Dave in Green

Thanks for the review. I wish I could have watched but was away from home. I certainly don't see anything you said that deserves ripping. While it may have just been high school kids, it was some of the best high school kids whose next official games will be as college freshmen, perhaps even playing against each other. So if Zeke looked good against this level of competition, that's a good sign for his freshman year with the Zips. I don't expect him to dominate, but I do expect he will be a solid contributor to next season's Zips team.

Some really good thoughts there, GoZips. I felt it in my gut when coach Boals got choked up, because it was so obvious that one side of him did not want to be leaving. But I agree with Hilltopper that it's really not possible for us to know if money was the motivating factor in his decision. There are many challenges in life that motivate people. Money is certainly a powerful one. But some people are simply motivated by bigger and bigger challenges. I'd like to think that coach Boals is more motivated by bigger challenges than by money. Like everyone else, I wish him all the best. As much as he will be missed, I'm confident that KD will find a replacement with similar abilities, potential and character.

Sounds like a recruiting slogan for Can't State athletics.

It's been discussed here quite a bit that the Zips are pretty well stocked for next season in terms of both returning experienced players as well as true and redshirt freshmen. The biggest problem is going to be finding playing time for all these guys. I just don't see a lot of value in trying to add the level of player you'd get with a split scholarship. It's going to take a full scholarship to attract the level of player it will take to earn any game time on this team. But if KD says he's "fooling around" in this area, it will be interesting to see if he has some kind of surprise for us.

I have no insight in this specific situation. But in any college basketball program, individuals will come and individuals will go. Whenever the departure of good people inevitably occurs at UA, it's ultimately going to be up to UA to replace them with other good people. If the school is committed to a strong basketball program, then the resources required to make that happen will be provided.

Actually, it's pretty cool that Akron is the only team that moved into the top 25 in the final poll from previously NR (not ranked). I suspect that many of the votes were made on team records, with many of the voters not being familiar enough with all the teams to know how they'd fare against each other. For example, the only two 6-loss teams are both in the top 4 with the Zips having the most losses (13).

Here's a good example of just how sensitive the NCAA can get:CBS Sports Story

Any individual who is an alumnus, benefactor, season ticket holder or simply a fan of the athletics programs can be considered by the NCAA to be a representative of its athletics interests and is subject to these restrictions. It's just not worth the risk for anyone on these forums to initiate any kind of contact with any player we have any interest in seeing play with the Zips.

I sure wish I was talented enough to make an accurate, detailed analysis of all the players involved in a full basketball possession from a single still photo.

Things adapt to whatever the rules are. While it may seem under present conditions that some of the smaller conferences may not be "worthy" of being locked into a 16-team national championship playoff, things would likely change if an inclusive playoff system like this were to be instituted. For example, if the MAC champion was locked into the playoffs every year, more good players might be attracted to sign with MAC teams over current BCS schools, and over time there might be less disparity between the haves and have-nots.Whether or not the NCAA would want something like this to happen is certainly open to question.

More cowbell!OK, now seriously, everything around a football game should complement football and put fans in the mood for supporting their team. There's nothing like traditional, upbeat marching music with flair -- gut-wrenching drumming with lots of syncopation and a wall of brass that brings fans screaming to their feet with tears in their eyes.The purpose of football is not to bring out crowds to appreciate fine music. The band is there to fire up the fans to fire up the football team. Period. Save the concert music for the concert hall, where people politely applaud after each number.On the football field, the band should make the fans explode with passion that carries over into a guttural roar for the offense and defense every time the ball is snapped.

Excellent point.For the first time in the CBA’s history, the college has been ranked by BusinessWeek Magazine as one of the best undergraduate business schools in the nation. In the magazine’s 2009 annual ranking of undergraduate business programs, the CBA was ranked 93rd and is the only business program at a public university in Northeast Ohio to be included in the top 100. There are over 1,600 undergraduate business programs in the U.S. Just be sure to check the NCAA rule book closely before making any "helpful" moves!

No. That's why I said that if you focus on one to the exclusion of the other, defenses can set up for it. So it pays to shoot a good balance of 2s and 3s. That keeps the defense guessing and allows you to shoot higher percentages on both. If they know you're shooting nothing but 3s, they can relax on the inside and contest the outside shots more intensely. The best scenario is to be good at both 2s and 3s, and then take advantage of what the defense gives you.

