Weekend update

Life without Adam Morrison at Gonzaga. A story by CBS Sportsline. Interestingly they go through the story and they only mention one current Gonzaga player (Derek Raivioli). A lazy writer? :-)

Lots of Recruiting news including a UCLA -vs- Clark Francis controversy on the (non)recruitment of SoCal phenom Brandon Jennings, as well as a few more verbals for 2007 and beyond, including two 7-footers making their mind up - at least for now, since verbals are not binding

CHN updates their 144 previews with Southern Illinois, New Mexico State (an all-transfer team), Wichita State, Texas Tech (are they serious?), Arkansas, BYU (nope), FSU, Michigan and GW.

Luke Winn of CNNSI is becoming the new online Andy Katz as his blog is 100% free. Some of the recent topics covered in his blog: Mascot activism and recruiting (Illinois), and old and new feature on Tennessee, UConn and Washington (comparing this vs last year's teams, including some number crunching!).

Andy did you hear about this one? In his blog he talks about teams still trying to complete their schedules, Adidas pulling out of the summer sneaker camps, Jawann McClellan recovery nicely, while Pac-10 foe Stanford has Collins-twins flashbacks once again as Brook Lopez is sidelined after a back surgery.

CSTV Daily News is as always jam-packed with news from various universities such as UW, Nova, Marshall, Brown, Marquette, Purdue, Auburn, Indiana, George Mason (featured on ESPNU's Midnight Madness on October 13), Iowa, USF, Cal, Dusquene, Kansas and a lot more. Some topics covered: Ryan Amoroso (former Marquette player famous for a high-scoring game at the Alaska Shootout in November 2005) lands at San Diego State (07-08 eligible) and recently renewed Steve Fisher. More schedules are announced. USC honors the memory of Ryan Francis with a scholarship. A Duke-vs-Carolina U-Wire duo of stories: Wes Miller as a senior leader and Puke's much-ado-about-nothing story on the choice of captains for this season. Bucknell celebrates 100% graduation rates.

CSTV's Bryan Graham has a jam-packed write-up covering scheduling in the A-10, BYU at UCLA, a trivia question, Morrow's injury, two for the Chowd BBall hall of fame, and Phil Martelli's recruiting.

Graduation rates should be taken with Tylenol. An increase of just 1%. But NCAA Czar Myles Brand spins the numbers just like any CEO would. Men's basketball again had the worst graduation rate of any sport, 59 percent, but the NCAA number was much higher than the federal figure (45 percent)

Morgan Wooten (not to be confused with John Wooden), is honored by the Basketball Hall of Fame

You can't keep Gene Keady away! He is back! as a member of the NIT selection committee that is :-)

The Hofstra Pride gets some love at CBS Sportsline.

Gary Parrish (not Paris, no relation to Paris Hilton), blogs about two Alaska Fairbanks players stealing laptops. Yes laptops, following the example of the UConn duo of last year. This will probably turn Alaska Fairbanks into a complete cupcake during the Alaska Shootout preseason tourney on ESPN (week of thanksgiving - feast week). And a look at his mailbag with more drama and bickering as usual

As if that wasn't bad enough for the NCAA hoops image, and for Iowa given the much publicized Pierce case, two potential starters of the 2006-2007 Iowa team, Mike Henderson and prep-brewed Tyler Smith were charged with theft at Dillard's. I'm sure Steve Alford emphrasized stealing during the game, but probably not this time of stealing... Double standards are usually the case in these situations where the coach has some disgression. Usually the more talented a player and the more PT/contributions, the more lenient a coach gets :-)

And now some good news, Harvey Perry has recovered from his injury and expects to have a nice season at UW (Washington Huskies).

Mike DeCourcy looks into the Big East Monster's eyes. While the numeric comparison is valid (8 tourney teams), the percentage is nowhere near what the ACC used to get (7 out of 9). I guarantee there is no way the Big East can get near that percentage (12 out of 16). So it's not a bed of roses by any means.

