Random Shots

'08 Football 09-10 Basketball General62

Where do you start when building a college basketball team?

Mike Huguenin’s answer: Give me the elite point guard…..

Jason King’s answer: …To me, though, the biggest key to any winning team is the coach…

Steve Megargee’s answer: … I’d lean toward the point guard because he’s more likely to make an instant impact and also probably has a better chance of staying in school for multiple seasons…

Capel Has High Hopes

Oklahoma coach Jeff Capel already has accomplished more before his 35th birthday than many coaches achieve in an entire lifetime. Now he faces the greatest test of his young career: Can he help Oklahoma remain one of the nation’s best programs even without the nation’s best player?

Ole Miss coach makes plea deal in Ohio

A few hours after he was arrested last December for an altercation with a cab driver, Mississippi basketball coach Andy Kennedy went on the offensive.

He vehemently denied the “heinous accusations” that he punched and taunted the driver. He insisted he would be exonerated. He had a persuasive talk with the Ole Miss athletics director, who publicly took his side.

Four months later, Kennedy is taking blame and apologizing.

Next Step in the Willie Williams Saga

A linebacker who was once widely considered the nation’s best defensive prospect coming out of high school …Williams is less than a week removed from the NFL draft. But rather than sitting in the green room with other celebrated draft picks in New York City on Saturday, he’ll watch with a small collection of family, eating some modest home cooking and hoping that some team, any team, will give him an opportunity to play in the league…

…one NFC personnel man said he expects Williams to go undrafted and that the former prep star will be signed as a free agent.

About VaWolf82

Engineer living in Central Va. and senior curmudgeon amongst SFN authors One wife, two kids, one dog, four vehicles on insurance, and four phones on cell plan...looking forward to empty nest status. Graduated 1982

'08 Football 09-10 Basketball General

62 Responses to Random Shots

  1. StewMan07 04/21/2009 at 4:53 AM #

    If Sid doesn’t work out, I would love to land Capel as our HC.

  2. Alpha Wolf 04/21/2009 at 5:10 AM #

    Interesting how the News and Observer’s web site has the headline re: Kennedy:

    “Former Pack Player Kennedy Pleads Guilty to Conduct Charge” on their website this morning.

    Call me overly sensitive, but it is that sort of passive-aggression that grinds my gears where the local paper is concerned.

  3. Noah 04/21/2009 at 5:52 AM #

    Kennedy was here for one year and then transferred to UAB, but did he ever play there? He shredded his knee in a pickup game.

  4. Wolf Dog 04/21/2009 at 6:55 AM #

    I think he #2 all time leading scorer at UAB. I know he played a little for the Hornets.

    Why can’t people learn to keep their mouth shut, put their hands behind their back, and just go with the police. They can bail out soon enough.

  5. Wolf Dog 04/21/2009 at 6:57 AM #

    I would say coach then point guard in starting a team.

    I wonder what Dick Sheridan said when starting a football program seeing as he was hired to do that.

  6. StateFoxer 04/21/2009 at 7:09 AM #

    As long as we’re talking random shots, si.com has Andre Brown listed as the 5th best running back in this year’s draft. They also had Costner, McCauley, and Hickson as the 2nd best frontcourt a few years ago. So take it for what it’s worth. Best of luck to Andre though.

    http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/multimedia/photo_gallery/0904/nfl.draft.top10.rb.prospects/content.5.html

  7. Alpha Wolf 04/21/2009 at 7:18 AM #

    ^ Running backs in the draft are a different breed. I wonder if NO feels like that Bush has lived up to his hype, for example.

    Brown may be 3rd round, whatever, but give him a year or two and my feeling is that should he stay healthy he will emerge as a back to fear on Sundays.

  8. Noah 04/21/2009 at 7:44 AM #

    Running backs are cheap and plentiful. I’m always going to be opposed to spending top-15 picks on them. Build up your line and you can grab a good back in the later rounds and get to the same place.

    I’ve seen mocks that had Brown going anywhere from the very early second round to the back half of the third.

    He helped himself a lot with his post-season workouts.

  9. Packman02 04/21/2009 at 8:15 AM #

    ^ Andre’s transformation from a backfield tap-dancer (sorry Andre, but you were for a time) to a North-South bulldozer will infinitely help his Pro prospects and, my guess is, his career in the league, too. By the time that kid had played his last snap, he’d improved not only his running style and consistency, but he was much more developed as a reciever in the flats.