Amen.

After a little more research, I found that Black was hampered early in the season by a foot stress fracture. I also found a newspaper article from December 2007 that helps explain how he came onto the radar so quickly after being such an unknown:Can't Roosevelt's Cameron Black has been coaching his son, Cameron II, since he was a third grader playing on the AAU courts. Cameron II is a 6-6 sophomore shooting guard who comes off the bench for the Rough Riders.In other words, he went from being a 6-6 backup shooting guard in his sophomore season to 6-9 starting center in his junior season. With the foot injury holding him back early, he doesn't even have a full season's experience playing in the frontcourt. So his rapid climb in the Bolus Ratings is obviously based partly on his potential and not entirely on his performance to date.As Rasor wrote in his blog earlier this year:After watching him a couple times, the ABJ's Michael Beaven said this about Black: "I think he is a pretty good player. He is about 6-8 or 6-9 and probably about 220 pounds or so. He scores mostly around the basket and is a good rebounder. He probably needs to add some muscle to play in the MAC."Adding bulk may not be a Black family problem based on the following from the December 2007 newspaper story:He has a younger brother (Curtis), who at 6-2, 265 pounds is a member of the 8th grade championship football and undefeated basketball teams.It's hard to predict how quickly HS players will continue to develop before graduation. But if his game keeps growing at this rate during his senior season, he could potentially be more than a college walk-on.Let's see how long it takes Scout and Rivals to suddenly "discover" him.

Through 3-29 the Zips made 33.2% of their 3 point attempts (196th in Div. 1), and 41.8% of their 2 point attempts (251st in Div. 1). In other words, they averaged just a hair under 1 point per 3 point shot, but averaged only .41 points per 2 point attempt. Sounds like they should forget going after big guys, recruit only guards, and launch nothing but 3s.OK, so you're not a math major. Actually, .418 x 2 = .836 points per 2-point shot and .332 x 3 = .996 points per 3-point shot. That's not a bad balance. If you focus on one to the exclusion of the other, defenses can set up for it. So it pays to shoot a good balance of 2s and 3s. But both percentages will need to go up if the Zips team hopes to climb to a higher level. Defense alone will not do it.

GoZips, I'm wondering how recent your information is about Black. The reason I ask is because he appears to be on a rapid upward climb in the Bolus Ratings. Black was not even mentioned in the Bolus pre-season report on Ohio HS basketball. His name was appended at the bottom of the pre-season rankings in January as "Additional Ohio Newcomer" (see link below). Just two months later in the March edition I linked to in my previous post, Black had risen to the Second 12 among all Ohio HS underclassmen. If he went from no mention in the initial ratings to second best 12 underclassmen in his junior season, he may be a much better player now than what you might have seen or heard of earlier this season.Cameron Black Added to Bolus Ratings

It's great that he lists UA as his first choice, and ironic that he lists Penn State second, as Zeke's father starred at PSU.He's an intriguing prospect. The dimensions are certainly impressive for a high school junior (6-9, 225 lbs, 7-2 wingspan) -- pretty similar to both Adreian Payne and Andrew Parrish. His HS stats are not as impressive as their's. But poking around some HS basketball forums, I saw it mentioned that Black played the first half of the season on a bum foot, and someone made the observation that he was a real "beast" the second half of the season after his foot got better.The fact that he's not listed on Scout or Rivals could be bad and/or good news. It may be that they have evaluated him as not ready for D1, or it may be that they've just overlooked him. He could be a late bloomer who has started blossoming over the last year and isn't yet on everyone's radar. You'd think a player whose father coaches basketball might have an advantage in learning fundamentals at an early age. Maybe someone on this forum knows someone who has seen him play and can give us an unofficial evaluation.Finally, I just discovered that Rick Bolus' High Potential Basketball Recruiting Service's latest rankings have Black listed in the second 12 of Ohio's best HS underclassmen. So maybe he is starting to show up on some radars.Bolus Ratings

The real question is how the piece was perceived by the rest of the country who don't know all the little things we know about LeBron and Akron. From my perspective, the single most important message is that the man who either already is or may soon be the best and most influential professional basketball player/businessman on the planet chooses to live in Akron, Ohio. I got that message out of the piece, but I was looking for it. I'm not sure how someone in New York, Chicago or Los Angeles saw it.