Seth Davis covers the story of Wisconsin's Greg Stiemsma and his battle with depression, an overall positive story, showing that the sports world is improving on social issues, and treating depression like a medical condition instead of a social stigma...

Steve Fisher is building a new empire in LoCal? Maybe so! He just got a new five year deal. He is currently 105-106. Had Marcus Slaughter stayed for another year...

InsideHoops has lot of news from a local perspective, including an update on the Dusquene injured players and lots of recruiting news

Surprised Bobby Cremins got out of retirement (TV analyst) and ogt the job at the College of Charleston? Well not as big of a surprise when you consider that he was a TV analyst for some of the SoCon games, so he was quite familiar with the teams and the conference.

Media Days

Last year both CSTV and ESPN-News provided coverage of the Media Days of some of the big conferences.

As more details become available, this post will get continually updated with more information... As always check local listings as these things may be rescheduled or shifted around:


Upcoming

Thursday, October 19, Conference USA Men's Meida Day on CSTV at 3pm Pacific time, with multiple replays

Wednesday October 25, Mountain West Men's Media Day on CSTV, at 6pm Pacific time, with multiple replays



History

Thursday October 12, Conference USA Women's Media Days on CSTV at 3pm PDT. Scheduled for an additional three repeats. Scheduled duration is 90 minutes, but usually these things last longer so if you are planning to TiVo or VHS it, give it a generous additional buffer.

Midnight Madness on TV

This is a work in progress story that will be frequently updated as more information on Midnight Madness becomes available.

Here is what we know so far for Friday, October 13, 2006:

ESPNU has a three hour special Midnight Madness (10:30pm - 1:30am EST) that will feature George Mason, North Carolina and Indiana. Bob Wenzel will be the "analyst" at George Mason's midnight madness. Not sure if this will also be broadcast on the more generally available ESPN properties (eg ESPN2 or News)

CSTV is planning a special 90-minute preview edition of Crystal Ball at 11pm EST, with two more replays later that night. No word yet which colleges CSTV will visit.

Fox College Sports Atlantic (FCSA) is planning a 90-minute special on Friday October 13, 2006 with a replay in the early hours of the morning. This year they will cover the national champions, Florida. Tentative air times 11:30pm and 4:30am EST. (last year they covered Kentucky).

More details coming soon.


Questions

What will FSN (Best Damn Sports show) do for Midnight Madness? (last year they visited Arizona)

Will any of the other ESPN stations offer additional Midnight Madness or simulcast of ESPNU?

Will Comcast Sports offer Midnight Madness coverage?

Check back for more on this as more details become available!

And on a related note, UW fans will get theirs

While waiting for Midnight Madness: on TV

BUYTV (operated by BYU) will show two reruns twice on Friday October 6: First up the 2002 BYU-Utah game and then the 1981 BYU-Notre Dame game. Yes the one with Danny Ainge and NotreDamus (Digger Phelps).

Coach Carter the movie, available on Showtime and on PayPerView and OnDemand

TV schedule (an early look)

An on-going post which will be continuously updated:

Please note all schedules are subject to change and as always check local listings as they may vary from region to region and provider to provider...

National TV schedule, Men and Women from MSNBC, includes ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, FSN, CBS, and ABC. Broken down by month, starting from early November.

Men and women basketball games on CSTV here

Men-only basketball games on CSTV (easier to read) here

Yahoo Sports Broadcasts: http://sports.yahoo.com/ncaab/collegebroadcast

List of regional FSN schedules Search for Basketball for a specific date. This includes the whole family of Fox channels, including the regional FSN channels, the three Fox College Sports, and a lot more (Speed, FSN-Espagnol, FSN+ (plus), FSC (Soccer)).

ESPN Full Court: ESPNFullCourt schedule here. Click on "TV schedule" for a popup ranging from early November to late March (women's NCAA tourney). Women's games are designated with a (W) in the listings.