    Noah’s right, in that the post-season workouts are probably more highly correlated with Andre’s rise…but he definitely improved during his stay at State.

    His hard work and dedication will pay off on Saturday.

    I might also add that this re-shaping coincided with O’Brien and Bible’s arrival in Raleigh. Coincidence? I think not…

    RB recruits…pay attention to the Andre Brown story!

  10. Greywolf 04/21/2009 at 8:20 AM #

    From the N&O about Kellie Harper — Reasons to be thankful she’s at NC State:
    • “If I had the opportunity to have [Harper] even speak to me, it would just be amazing,” said Tennessee Attack guard Kylie Russell, a 16-year-old sophomore.
    o This is a point of view of our new HC as expressed by high-level recruit.
    • Morris said the Harper should follow the example of past N.C. State teams, which mixed national and in-state recruiting.
    o (See following comments. Do we really want our new HC following our past ways?)
    • White’s All-Star report has State’s recruiting class ranked 10th in the ACC and 60th overall, and UNC is ranked the second-best class in the nation.
    o It might be little cold to blame the recruiting on Glance since she likely was being attentive to her partner’s illness, but as associate head coach, she must shoulder some of the responsibility. No matter how good a sideline coach you are, the short end of the stick is what is to be expected with this disparity of talent.

  11. Bubba 04/21/2009 at 8:28 AM #

    Interesting comments from Bobby Purcell this morning on 850

    Lots of praise for LF. Said criticism is part of all AD’s jobs.. Said with communication vehicles of today, you just cant please everybody,no big deal.Said Lee has made some great hires recently

    Expect around 800 tomorrow night at the Caravan

    One big announcement(I think it may have something to do with a very large donation)to be made tomorrow night

  12. BJD95 04/21/2009 at 8:31 AM #

    Sounds like happy talk from a likely successor for a guy getting ready to “retire”, doesn’t it?

    I can guarantee that Fowler and Purcell don’t sing from the same hymnal, in general.

  13. Greywolf 04/21/2009 at 8:39 AM #

    It must be extremely difficult to evaluate RB talent for the next level. Running back ‘x’ has good stats running behind a good line while RB ‘y’ has average stats running behind a mediocre OL. And we had a mediocre at best run-blocking OL during AB’s stay at NCSU. So they are looking at the combine stats and physical attributes. I remember the Dallas Cowboys drafting an NCSU RB very high based on speed and size — Charlie Young. I hope AB has a better career than CY. My mind’s eye recollection of CY is his running down a defender with either an interception of a fumble from across the field and stopping what I thought was a sure TD on about the 25 yd line. An unbelievable burst of straight line speed. My memory is fading but I vaguely recall CY having fumblitis.

  14. SuperStuff 04/21/2009 at 8:39 AM #

    Kennedy left our program because he did not want to be a 3pt specialist. Funny thing is when he went to UAB he broke some 3pt shooting record for the school or possibly the conference.

    If the guy had done something good he would be known as a former UAB player. LOL…

  15. Thompson44 04/21/2009 at 8:44 AM #

    How can the head of the WPC praise Lee. Does he not look at how pathetic the state of our Athletic Department is in? What Great Hires is he talking about? TOB basically said hire me and he did, Sid has done nothing since he became head Coach, and as far as Harper we shall see. I do think that she will be a great Coach but come on we want mens sports to succeed as well. And am I missing something about Capel, I thought he went to Arizona?

  16. Alpha Wolf 04/21/2009 at 8:44 AM #

    “Retire” as in Blade Runner “retire,” n’est c’est pas?

  17. Bubba 04/21/2009 at 8:50 AM #

    It will be interesting to see what LF does. He’s got a contract worth roughly 900K over the next 4 yrs.I’m sure his attorney would have no problem collecting.I’m guessing Lee is getting close to 60 yrs old.I could see him saying “show me the money” and riding off into the sunset.

  18. BJD95 04/21/2009 at 8:55 AM #

    Maybe they will announce Fowler’s “retirement” and everybody will pretend to like him for one night.

