New Site

http://battledoesitagain.com/

Bam. The design and layout are certainly not finished, but it’s good enough to start blogging on. The future of this blog now resides there. So with that, I say goodbye to CnC. It’s been fun.

Media Day Recap

Aghhhhh, the season is so close and I’m swamped with exams the next two weeks. Frustrating because I have so much I want to start previewing and I’m probably not going to get to it all. And FWIW, although it might not seem like it, I am spending time on my blog…just not here. It’s going into getting the new site together. Once it’s ready (hopefully by November 1st), I’ll let you know.

So anyway, the team had it’s own version of midnight madness on Saturday afternoon before the homecoming football game. With everyone in town and literally nothing to do since tailgating was nixed before the game, I was pretty disappointed with the crowd (maybe 2 grand, 75% of whom were of the older demographic waiting for TailGreat with the Blue Band). The guy next to me was sleeping the entire time.

The team was in the middle of a 2-hour practice when they opened the doors to the BJC at 11 AM. They then had a 20 minute scrimmage with refs and everything. It was a running 10 minute clock for two halves. I’m not going to sit here and analyze it because frankly, it’s unfair to the players. They had just finished their second full practice of the season, and they were noticeably tired. Also, they only played for a few minutes. All I can say is that all of the freshmen gave some good impressions. They deserve to be playing at a D-1 school and they’ll definitely contribute. That certainly hasn’t been a given with new recruits the first 6 seasons of the DeChellis era. You can check out video highlights of the scrimmage and the ensuing Dunk Contest and 3 pt Contest at Happy Valley Hoops. You can also read other fans reactions and impressions over at PSHoops.com.

Penn State Media Day was yesterday. You can really get the complete recap of press conferences and player interviews at GoPSUSports. Below is a list of articles that have come out the last two days:

• From Jeff Rice: Nittany Lions give fans show, Lions hoping for a healthy Oliver, Ready for Battle
• From the Collegian: Lions basketball returns to the BJC, Guard growing into leading role, Flu affecting two Penn State players
• From Genaro Armas (AP): After NIT win, Penn State men’s basketball hopes for return to NCAA tournament
• From Cory Giger: Lion in his hands
• From Mark Brennan: Nittany Lions have unfinished business
• From Tricia Lafferty: Penn State coach DeChellis has high hopes this basketball season
• From Ben Brigandi: Penn State basketball looks to build off NIT title

A few other things of interest. I was interviewed by Dylan at UMHoops on my thoughts for PSU on the upcoming season. It will give you an impression on my general feelings before I dive into my in-depth preview stuff. Also, be sure to check in with Big Ten Geeks. Their PSU recap and preview should be coming very shortly (perhaps even tomorrow).

Basketball is back.

DeChellis receives contract extension

Press Release

I don’t know too many coaches who’ve gone 6 years at a BCS school without ever reaching the NCAAs receive coaching extensions, but DeChellis has.  However, he’s certainly made progress last year and it seems silly to not see this thing through. He’s now employed until after the 2013-2014 season. Usually extensions like this are used as recruiting tools to show coach stability. I would hope if Battle comes and goes without getting to the NCAA tournament that we would re-evaluate the program. But that is a long ways down the road (and an unlikely scenario IMO), so for now, congrats to DeChellis.

We’re Getting Close…

Happy October everybody! This signals the season is approximately one month away. Here are some important dates on the horizon:

• If you’re in the Harrisburg area and have no plans tonight, hurry up and a reserve a spot at the Central PA Basketball Preview dinner. DeChellis, Battle, Jackson, and Jones will be in attendance.
• If you’re a student, season tickets sale is one week from today. It’s at the HUB again in Alumni Hall (starts at 10 AM).  Sounds like there’ll be the fanfare as last year’s sale. The players will be out, and there’ll be food, raffles, and prizes.
• Official practice starts October 16th.
• There’ll be a Blue-White scrimmage again in the BJC on October 17th (homecoming against Minnesota). It is free to the public.

Also, look forward to more blogging from me (and hopefully a new site).  Team previews, expectations, analysis, random thoughts, maybe even some recruiting nuggets if I can find some. I can’t wait.

Back at School

The offseason got so boring after the schedule was basically finalized, I just stopped posting. But now that school’s back in session and another boring Big Ten football season is about to take place, basketball is back on my mind. Here’s basically what has gone down this summer if you really use this blog as your only source for PSU basketball news:

• Jamelle and Stanley have signed contracts overseas.
• Talor finished the WUG as the team’s leading scorer and a bronze medalist. Jeff Rice wrote an article about how Talor’s game has improved because of the experience.
• Battle is on the Wooden Award watch list with 49 other players.
• Battle’s family has officially moved to State College and Taran will be playing for the Little Lions next season. I look forward to catching many of their games as well.
• All the incoming freshmen have been on campus since the second summer session. Jeff Rice and BWI wrote articles on all the incoming players.
• We have a ton of national TV games on next year’s schedule…and none of them are against Northwestern! Progress.

Otherwise, it’s been a pretty slow summer.  Be sure to check out ESPN’s shootaround, which gives a nice early preview of the Big Ten next season.

More posts and news once the season nears…

09-10 Non-Con released

Man, who knew going out after a day’s work on Monday would allow me to miss the highlight basketball announcement of the summer: the 2009-2010 Non-Conference schedule, ladies and gentlemen.

First thought: DeChellis finally got the message and he wants us all to know it.  I asked who knew because this is by far the earliest the schedule’s been released in recent memory. It generally dropped along with the conference schedule in August or September. It was released ‘early’ last year at the end of July.

Don’t you love the PR spins in the official release?

Penn State’s nine guaranteed non-conference opponents will bring an average RPI of 134, based on RPIs at the end of 2008-09 campaign, into the 2009-10 season. That is better than 80 RPI points lower than the average of last seasons 13 non-conference opponents entering the season.

“We consulted several people in the conference and nationally to make sure we were making the right decisions in regards to effecting our RPI and tournament resume should we be able to put ourselves in that position at the end of the season.”

After 6 seasons, DeChellis was finally forced to solve the RPI puzzle to scheduling after getting beaten to death with the topic in March. At least the lesson has been learned. My only gripe is there is an absence of an ‘elite’ team. Va Tech with Delaney and Allen returning will be pretty good. South Carolina will be talented if we meet them in the CC. But it would’ve been nice to have a sure top 25 opponent that could help our young team prepare for what looks to be a rugged Big Ten, next season.

Here’s the schedule (with 08-09 RPI #’s):

11/13/09 – Penn (258)
11/16/09 – Robert Morris (109)
11/19,20,22/09 @ Charleston Classic – (Miami 65, South Carolina 57, South Florida 190, Davidson 69, