Archive for February 3rd, 2010

South Florida, a doormat? Not anymore

Unable to lure enough elite high school talent to South Florida to complement emerging star Dominique Jones, Bulls coach Stan Heath faced a difficult dilemma as he hit the recruiting trail the past couple years. Should he continue to build the program by seeking under-the-radar gems in the high school ranks? Or should he take a few calculated risks on talented but well-traveled transfers whose pasts were too checkered for traditional powers to give a second chance? That Heath went with the latter option has been a double-edged sword for suddenly surging South Florida. On the one hand, one Bulls transfer was arrested twice and briefly kicked off the team during the summer, another was arrested once and suspended six games this season for a disciplinary issue and a third reportedly is at the center of an NCAA investigation . On the other hand, South Florida is on the cusp of contending for its first NCAA Tournament berth since 1992 after winning its fourth consecutive Big East game tonight by toppling heavily favored Georgetown , 72-64, on the road. Heath made no apologies for the manner in which he built the program when reached by phone on Tuesday morning. “I just felt we had to pursue all avenues,” he said. “We had to find players that could compete at the highest level because taking somebody that wasn’t at that level wouldn’t get us where we wanted to be. And I didn’t take high risks. I had to research, find out the reasons the young men transferred and figure out if they were worthy of a second chance.” While the victories over Providence, Seton Hall and Pittsburgh were stepping stones for South Florida (15-7, 5-5), it’s this win over Georgetown that will truly make the rest of the league take notice. After all, this was a Hoyas team ranked eighth in the nation and coming off a convincing victory over ACC-leading Duke. And for that matter, this was a South Florida team that was 11-57 in Big East play the past four years entering this season. Playing a starring role for South Florida once again was Jones, who scored 22 of his game-high 29 points in the second half to rally the Bulls from a nine-point halftime deficit. The 6-foot-4 combo guard led the nation in scoring in January at a ridiculous 29.5 points per game, posting a school-record 46 in an overtime win at Providence on Jan. 23 and then following that up with 37 in a home win over Pittsburgh on Sunday. Georgetown still was within two when star center Greg Monroe picked up his fifth foul with 2:52 remaining and left the game with 21 points and 8 rebounds. South Florida scored seven of the next eight points, silencing a stunned crowd at the Verizon Center in Washington, D.C. When I spoke to Jones before he boarded a flight from Tampa Bay to Washington D.C. on Tuesday night, I asked him whether it bothered him that people weren’t taking his team seriously just yet. “No, because respect is earned,” he answered. “You’ve got to take respect. It’s not something that’s automatically given unless you’re at one of those schools that gets all the hype. At South Florida, respect is taken, and that’s what we plan on doing.” One night later, mission accomplished.

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Leafs say Komisarek done for year; Team USA down 2 defensemen

The Toronto Maple Leafs confirmed on Wednesday night what had been assumed for the last week: That defenseman Mike Komisarek (notes) is done for the season after being told definitively that he needs shoulder surgery, and therefore will miss the Winter Olympics. For the Leafs, he’s been out since Jan. 2 — better to have him shut down and heal properly in what’s been a lost season.

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Luis Fabiano using lucky props in goal celebrations now

Back in the second round of the Copa del Rey, Sevilla chairman Jose Maria del Nido wore a black fedora that proved lucky as his side beat the unbeatable Barcelona in both legs to advance. Since then del Nido has clung to the superstition and Sevilla are now in the semifinal against Getafe. In Tuesday’s first leg, Luis Fabiano opened the scoring with a rainbow header just before halftime and celebrated by putting on a black fedora of his own, which he tipped to del Nido up in the director’s box. Sevilla went on to win 2-0 , furthering the belief in the powers of this magic hat. So if you happen to be in the fedora business in Sevilla, business will probably be good this week.

Let the Lindsey hype begin: Vonn is Sports Illustrated cover girl

Lindsey Vonn is hoping the Sports Illustrated cover jinx doesn’t cross international borders. America’s great Winter Olympic hope is featured on the front of SI’s Winter Olympic preview issue, which hit newsstands today. Vonn’s semi-provocative pose has drawn the predictable ire from those who claim that it objectifies her too much . She’s an athlete, not a sex symbol, the chorus inevitably reminds us.