ESPN360 schedule: Details at espn360.com



Must-See TV games
* according to MSNBC and DeCourcy
* Top 5 games on CSTV, ranked by Doug Knoll of CSTV

The Guardians Classic, now renamed the College Basketball Experience (CBE) has a 16-team field highlighted by the top four seeds Duke, Stanford, Marquette and Knight Tech (errr Texas Tech). Expect the semifinals (Nov 20) and the final (Nov 21) on either ESPN or ESPN2, with the possibility of additional games on other ESPN-networks (eg ESPNU).

The Maui invitational will take place as usual Mon, Tue and Wedn November 20-22. All four day 1 games will be on ESPN and ESPN2, along with the two semifinals of day 2 and three of the last four games on day 3. ESPNU will cover the other three. Details and Maui tourney official website

The pre-season NIT (now called Season TipOff) will span two weeks. First week will be the four regionals (4 teams at 4 sites) on November 13, 14 and 15. The Final four will be as usual at MSG on November 22 and 24 (Wedn/Friday). The ESPN family of networks will cover at least 12 games. Details The format is slightly different with games played in regional arenas, in Charlotte, Indianapolis, Spokane, and Nashville instead of the home court of the top seeds. Wiki entry

The fourth of the big tourneys of the out of conference season is the Alaska Shootout. Four games in four days on ESPN2, November 22,23,24,25. First two games will be Loyola Marymount vs the home team, and Marshall vs Cal (no Leon Powe). A west coast flavor in this tourney as the other pairings are Hawaii (weather shock!) vs Hofstra and Pacific vs UMKC. Hofstra will be on TV only if they make it to the final.


==============================================================================

by Conference

Big East Press Release on TV coverage and Detailed TV schedule of Big East teams, including airtimes!!! The first game is on Nov 12, W.Michigan at Pitt, in the inaugural Maggie Dixon Classic on ESPNU. Don't miss the December 5 coaching rematch of the 1997 NCAA Final between Rick Pitino and Lute Olson at the Jimmy V classic in MSG on ESPN. It's Awesome baby!

The SEC Conference schedule on Jefferson Pilot Sports (now known as Lincoln Financial) is published as an advertisement in the 2006-2007 Street and Smiths college basketball yearbook. This only lists the SEC conference games to be shown on TV on Jefferson Pilot (aka Lincoln Financial). It includes split games.


==============================================================================
Classic Games rebroadcast

Thursday October 19, 830am, the 1999 StJohns-UConn game on CSTV

Friday nights double-headers on BYUTV, featuring BYU games. BYUTV is usually found in digital cable packages (or satellite).

November 2, at CSTV, rerun of the Villanova championship game

Monday Night Hoops

ABC Sports presented a one-hour basketball special called "Who's Got Game" hosted by James Worthy and Paul Sutherland (Sunderland?). They featured an NBA preview, a look at the top rookies, with a feature on Ammo (Adam Morrison), along with an interview with future Dookie Taylor Queen (ooops! King), and an interview with Ben Howland and a few of his players (Josh Shipp, Zo Mata, Darren Collison) looking forward to the upcoming season and looking back at their Final Four run. Ben Howland reminded everyone again that they only put National Title banners at Pauly. Final Four banners don't make it there! In his two-minute NCAA preview James Worthy pointed out Florida, NC and Oden State (Ohio State), blissfully unaware of Oden's injury. They also mentioned Kansas, Pitt, Duke, UConn (!) and Arizona. Judging from their nano-preview, they did not seem to be very familiar with the current rosters and status of the teams they talked about. They mostly cover the NBA after all!

The committment of Korie Lucious of the class of the 2008 was the big news of the last few hours. More recruiting news at RecruitingWars

Like to collect preview magazines? Don't forget about the ACC Handbook, currently available for pre-order.

The CHN 144 previews continue with GW, Oklahoma, Houston and SDSU.

