Class of '66 Old Fart

And Jordan Howard could run out of bounds into Pagano!

Kevin Ferrell impresses Nets’ head coach Kenny Atkinson Updated October 7, 2016 7:34 PM By Laura Albanese laura.albanese@newsday.com The Nets’ undrafted point guard made a strong effort to distinguish himself in their first preseason game Thursday. Jeremy Lin was pretty good, too. While most of the attention was focused on Lin during the Nets’ 101-94 win over the Pistons — Lin scored 21 — anyone who watched the fourth quarter can attest to the fact that his sub, Kevin “Yogi” Ferrell, made a fairly convincing case to be considered for a spot in the opening day roster. Granted, that’s not saying all that much. But when you have about a half dozen point guards coming to training camp every day, it’s pretty much an honor just to be nominated. “I think when making the right play happens, you have a great chance of winning,” said Ferrell, who came out of out of Indiana University as a potential late second-round pick, but didn’t get a phone call on June 23. “I feel like the more wins you can get, such as myself, trying to make the team, then you can try to make your case as a valuable asset to make the roster.” Ferrell was a dynamo off the bench, scoring five points and grabbing two rebounds in an extremely hard-nosed 12 minutes in which he ably corralled the Nets offense in a late-game surge. “He played well,” coach Kenny Atkinson said after practice Friday. “He’s got a lot of characteristics we like. We love his explosiveness, like how he shoots it. I think he’s improving defensively, but I think those roster decisions are later down the road, but he played well last night.” Either way, the Nets have shown an affinity for Ferrell, who signed a partially-guaranteed one-year contract worth $100,000. That came after an impressive summer league debut in which he averaged 8.8 points and 1.8 assists. At the very least, the contract means he’ll serve the Nets in some capacity this year, and if that happens to be in the D-League, so be it. “It’s always hard for someone not to hear their name on draft night,” he said. “But you know, I always heard a lot of cases of guys going undrafted and still making a team, whether it was a summer league team or whether it’s the D-League, it’s still called up to another team. I knew my dreams weren’t over. It was just time to go back to the drawing board and figuring out what situation I wanted to go into best and I felt Brooklyn was the best opportunity for me.”

Yogi’s second NBA preseason appearance Nets beaten by the Knicks. 116-98. Yogi played 15 minutes; 8 pts. on 1-3 F’s; 1-2 on 3’s; 5-6 FT’s; 1 reb; 3 asst; 1 stl; 1 TO. Team was -8 while he was on the floor. Next game is Tuesday evening.

Multitude of reasons people can't attend IU home games but their absence doesn't necessarily lessen their status as a true fan. To me, it's your phrase "can upset". Sadly, that's the usual weekly mantra for IU football. Certainly on any given week we "can upset" the opponent but let's be honest, how often does it actually happen? Our earlier defeat of MSU isn't even looking like much of an upset at this point with its record of 2-3. I've followed IU sports for 50+ years and how many winning seasons have we had in those 50 years? I guess what I'm saying is that I apologize to everyone for not being a true fan and spending a minimum of 6 hours in a car to watch IU football.

Suffice it to say the ND faithful are not a happy bunch of campers this evening. The usual chatter about play calling and fire the coach but to me this was one of the best comments -- Kelly can blame the rain- it was raining every time ND was on offense; it was raining every time ND was on defense.

We're 5 games into the season; Lagow is not the answer at QB and I'm not sure we have an answer on the squad. Yes, he had 2 TD's, but that's not the sole measure of a successful QB and IMO his overall level of play just doesn't cut it in the B1G. And FWIW, I'm not all that hyped on our play calling.

A really nice piece from Rich Campbell at the Chicago Tribune: Bears' Jordan Howard honors late father with quiet determination http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/football/bears/ct-jordan-howard-quiet-determination-bears-spt-1009-20161008-story.html

Retweet from Alex Bozich: Will Sheehey will be joining the Raptors 905 of the D-League to start the 2016-17 season, sources tell Upside & Motor #NBADL

Retweet from Alex Bozich: Christian Watford will sign with the NBA D-League and join the Fort Wayne Mad Ants as a RR player, a source tells Upside & Motor #NBADL