Thanks, g-mann17, for reinforcing my point that there are many variables and detailed factors that we fans do not have the time to research nor the expertise to professionally evaluate. For example, MTSU's home attendace was readily available for the last decade, but not for the first 25 years of the facility. So while the numbers I posted have some relevance, they are far from complete. One might ask what kind of attendance increase MTSU would get if they built a new, state-of-the-art, 11,000-seat arena to replace their 36-year-old one, as well as what the effect on attendance might be if they built the new one in a different location. As I said, lots of variables requiring lots of research and evaluation.I've also said in this thread that it doesn't matter to me which location is selected, so I'm obviously not just looking at solely a UA arena. If a downtown arena in partnership with the City of Akron and/or others works better for everyone than the current UA location, I'm fine with that. To avoid misunderstanding, I'll stop referring to it as a UA arena and just call it generically a new Akron arena.

It's interesting that when quality players sign with major basketball schools, the programs tend to get a lot of credit for the performance of the team. But when quality players sign with schools that don't have a long record of winning at the national level, more credit for the team's performance is given to the players. One great player alone might not be enough to lift a smaller program to national prominence. But several highly ranked players going to the same school can have a huge impact on college basketball.UA is on a roll right now, with the conference championship, the competitive game against Gonzaga and the signing of Zeke. Running through all of this is the LeBron factor, as noted in the national stories on UA being in the NCAA tournament, and most recently on 60 Minutes.I'd sure like to know just how much effect LeBron's association with the City of Akron and UA has on the minds of the country's top high school basketball players who aspire to be the next LeBron.

Skip, my comment was really a general one to anyone who might get the idea that MTSU's arena would be a good example to encourage similar invesment at UA. The key factor in any investment is ROI (return on investment). The key measure of an arena's ROI is BIS (butts in seats). To the best of my knowledge, no one on this forum has the time or expertise to do a thorough evaluation of all the pros and cons of a new multi-million dollar arena. But it took me only 5 minutes to click through MTSU's men's basketball stats to see they have averaged less than 4,000 fans in their 11,000-seat arena over the course of the last decade.Now, as a fan, sure I want the Zips to have a huge, magnificent basketball facility. But things could get pretty nasty among the investors if the facility they finance ends up with as many empty seats as MTSU.Xavier and Dayton are better examples of successful new arenas built around successful basketball teams with ever increasing attendance. I would expect those responsible for the UA facility to study both successful and unsuccessful arena efforts to see what works and what doesn't, and then try to determine what type and size of arena is most likely to succeed in Akron.Ideally, LeBron James would somehow be involved in this effort to have a first class basketball facility in his hometown. As long as he continues to live in and support his hometown, Akron will always have an extra dimension when it comes to basketball.

As Zips fans we should all be optimistic about Zeke's potential to make the Zips an even better team. I think we all understand that no matter what we may wish for, Zeke's playing time will be totally dependent on how the Zips coaching staff evaluates his progress. If we're overly optimistic about what Zeke can do right out of the box, we may be disappointed. On the other hand, if we're too pessimistic, we may be pleasantly surprised. Every year, some first year collegiate players outperform their high school rankings while others underperform. I don't know of any sure way to predict who will do what. Maybe the old saying about hoping for the best but preparing for the worst is a good way to look at it with any first year player.

Dig a little bit deeper into the Middle Tennessee website and you'll find that the men's basketball team's average home game attendance this season in that 11,000-seat arena was 3,833 -- and that includes an announced attendance of 11,802 for a home game against Tennessee. Subtract that one game, and they averaged about the same attendance as the Zips at the JAR. So I would not hold this up as a great example of the value of a new multi-million-dollar arena investment.

Bardo played 535 minutes this season in prime time and Swiech played 29 minutes at the end of a few blowout games. Their combined game time pales into insignificance compared with the hundreds of hours they worked their butts off on conditioning and practicing under the watchful eyes of the coaching staff, where Bardo earned the right to 535 minutes of prime time vs. Swiech's 29 minutes of mop-up time.Basketball is all about stars, starters, super subs, subs, role players and seldom-used subs who are all instrumental in creating a team. I have the greatest admiration and respect for anyone who puts in so many hours of effort trying to earn game time, no matter how many game minutes they actually earn. If we examine them all closely under a microscope, we'll finds warts on each and every one of them, just as each and every one of us fans has warts of our own.How far do you want to carry this discussion?