 points (six three-pointers) and D.J. White collected a double-double with 13 points and 10 rebounds. Eric Gordon scored 16 points, but shot just 5 of 16 from the field and committed four turnovers.

The Hoosiers will return to action on Thursday night with a Big Ten road game against Wisconsin at 9 p.m.

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Game Thread: Connecticut @ Indiana

by in Game Threads | January 26th, 2008

megan-cheer1.jpgOpponent: Connecticut

Date: Saturday, January 26, 2008 | 1:05 p.m. EST

Arena: Assembly Hall (17,357) – Bloomington, Indiana

Line: Indiana by 9.5

All-time series: Connecticut leads 4-3

Previous meeting: Indiana won 77-73 on Jan 20, 2007

TV: CBS (Verne Lundquist and Billy Packer)

Radio: IU Radio Network (Don Fischer, Todd Leary and Joe Smith)

Probable Starters:

  • Connecticut (13-5, 4-3 Big East): A.J. Price, Stanley Robinson, Craig Austrie, Jeff Adrien, Hasheem Thabeet
  • Indiana (17-1, 6-0 Big Ten): Armon Bassett, Eric Gordon, Jamarcus Ellis, DeAndre Thomas, D.J. White

Game Notes (Adobe Reader required to view):

Gameday reading:

As always, your predictions, analysis and comments are welcome in the game thread.

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NBC Sports meets ITH

by in Media | January 25th, 2008

Just a couple days ago, John Walters and crew at NBC Sports dot com hit us up for some discussion on Saturday’s UConn tilt. Hilarity ensued.

To get a nice look at a creepy photo I pulled from my Facebook page, as well as some back and forth on D.J., Eric Gordon, Hasheem Thabeet, and MUCH, MUCH MORE — click right here. Enjoy.

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White welcomes challenge from UConn’s Thabeet

by in Media | January 25th, 2008

thabeetclose.jpgD.J. White will get his toughest challenge of the season tomorrow when the Hoosiers go for their 30th straight win Assembly Hall. That challenge will be in the form of 7-3 Connecticut center Hasheem Thabeet.

Thabeet, a sophomore from Tanzania, considered a jump to the NBA a year ago, but returned to Storrs to polish his game.

And he’s done just that.

He’s the nation’s fourth leading shot blocker at 3.9 per game to go along with 11.1 points and 7.6 rebounds. He’s also shooting 72 percent from the foul line, up from 51 percent a year ago.

Despite the strides Thabeet has made, don’t expect Indiana’s senior captain to back down from the challenge.

“You always play aggressive and never back down,” White said. “It’s not in my nature to back down from anyone, no matter what the stats say. We are going to look at the game plan and just play like normal.”

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