Basketball Hall of Fame News on ESPN News!

Watch it live! Who's in, who's out??? Let's get started!

The Bob Cousy award for the best point guard goes to ... *drumroll* DJ Augustin of Texas-Austin. The award was announced and presented by the man himself, Bob Cousy! DJ Augustin was there of course to receive the award, wearing an (ooops!) this is not the Oscars :) They also announced that the Sports Museum of America in New York City will be the new home of the Cousy Award.

Next one in, announced by the one and only Jim Nantz, the scoring machine of the NBA, Adrian Dantley! Those of you young enough not to know of him, watch some games on ESPN Classic, NBA-TV, and YouTube!

Next up, Bill Davidson, of the Detroit Pistons and such, not as a player obviously!

Followed that, jumping in was Patrick Ewing, the New York Knicks and Georgetown Hoyas supercenter! And it was fitting perhaps that one of Ewing's rivals also enters the HoF at the same time: Hakeem Olajuwon!

Next, going in as a head coach, the sleek Armani-wearing, Pat Reilly of the Lakers, Knicks and Miami Shacks! Not a surprise to anyone!

Another coach, the head coach of Immaculata, an all-women's college, Cathy Rush!

And oh the irony! After causing drama about Vitale/Packer, Jim Nantz would actually announce the induction of Dick Vitale. It's awesome baby with Capital A! It's unbelievable!!!

And when Jim Nantz interviewed Dick Vitale, Vitale CRIED within 20 seconds of his interview! It's cry-awesome baby with capital tears! Vitale also thanked Bob Knight for his letter-writing campaign to get Vitale in the Hall of Fame.

And perhaps this is why Vitale got in, the big push from the one and only the General Robert Montgomery Knight!

It's Awesome Baby! This was a huge class in 2008, the enshrinement ceremony will take place on September 5, 2008!

Can someone please nominate this blog for the College Hoops Blogging Hall of Fame???

The 2008 Joe Biden Coaches award goes to...

Instead of handing out the traditional Player of the Year, Coach of the Year, Freshman of the Year Awards, we decided to try something different, and hand-out different types of awards.

The first award of this kind is the Joe Biden Media-savvy College Basketball Coach award. (Award not endorsed by Joe Biden). Those who watch the various cable news channels or read political blogs are familiar with the phrase: "don't get between Joe Biden and a camera", because if there's a camera in the zipcode, Joe Biden will find a way to be in front of it.

So which college basketball coach has won this award for the 2007-2008 season? Well, we'll give you a few sentences to think, before we announce it in the paragraph below. If you don't want to be spoiled, stop reading right now!!!

And the winner is.... *drum roll* John Calipari of the Memphis Tigers! Calipari has managed to find himself on just about every sports show on television, regardless of network affiliation. Just on Selection Sunday, Calipari had not one, but two interviews on CBS within hours of each other. And if that wasn't enough, he was also interviewed on CSTV's March Madness show. We haven't checked all the outlets, so he could have been elsewhere as well.

2007-08 Preseason awards: Funniest College Basketball Announcers

Since so many websites and blogs are doing player of the year, freshman of the year, coach of the year type of awards, I decided to do something else: The Funniest College Basketball Announcers awards! And without any further delay, here they are:

1. The Trio of Bill Raftery, Jay Bilas and Sean McDonough (ESPN)
2. Marques Johnson (FSN)
3. Bill Raftery solo (ESPN/CBS)
4. Pete Gillen (CSTV) ("eating bagels")
5. Tom Brennan (ESPN/ABC) ("sometimes you are the pigeon, sometimes you are the statue")

And we have a regional media award as well for announcers who are not typically available to a national audience. From the ones I have seen/watched, the award goes to... Bob Elliott of FSN Arizona. His humor is an acquired taste, it is accountant humor after all :-)

What do you think?

Scandalous: Gonzaga's Jeremy Pargo not a preseason Cousy Award nominee!

This is scandalous! Jeremy Pargo of Gonzaga is not in the long list of forty (40) preseason Cousy Award candidates, yet Kyle "420" McAlarney of Notre Dame, Greg Paulass of Duke, UConn's AJ Price, and medical unknown Lanny Smith of Houston among others are nominated! Clearly the selection cmte is drinking MAJOR BCS koolaid. Perhaps Vitale and Digger Phelps have a guaranteed-player-in vote, which would explain the Domer and the Dookie! Some of the other iffy selections include Syracuse's Eric Devendork and Washington State Kyle Weaver. Kyle Weaver a point guard? Yes, Kyle Weaver is a nice and versatile and unique and game changing player but a top 40 point guard? Kyle Weaver, really, really, really ????????

More iffy selections: Florida State's combo guard Toney Douglas, and Missouri's Stefhon Hannah. Jamont Gordon fits the Kyle Weaver category, a pure point guard though???

The list includes 36 D1 point guards, two from D2 and two from D3. Of the 36 Division 1 point guards, only five come from outside BCS schools: Derrick Rose, Lanny Smith, Duke Slayer Eric Maynor, Davidson's Jason Richards and Bradley's Jim Les Daniel Ruffin Sr. BCS Koolaid, table of 31 please!

The list of preseason candidates is on page 34 of the Athlon preview magazine (which I reviewed) as a paid advertisement from The Hartford and the Bob Cousy award. The Cousy award website doesn't seem to be updated yet.