I'm not that big of a fan of pro football or the Colts, but I do try to keep up with "background noise" about the team and I know many of you will enjoy this from Ryan Phillips at the BigLead: Ryan Grigson is somehow still the general manager of the Indianapolis Colts, despite a mountain of evidence that he should have lost his job long ago. On Friday, Grigson once again proved he’s unfit for his position when he blamed Andrew Luck’s contract for his team’s defensive woes. Grigson said the following: “When you pay Andrew what we did, it’s going to take some time to build on the other side of the ball.” Hey Ryan, maybe you should have thought of that before giving Luck $139.125 million when you had massive holes littering the rest of your roster. I don’t know, just spitballing here. Grigson’s real problem has been his horrible draft record. Other than landing Andrew Luck and T.Y. Hilton in the 2012 NFL Draft, he hasn’t selected any true impact players. You could slide Donte Moncrief, Dwayne Allen and Jack Mewhort into the discussion, but after that there is an absolute dearth of talent. Guys like Bjoern Werner, Coby Fleener, Khaled Holmes and Hugh Thornton highlight the long list of Grigson draft failures. Not to mention the fact that he shipped a first-round pick to Cleveland in exchange for Trent Richardson. Grigson has also spent money on the wrong guys. He wasted cash on busts like Todd Herremans, LaRon Landry, Trent Cole and Donald Thomas, all of whom were or have been awful. Meanwhile, he let stud linebacker Jerrell Freeman walk this offseason without so much as a wave in his direction. For the record, Freeman is one of the NFL’s best bargains right now. Aside from that, it’s not like it’s impossible to pay a quarterback and build a defense. The Broncos paid Peyton Manning a ton of money and managed to have one of the NFL’s best defenses. The Patriots have had outstanding defenses while Tom Brady has been under center. It’s a weak excuse by Grigson. The real problem for the Colts is poor decision-making, not Luck’s contract. Grigson and Colts owner Jim Irsay are to blame for all of this. They can point to Luck’s massive new deal, but this has been a problem for years. It’s ridiculous to claim one player’s contract is responsible for the failings of an entire front office. This is systemic and it starts at the top. Grigson should have been fired long ago. It is stunning that he still has a job.

Jon Rothstein - 20 impact transfers for the 2016-17 college basketball season Josh Newkirk, Indiana: The 6-1 point guard has cheetah-like speed in the open floor and should be a menace defensively. Newkirk battled injuries during the tail end of his career at Pitt, but should be a suitable replacement for Yogi Ferrell at the most important position on the floor. Full List

Watford to participate this weekend in the eighth annual USA Basketball Men’s Junior National Team October Minicamp on Oct. 8-9, 2016, at the United States Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado. The 2019 ESPN 25 features: Trendon Watford (Mountain Brook H.S./Mountain Brook, Ala.) third; Vernon Carey Jr. (University School/Southwest Ranches, Fla.) fifth; Matthew Hurt (John Marshall H.S./Rochester, Minn.) sixth; Onyeka Okongwu (Chino Hills H.S./Chino, Calif.) seventh; Antoine eighth; Christian Brown (A.C. Flora H.S./Hopkins, S.C.) 10th; Juwan Gary (Gray Collegiate Academy/Columbia, S.C.) 12th; James Wiseman (The Ensworth School/Nashville, Tenn.) 13th; Cole Anthony (Archbishop Molloy H.S./New York, N.Y.) 14th; Lewis 16th; and Romeo Weems (New Haven H.S./New Haven, Mich.) 17th Full Article

From Jon Rothstein: Minnesota's Davonte Fitzgerald will miss the 2016-17 with an ACL tear, per release. Tough blow for the Gophers. Was going to be in rotation.

Not trying to take away from Troy's overall performance but he did pick up 4 fouls for his 22 minutes of court time. He's a rookie so clearly he won't get the benefit of the whistle so he'll have to learn to play smarter.

First pre-season game for the Nets who defeat the Pistons 101-94. Yogi played 12 minutes; scored 5 pts. on 2 of 4 FGs' 1 of 2 on 3's; 2 reb; 1 asst; 1 stl; but 3 TO's. Nets were +8 while he was in the game. Full pre-season schedule for the Nets DATE DAY TIME OPPONENT LOCATION 10/6/16 Thursday 7:30 PM vs. Detroit Pistons Barclays Center 10/8/16 Saturday 7:30 PM at New York Knicks Madison Square Garden 10/11/16 Tuesday 7:30 PM at Miami Heat American Airlines Arena 10/13/16 Thursday 7:30 PM vs. Boston Celtics Barclays Center 10/17/16 Monday 7:30 PM at Boston Celtics TD Garden 10/20/16 Thursday 7:30 PM vs. New York Knicks Barclays Center

I hope that's the case because my digestive system could get really upset thinking of a small number of our players on the loose in NYC. Visions of past transgressions are dancing in my head.