Gary Parrish latest post has a common theme: CRAZY. Crazy as in Jim O'Brien wanting another 1.3 million after he was award 2.4 million from Ohio State. A grudge of mega-proportions perhaps? Crazy as in Eric Gordon visiting IU again, making the Illini fans and Bruce Webber crazy as well :)

Andy Katz blogs about Shawn Finney (ex Tulane coach and long time Tubby Smith associate) returning to Kentucky as director of basketball operations.

Sportsline has a story on all-state teams in a post that you usually see when a writer runs out of things to write about :-)

InsideHoops has news from a local perspective via newspaper story links. Included Dusquene updates, recruiting news, injury updates, legal update on Gavin Grant at NC State, Steve Alford's contract extension and even Nebraska broadcaster news.

CSTV Daily news includes more schedule and midnight madness announcements (reminder: Friday October 13). Exactly one month later Indiana opens the season and starts the Kelvin Sampson season (sponsored by Unlimited Calling from XYZ Wireless) in the preseason NIT (aka Season TipOff or whatever crappy new name they came up with). That game will be on ESPN2, while the next day the winners will meet on ESPN. First round is Indiana-Lafayette and Notre Dame-Butler, a distinctive Indiana flavor in this regional! ESPN2 will cover the NIT semifinals and final (Nov 22 and 24). Also Tony Jones leaves Idaho State.

Couch Coach

You know who you are. You think you know it all. You think you know better than the coaches. You think you can design a better play. Well now you can do it from the comfort of your own couch with these:

Weekend update

CHN previews continue with GW, Oklahoma (Capel), Turnaround Tom Houston, SDSU (no Marcus Slaughter), Umass and DePaul.

Gary Parrish updates his blog with a write-up on volleyball and Chase Budinger of Arizona

Stanley Ansumnu (a senior with Tennessee basketball last year) is making the transition (back) to football for this season. He is a member of the TN football team as he has one year of eligibility left that he can use for football. (featured on the SEC TV weekly show)

Bad news for Georgia Tech Morrow is out 6-8 weeks

Andy Katz blogs about Bob Knight's new stream of talent and the situation at Dusquene

Frank Burlison comes up with his player of the year predictions and candidates. You won't be surprised by his choice for player of the year :-) He provides ten candidates to choose from including Oden providing he plays at some point. A bit of a surprise is the inclusion of Aaron Gray. While he may be able to post numbers and help his team, he hasn't shown signs of being a player of the year caliber player consistently. But he is a senior now, so only time will tell...

Dave Telep updates his recruiting buzz at FoxSports with a story on Jai Lucas. If the name sounds familiar, it's because he is the brother of the Oklahoma State PG and son of the former NBA great. At 5-9 he is considered a Top 50 prospect. He has four teams he is mostly considering. Read all about it at Foxsports.com. Mike Sullivan covers the rumor of a Rice HS sophomore commiting to Rick Pitino and stories on a couple of east coast recruits. Greg Hicks has three updates from the West Coast.

InsideHoops continues its coverage of the Dusquene tragic shootings.

CSTV has updates on Dusquene, troubles at Arkansas State and Jackson State, new assistant at Kentucky, an opening date is set for Herb Sendek's first game at ASU, Washington gets 10+ national TV games (even without B-Roy or Nate Robinson) with LSU and Pitt being their high profile OOC TV games. Other stories covered: Jim Harrick's lawsuit update, more schedules announced, and tidbits from teams all over the country

TV wise, there is a wisconsin HS basketball all star game scheduled to broadcast on Fox College Sports tomorrow. I have no clue if it is a rerun or a new broadcast. I am assuming there will be some Division 1 signees or prospects, but I don't have any further details.

Skwara of Rivals looks at LSU and old-new PG Tack Minor, chimes in on Crean's new contract, and looks forward to two games that include four of the top six recruiting classes (Ohio State at North Carolina, and Texas at Tennessee).