  19. Greywolf 04/21/2009 at 8:55 AM #

    “Sounds like happy talk from a likely successor for a guy getting ready to “retire”, doesn’t it?”
    If it does, shouldn’t we be critical of Purcell for making the same kind of commments that Fowler made about Amato before he “retired”?

    BJD: No. Purcell is in the loop, and knows what’s going on. Fowler really meant the stuff about Amato, and really wouldn’t have fired him. He didn’t anticipate the BOT stepping in.

    Bobby Purcell is the same type sentimental favorite that Stephanie Glance was. IMNSHO it would be a smarter move to bring an AD with a background parallel to that of Kellie Harper. Charlie Cobb would be my choice over Bobby Purcell and that does not reflect my POV of BP. Why risk losing someone as vital as Purcell is to the success of the Wolfpack Club.

    BJD: I’m not advocating Purcell as the successor, but I think it’s at least 51% likely to happen. What the big donors want is much more important than what I want in that regard. Being confident that Tom O’Brien is comfortable with the next AD is also an extremely high priority. I am confident about the Wolfpack Club being in good hands even if Purcell gets promoted.

    The “anybody would be better than Fowler” attitude often expressed here, more as an insult than as a genuine notion I hope, would be a folly of the first order in selecting a replacement for Fowler. I doubt most of us have a clue what skill set it takes to manage an athletics department. I know I don’t. I can’t manage my “chicken-shit” weatherization business at a time when anything green is hot.

    BJD: I don’t know how to manage the athletics department, either – but I am surely able to judge when an AD is doing a shitty job. And yeah, I do think that pretty much anyone would do a better job than Fowler – as long as we don’t re-hire Todd Turner or Crazy Gene from BC.

  20. Noah 04/21/2009 at 8:57 AM #

    It must be extremely difficult to evaluate RB talent for the next level.

    I had a former ACC coach tell me once that if he had his way, he’d put running backs in the back of a car with no seat belts and then drive it into a tree at 35 mph. THEN he’d have the guy run the 40.

    I only know one pro scout, but he never pays attention to stats. His department will look at every single snap a particular prospect took during their entire collegiate career. One of the big things he looks for is a clear sign that a RB has vision. Does he dance around or does he hit the hole immediately? Does he try to bounce everything to the outside? Does he know how to use his blockers?

    They also spend a long time talking to the college coaches about their impressions of a guy. He told me that when he was scouting an NCSU def. lineman named Mike Jones, the defensive coaches here warned him that Jones was soft. When he talked to the current staff about Andre Brown, they told him the exact opposite and told him about how Brown played the entire year in pretty severe pain.

  21. Noah 04/21/2009 at 8:58 AM #

    Bobby Purcell is the same type sentimental favorite that Stephanie Glance was. IMNSHO it would be a smarter move to bring an AD with a background parallel to that of Kellie Harper. Charlie Cobb would be my choice over Bobby Purcell and that does not reflect my POV of BP. Why risk losing someone as vital as Purcell is to the success of the Wolfpack Club.

    I agree 100 percent. But I’m not going to be critical of Purcell toting the PC line during a radio interview.

  22. Noah 04/21/2009 at 8:59 AM #

    I could see him saying “show me the money” and riding off into the sunset.

    He should be glad I’m not on the other side of the table. He’d get squat and he’d be happy about it. I would DARE him to sue. The discovery phase of that trial would be all sorts of fun.

  23. beowolf 04/21/2009 at 9:10 AM #

    I think Andre Brown can be an outstanding pro back, if he ends up in the right situation. He’s got a great combination of speed, power and excellent hands. You were talking about Reggie Bush; I think Brown would be a great fit for the Saints, for example.

  24. BJD95 04/21/2009 at 9:14 AM #

    I agree, Beo. The Saints could really use a tough, inside runner like Brown to complement Bush and Pierre Thomas.

  25. bradleyb123 04/21/2009 at 9:16 AM #

    He should be glad I’m not on the other side of the table. He’d get squat and he’d be happy about it. I would DARE him to sue. The discovery phase of that trial would be all sorts of fun.

    He would win because we recently extended his contract. It wouldn’t be too hard to use that in court to prove he was doing a good job. “If they didn’t like my work, why did they extend my contract?”

    Still holding out hope that he’ll be gone soon. Anybody got any “sources” with updates on that?

1 2 3

Leave a Reply