Another great piece of writing from Hutch at The Anderson Herald-Bulletin: http://www.heraldbulletin.com/sports/thomas-bryant-s-vertical-has-improved-by-leaps-and-bounds/article_8a9ba44e-8c0e-11e6-bc48-970c904844c5.html Thomas Bryant's vertical has improved by leaps and bounds BLOOMINGTON — The Indiana University basketball team has been practicing for a week as it gets ready to open the season Nov. 11 in Honolulu against Kansas. When IU coach Tom Crean met with the media recently to talk about personnel and what he hoped to get out of the first few weeks of practice, he passed on a little factoid about one of his best players, sophomore preseason All-America selection Thomas Bryant. According to Crean, Bryant is literally jumping out of the gym. “Thomas has really gotten better athletically,’’ Crean said. “At 14 months, or 14-and-a-half months, his vertical has gone up 13 inches, and I’ve never been around anybody who has done that. His squat has gone up almost 200 pounds since he got here last June. And one of the biggest areas of need for him were his feet and his lower body being stronger, and he’s well on his way to doing that. “Now we have to apply it to the court where he actually has to go against other people, and that will happen no sooner than when we get to Hawaii, and he’ll have to deal with that right away.’’ Bryant didn’t get a great deal of an opportunity to go up against bigger bodies at IU in the summer time because so many of his teammates were out with injuries. OG Anunoby had a groin injury that limited his work. Juwan Morgan had offseason shoulder surgery. Collin Hartman had a hand injury, and then a week before camp started he suffered a knee injury that required surgery. And IU’s top two big men in the incoming class stayed home for the summer working on academic issues and didn’t arrive in Bloomington until the day before school started in August. “We didn’t have the guys who could go against Thomas this summer,’’ Crean said. “So we would tailor half of the week for Thomas just dealing with the strength coach hitting him with pads, the managers and the graduate managers swiping at the ball. We would have short verse workouts that were focused on his inside play and his ability to run out and set ball screens. Then the other times he was kind of in the mode with everybody else where he was working on his shooting, working on the ballhandling, working on the pick-and-roll and working on coming off screens. “It was just completely training him like a guard which we did with Cody (Zeller) and we did with Noah (Vonleh) and like we want to do with him. The next step would be him guarding those people in the summer which has improved. But again it has improved in a half court, one-on-one, two-on-two, three-on-three situation, and now we have to see how it will transfer to the court in a five-on-five.’’

Andrew Slater ‏@ASlater247 28m28 minutes ago New York, USA Bryce Wills has UConn, Nova, Maryland, Gonzaga, St.John's, Prov. & Min offers + Cuse, L'ville, IU, Kansas, Zona, Cal & FSU interest.

ESPN's pre-season ranking for IU is #12. Mike Miller ‏@MikeMillerHT: James Blackmon Jr. and Thomas Bryant will represent Indiana at next week's Big Ten Media Day in Washington D.C.

I thought it was their mud spa for their facials.

From Sports Illustrated which features a picture of JBJ: 64 reasons to be excited for the 2016–17 college hoops season (Nos. 64–33) 55. James Blackmon is back Blackmon only played in 13 games last season before he suffered a torn ACL in his left knee. But in those 13 games, he showed an improvement from his already excellent freshman season. He took more of the Hoosiers’ shots and possessions while improving his offensive rating and assist rate. Now that Indiana is without Troy Williams and Yogi Ferrell on the perimeter, Blackmon should have a green light to make plays and put up points. He’ll be helped by the continued growth of second-year big man Thomas Bryant and wing O.G. Anunoby. List of #64 down to #33

Sickle cell trait may force former IU star Tevin Coleman to miss Denver game Jim Ayello , Jim Ayello 4:44 p.m. EDT October 4, 2016 (Photo: Jason Getz-USA TODAY Sports) Atlanta Falcons running back and former Indiana star Tevin Coleman is unsure if he'll play this weekend in the high altitudes of Denver because of his sickle cell trait. "Really don’t know how I’ll feel or how it will be like," Coleman recently told ESPN.com. "I’ve never been to Denver." According to the Centers for Disease Control, the blood disorder related to sickle cell disease can become aggravated by intense physical activity, dehydration and in places with low oxygen levels in the air. It affects 1 in 12 African Americans in the United States, the CDC reports. INDIANAPOLIS STAR Tevin Coleman confirms he has sickle cell trait While at IU, Coleman never acknowledged his condition publicly, and the Hoosiers coaches never revealed it. This August, ESPN reported that Coleman was removed from a practice because of the extreme heat. "I was just dehydrated,’’ Coleman said. "I’ll probably get a lot of fluids in me and an IV while I’m in Denver. I will be hydrated so that helps a lot. That will be a step that I take.’’ In 2012, then-Pittsburgh Steelers safety Ryan Clark, who also carries the sickle cell trait, skipped a game in Denver because of the risks the altitude.