Mike DeCourcy dishes the latest on non-BCS players who got game and are planning to showcase it during the upcoming season. Who are they? Almond of Rice, Brown of CSF, and Schilb of Loy-Ill. For a quick intro, read Mike's post :-)

Midweek update

ESPN Classic holds basketball colleges in high esteem as its latest "Who's #1" featuring the best coaches included a large number of basketball coaches, including John Wooden (#1), Coach Cry-Dookie at #10, Dean Smith #11, along with the General and Pat Summit. Also included were Phillip (Jackson), Red (Celtics) and Pat Riley. Larry Brown just missed the cut. Some of the other "Who's number one" series on ESPN Classic also feature college basketball related topics.

CHN continues its previews with DePaul (watch out for this team!), UMass (Pitino disciple at the helm) and Utah State.

Whos's buying lunch tomorrow? Tom Crean of Marquette and Steve Alford of Iowa. They both got contract extensions!

Gary Parrish thinks again: Tom Crean got extended at Marquette through 2016-17 (ten years from now). He allegedly made 1.65 million total last year. Mike Cook get his own write-up, the tough former East Carolina guard is a perfect fit for the Pitt system.

The Guardians Classic (the Coaches being the Guardians, although some may argue against that), will be headlined by Puke, Stanford (on collision course in the semifinals), Texas Tech and Marquette. Four regionals of four teams each, the four winners meet in a final four setting in Kansas City, MO on Nov 20/21. But apparently "Guardians Classic" was not a fun name, because it has been renamed to the CBE (College Basketball Experience). And no, Jimmy Hendrix won't be performing. It may look like Bob Knight can pick up two at home cupcake wins in his quest to surpass Dean Smith, but don't them in yet: His 2nd round opporents will probably be the Akron Zips, with LeBron's HS teammates all grown up!

Sportsline has a story on Arizona freshman Chase Budinger eating jello and pudding

InsideHoops has extensive coverage of the Dusquene story, along with stories on Romar, Indiana planning to upgrade their facilities, Gonzo discussing his teams horrible conditioning (ouch for Orr), and a lot more.

Andy Katz's Insider blog has an update on Dusquene, including the Kojo Mensah -vs- Siena scholarship situation.

Meanwhile CSTV Daily News is loaded with schedule updates from UCLA, Xavier, Butler, Loyola(MD), . Other stories: BCE field, Dusquene, Duke LaCrosse, coaching extensions, Earth Wind and Fire playing at Virginia's Midnight Madness at their new shiny arena and a lot more.

Midnight Madness Reminder

Midnight Madness will be Friday October 13, 2006. And it won't happen at midnight local time. It will be earlier!

Judging from previous years, there will be some extended TV coverage. I have not seen any plans/schedules from TV stations this year, but I will post updates once I found out.

To get an idea, here is what happened last year (2005-2006):

ESPNU big coverage with visits to 4-6 college, one hour each

Parts of the ESPNU coverage were shown on ESPN/2

ESPN-News coverage

Fox College Sports (and some regional FSNs) covered the Kentucky Blue Madness in its entirety

CSTV had its own special

FSN's BDSPP (Best Damned Sports Show Period) and John Salley visited the campus of Arizona for the festivities.

Start warming up your VCRs! ;-)

The Six Carmellos-TNG of 2006-2007

The 2006 class has been touted for a while now as one of the best classes of the last few years. And thanks to the new NBA Draft rule, all of them are going to college for at least one year. One of the highlights of the class are the long, rangy, versatile, and extremely talented forwards (thus the Carmello-TNG reference). If you watched the 2006 McDonalds All American Game, you have seen them all! If you haven't, find the tape and watch it!

Here they are:

Kevin Durant at Texas. He will be the star of the team from day one since their top three underclassmen bolted for the NBA.

Thaddeus Young at GaTech. GaTech fans i'm sure will be reminded that one superstar alone does not bring Final Fours (the Chris Bosh season)

Brandan Wright at NC. Roy won't be able to "hide" him like he did with Marvin Williams.