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Gundy talks national haul in 2010

Oklahoma’s nationally ranked 2010 signing class wasn’t built overnight. That’s because OU coaches worked tirelessly this past season behind recruiting coordinator Cale Gundy to put together one of the nation’s top classes early in the recruiting process. This marks the second year in a row Oklahoma has had commitments for next year’s class on national signing day. And it also marks one of the most successful national recruiting efforts Stoops has put together during his 12 years at OU

Kiffin can close, but even at USC, he’s still chasing Urban Meyer

Even if you’re not a flame-wielding Tennessee fan , odds are that you either don’t like USC coach Lane Kiffin for trading on contacts and unscrupulous bravado over substance and dues-paying on his way to one of the best jobs in his profession, or you simply don’t respect him. Maybe both. But you have to give him this: The man can close. With just two months to salvage a mediocre class at Tennessee last winter, Kiffin and recruiting consiglieri Ed Orgeron dramatically improved the Vols’ final haul, stealing coveted prospects Janzen Jackson and Nu’Keese Richardson from rivals LSU and Florida, respectively, at the the last second, then sealing the deal with the nation’s best player, longtime Miami commit Bryce Brown, a few weeks later. This year, with even less time to cobble together a USC-worthy class in their new digs, Team Kiffin quickly secured a pair of five-star wafflers, Kyle Prater and Dillon Baxter, from Pete Carroll’s crop of commitments, added four-star target Demetrius Wright down the stretch and closed with a resounding bang today, locking up cross-country signatures from five-star Georgia receiver Markeith Ambles, hotly-sought Florida cornerback Nickell Robey and the gem of the day, towering, top-ranked Minnesota offensive tackle Seantrel Henderson. No one was pegging any member of that trio for L.A. before Kiffin and Orgeron burst onto the scene. In a single 12-hour gambit, the Trojans’ 2010 crop went from an undersized, on-the-brink group hovering around the bottom of the gurus’ top-10 lists — a mediocre effort by USC standards, to say the least — to one of the few truly elite classes in the nation, a Carroll-worthy haul that easily landed at No. 2 in Rivals’ final national rankings. It might have threatened to come in at No. 1 if they’d landed UCLA-bound targets Dietrich Riley and Josh Shirley in the afternoon, but by any standard, Kiffin and Orgeron left no doubt that the USC recruiting beat lives on for the foreseeable future. Still, if there was any question, Urban Meyer is here to assure you that, as recruiting beasts go, there is none beastlier than the creature he’s nurtured at Florida, a tyrannosaur in an F-14 whose appetite for young, blue-chip blood is never sated. Here is a man who quit his job barely a month ago, just weeks after being wheeled from his house on a gurney in the middle of the night, unconscious, having literally worked himself into a heart-wrenching stupor. As recently as three weeks ago, he was still scheduled to be on Tahiti today, or at least in a hammock or something, rather than putting the finishing touches on Florida’s third No. 1 class in the last five years. But here it is. The Gators brought in every headliner reported to be in the fold before today’s proceedings — top-ranked defensive end Ronald Powell faxed his letter-of-intent in from Los Angeles; flaky, five-star safety Matt Elam came through after months of waffling on his commitment — and managed to add to their riches with on-the-fence offensive lineman Chaz Green and receiver Adrian Coxson as the day wore on. A title like “Best Recruiting Class Ever” has no meaning before anyone in it has set foot on a college field, but less than five weeks after Urban Meyer decided needed to throttle down for the sake of his health and family, he somehow reaffirmed his program’s status as the gold standard for contemporary talent magnets: Such continuity is startling, given the stark future the burgeoning Gator dynasty faced when it looked like Meyer may not be back this fall, if he was ever back on the sideline at all. Already, Florida had lost both coordinators, its mega-star quarterback and the core of the exceptional defense that built the dynasty in the first place. If Meyer had followed those departures, there would be no semblance of the spectacular four-year run from 2006-09 remaining at all. Instead, today is the day Meyer put any notions of long-term decline out of their misery. The Gators aren’t going to win a national championship every year, or every other year. But as long as Urban lives to stalk the trail, obviously the well that produced the last four years isn’t running dray any time soon.

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