http://www.vigilantsports.com/2016/10/04/nick-zeisloft-discusses-his-opportunity-with-the-pacers/ Former Indiana University guard Nick Zeisloft signed his first NBA contract on Sept. 6, 2016. He didn’t receive an invitation to play for an NBA team during Summer League action in July, but the Pacers later asked him to join them for a week of workouts at the end of August. The 23-year-old from La Grange, Illinois ended up signing a one-year deal for the league minimum ($543,471), of which only $25,000 is guaranteed, per league sources. Ultimately, this is a deal for the Pacers to own the rights to Zeisloft when it comes time for the Developmental League. The Pacers own the Fort Wayne Mad Ants, and that’s where Zeisloft, along with Julyan Stone and Alex Poythress, will end up. The 6-4, 210-pound guard, wearing No. 15, will suit up in the Pacers’ first of six preseason games Tuesday in New Orleans. Here’s a brief Q&A with Zeisloft on joining the Pacers and what he’s trying to prove to scouts and team officials. How did the opportunity to join the Pacers come about? I came in to workout for a week or so at the end of August. I just thought it was going to be a week of workouts and open gym and playing with the team. And then they invited me back for another week, liked what I was doing, and decided to sign me to a contract the next week. It all fell into a place how I never expected it to, and it worked out well. Were you under the impression that the workout was a tryout, or that they were simply needing an extra body? Any time someone has you in, I guess it’s kind of like they are checking out what you can do. It just felt like workouts and open gyms, and it was all a lot of fun how it all came about. We didn’t see in any of the three NBA Summer Leagues. So, how did you spend your summer? Yeah, I wasn’t invited into summer league. I was working out on my own a lot and getting better on my own a lot back in the Grange, sometimes in Bloomington. I was all over. What are you trying to show the decision makers for a chance at making it in the NBA? I’ll have to play with the ball more some, just because of my size in the NBA. Ball skills. Working on everything. Defending on this level is tough and so just improving in that way, too. Just a lot of things. It all matters. I’ve been told to expect to see Christian Watford join the Mad Ants this upcoming season. What will that be like for you — two IU guys? I didn’t know that. That would be a lot of fun. Christian is a great player. Never got to play with him because our paths didn’t cross at IU. He’s a great guy, hard worker, and I’ve talked to him several times and like being around him off the court. He’s a great dude to play with.

IUWBB: Penn explains decision to attend IU October 3, 2016 Jon Blau Women's Basketball Leave a comment Indiana claimed a statement recruiting win on Sunday, nabbing five-star guard Jaelynn Penn in a head-to-head battle with South Carolina. Penn, considered the No. 39 recruit in 2017, according to ESPN, explained Monday why she chose IU over a program consistently ranked top 5 in the country. “I felt more of a priority to them,” Penn said of IU. “They have McDonald’s All-Americans on the bench over (at South Carolina). Indiana’s closer to home. I want my parents to come to my games and stuff, that’s important. But mostly the education.” It wasn’t just about basketball for Penn, who wants to be a doctor someday and likes IU’s medical school. But in terms of the Hoosiers’ basketball program, Penn said she feels it’s ascending after last year’s NCAA tournament appearance. “I feel like they are on the come up,” Penn said. “Getting to the NCAA tournament was a big thing for them. Just because they are not established as one of the top schools in the nation, that doesn’t mean we can’t get there, you know?” Penn, a 5-foot-10 guard, figures to be a valuable piece next to point guard Tyra Buss, who will be a senior in 2017-18. The Hoosiers will also have graduated current seniors Alexis Gassion, Karlee McBride and Amber Deane from the backcourt. With a backcourt of Buss, Penn and possibly Ria Gulley, the Hoosiers will have three athletic guards who can run the floor and attack the basket. Penn was also a 40 percent shooter from 3 last season for Butler High School in Louisville. IU’s pace of play definitely intrigues Penn. She also likes the fact that head coach Teri Moren doesn’t take kindly to losing. “I heard she’s not a great loser at all,” Penn said. “I think they take pride in that and that’s what I take pride in now as a high schooler.”

I've seen him play several games and he never gets rattled. In a couple of the games it almost seemed that he went out of his way in the first half to get his teammates fully involved and then he just took over scoring wise in the second half. I hope we do make a really serious effort to recruit him and it would be even more special if he committed since he lives in PUke's backyard!