Durrell Arthur at Kansas. He will have to earn his PT, Bill Self could "hide" him hoping for another year.

Earl Clark at Louisville. His versatility will be needed as Louisville re-invents itself and re-integrates the injured players as they come back

Lance Thomas of Puke, a late addition, the "Coach K magic" won him over Rutgers and Mr NewJersey

At least one of them will be at the 2007 Final Four, although I wouldn't be surprised if four of them find themselves at the Final Four.


PS> TNG = The Next Generation

Super Tuesday (updated)

Dean Smith sighting! Dean Smith had a one-segment interview on ESPN News today, talking about the paralysis cure foundation he was helping with. He also talked about basketball and said the refs should be calling more of the fouls instead of letting them go on like that. He also praised Ole Roy and tried to defend Larry Brown's tenure as USA Basketball head coach. He also mentioned that both he and Bill Guthridge maintain their previous offices on campus.

New show on CSTV dealing with NCAA-related issues. Title: "Taking issue with Brian Curtins", hosted by CSTV "guru" Brian Curtis. New episodes come out each Wednesday and they repeat about half a dozen times later on. Each episode is 30 minutes long (with commercials). They try to cover all sorts of topics as they relate to sports, including controversial issues. Episode #1 was promising given that its the only one of its kind (I don't have access to ESPN-U).

Yocohoops talks about the 2008 Final Four Logo and the promotion of NCAA guru Greg Shaheen (you may remember him from ESPNU's Organizing the Madness)

Interesting topics in Mike De Courcy's blog: Billy Walker's eligibility in high school, college and the NBA; the shootings at Dusquene, Reggie Bush, top 10 things to watch in 2006-2007, and the A-10 getting serious about scheduling (GW cupcakes, StBonn/Dusquene soft-serves)

Sportsline looks at the Top 10 seniors of 2006-2007. The list includes versatile game changers (Jared Dudley, Alando Tucker, Curtis Sumpter), men of size (Fazekas, Jermareo Davison, Aaron Gray), scorers (Morris Almond of Rice, Jarrius Jackson of Knight Tech, Acie Law the IV), and FSU's Al Thornton. Visit the website for the actual ranking. Their #1 choice may surprise you. The message board users have added their own write-in choices (Terry, Shakur, Radenovic).

Speaking of Sportsline, Gary Parrish updates his thoughts with a write-up on the shootings at Dusquene, the ole facitilies at Ole Miss, and Kentucky revisiting the past.

Multiple newswire reports on the tragic Dusquene shootings at the Sportsline newswire page. The players taken to hospital were Kojo Mensah, Aaron Jackson, Stuart Baldonado, Shawn James and Sam Ashaolu. A bullet had Baldonado's name on it, but fortunately it missed his spinal cord by 1/4", which would have caused paralysis. Baldonado was quoted by AP saying "I'm lucky". Meanwhile Sam Ashaolu remains in critical condition :-(. New coach Ron Everhart who tried to reboot the program with 10 new recruits called this "absolute mayhem" and he is thankful he got a phone of support from NCAA Czar Myles Brand. FoxSports coverage as well. Newspaper coverage links at InsideHoops.

The previews keep on coming at College Hoops Net (CHN). Latest additions: Utah State, Clemson, Drexel, Oregon, and Kansas State

The MarquetteBlog links to the Big East report on Big East point guards for 2006-2007. Follow the links on their website for their rankings of the other positions as well.

Greg Oden update: SST reported that the earliest Greg Oden could play at Ohio State would be January. The Ohio State magical mystery tour is officially postponed!

Bill Hodges and CSTV report on a trio of new signings by the General, Robert Montgomery Knight, FSU, GW, Fairfield, LaTech, Rice and Pacific

Jeff Goldman of FoxSports reports that Bridgton Acamedy has been taken off the list of alleged "diploma mills" under investigation. The complete list can be found in Jeff's story. It includes some high profile prep schools, such as MtZion, NDPrep, StTHomasMore, Patterson (if they played in the NCAA they would probably make the Sweet 16 given their roster), and once-mighty Laurinburg.

More news than you can digest at CSTV as they talk about Nash's # retired at SCU, Texas A&M going abroad, and 2006-2007 basketball schedules released for Holy Cross, Brown and Siena.

The latest Andy Katz updates talk about "the Godfather" (Sonny Vaccaro) pushing for basketball academies. Apparently Andy Katz has become ESPN royalty now since he doesn't write on the weekends anymore :)

Reading is fun-damental!

2006-2007 Athlon College Basketball Season Preview Review

Update September 2007

The 2006-2007 season is long gone, but the 2007 NCAA College Basketball Tournament games are available on DVD!.

And you can get started on the 2007-2008 season by checking our Gigantic 2007-2008 preview of links.

Catch up the latest recruiting rankings

Looking for the 2007-2008 Athlon Sports preview magazine review? I just finished the review! Check it out!!!


The original 2006-2007 review
The Athlon Sports 2006-2007 NCAA basketball college preview is now out! I picked it up at Borders Bookstores for the list price of $5.99 (display until Dec-15-2006). This is a west coast edition with Stanford's Mitch Johnson and California's Ubaka sharing the front cover.

And now I am putting my Magazine Reviewer hat on.

Comprehensive Review
* The review is divided in two parts
* The first part covers all the special features, stories, recruiting and player rankings.
* The second part covers the meat of the magazine, the team-by-team within conference-by-conference analysis.


Part One: Grade A-

Lots of advertising in this magazine, including ESPN Full Court, Samsung 40" LCD HDTVs (nice way to start the season, but who's gonna pay for it?), Sirius, and sadly a few gambling sites. Ironically in one of them (page 101) there is a picture of a random dude partially covering his face, but he looks a bit like the Coach K! That made me laugh for a few minutes :-)

Magazine content starts with an editorial from Michael Light

Five pages called "Hoops Madness" that cover a variety of topics, including some top XX lists, including coaches on the hot seat, and "put up or shut up" for touted but not-delivering players (they usually play on teams who underachieved or did not make the NCAA) (DUH!)

A three-page story on the new "One & Done" phenomenon because of the new NBA Draft rules. Featured is a full page picture of Greg Oden. Interesting "Oden" is an anagram of "Done". One & Done for Oden?

Next there is a "Ten things to watch in 2006" list. This covers players, teams and coaches.

A very nice touch follows, the preseason Bob Cousy Award candidates, about 40 of them including two from Division 2 and one from Division 3. Some of them are combo guards, but I digress. Included in the list are some of the highly touted freshmen. The 2006 class is definately going to sizzle this year! New Feature!

Three one-page interviews follow with Joakim Noah, Arizona's M-Will (Marcus Williams) and Kansas's Juliana Wright.

New Feature!: Their post-season predictions come with a nice overlay of the colleges on a two-page USA map. Very clever idea! Quite surpringly Oden State is not predicted to make the Elite 8! And their pre-season #1 maybe a surprise, but it is really the common-sense choice. Here is a hint: Ole Roy ain't that good? Two mid-majors are predicted to make the Sweet 16 and neither one is Gone-Zaga.

Then they present their three All-American teams, along with 30 honorable mentions. (Top 45 in all)

Recruiting
* Top 100 of the 2006 class, sorted by position.
* Top 25 recruiting classes of 2006
* Next 200 (101-300) of the 2006 class sorted alphabetically
* Top 100 of the 2007 class sorted alphabetically
* Top 25 of the 2008 class
* Top 10 of the 2009 class
(Editiorial humor: What's missing is the Top 5 of the Embryo class)

Two pages of Women Hoops coverage

Scheduling: The back of the magazine has an incomplete schedule of all teams, sorted alphabetically. Because the magazine is published relatively early, and some of the schedules have not been announced/finalized, some teams has complete schedules, some teams have partial schedules, some have none. They do however have a listing of all the holiday tournaments, but the font is very tiny. Pull out your magnifying glasses! The first game listed is the 2K Sports College Hoops Classic on November 7 and 8 at College Park, Maryland. If you want to see Gary Williams sweat early in the season, bang your monkey and demand ESPN-U! (Jim Rome radio listeners should be familiar with that phrase)

The Back Page: They take a critical look at the Athlon Top 20 Recruits of 2002. Some very familiar names there such as Melo, McCants, Dee Brown, Bosh, Felton, and Hot Sauce. There's also some disappointments: Evan Burns (who?), Christian Drejer, Anthony Roberson (the Me-First class at Florida pre-championship), Elijah Ingram and Soft Davis (of Izzo). But I disgress.




Part Two: Overall Grade A-

In a nice new twist, all conferences are listed alphabetically. In the past the smaller conferences were sent to the back. Not any more. All conferences alphabetically. Good!

Conference Pages. Grade B-
* The BCS conferences get one full page each for a conference preview, which includes the predicted order of finish (POF), a one-line recruiting round-up analysis, first, 2nd and 3rd all-conference teams (top 15 players), and the superlative awards (player of the year, defensive player, underrated, newcomer).
* The non-BCS conferences get the POF and the all-conference first team only, but they don't get a page for the conference preview.

Team Pages. Grade A-
* Team by team coverage for BCS teams: Each BCS conference team gets its own FULL PAGE, with Intro, Frontcourt, Backcourt and Analysis. Thankfully this magazine (unlike Lindy's) has complete rosters with jersey numbers for the returning players and most of the freshmen/newcomers. The redshirts and transfers are clearly indicated. For returning players comprehensive stats are listed (Games Played, MPG, PPG, RPG, APG, FG%, FT%) and their hometowns. For newcomers/freshmen it lists their hometowns and a short paragraph of recruiting analysis which is a nice touch. Each team also gets a corner picture of one of their players captioned with a sometimes related statistical factoid. Also nice! Sadly coaching records and tenure are not included.
*Team by team coverage for non-BCS conferences: The designer teams (Memphis, and Gonzaga) get a full page, similar to the BCS teams above. Semi-designer teams expected to make it to the post-season (NCAA or NIT) get half a page (eg Nevada, George Mason, New Mexico State, Charlotte, Xavier, Akron, four MVC teams, GW, and a few more), which includes full rosters, jersey numbers and but no recruiting analysis. The remaining teams who are not expected to make to the NCAA or NIT get only a 15-line writeup that is 1/3rd of a page wide, no rosters, but the top players are mentioned in the 15-line writeup. Ouch for those teams in terms of coverage.


Shortcomings

Schedules are incomplete

Tenure and coaching records along with assistant names are not included


Compared to Lindy's magazine
+ Athlon: Complete rosters and almost all jersey numbers
+ Athlon: More recruiting coverage in the back of the magazine
+ Athlon: partial schedules (vs none for Lindy's)
+ Lindy's: More coverage for teams not expected to make the NCAA/NIT
+ Lindy's: Coaching records (but no assistants) included


Recommendation
* I recommend this if you are a college basketball fan.
* If you are buying it mainly for your conference or team, the BCS teams get a nice full page of coverage each. If your team projected to make the NCAA/NIT you also get a nice half-page to full-page coverage. For teams projected not to make the post-season the coverage is very little.
* Which one to get? Compare the +/- of each, and browse through them at your local bookstore/newstand.


Upcoming Preview Magazines
* Sporting News, CBS Sportsline, Blue Ribbon Yearbook, ESPN, and SI

Supporting the blog/reviews
If you found the review useful you can support this blog by making your Amazon purchases using this affiliate link. This will encourage me to review every single 2006-2007 college basketball season preview magazine :-)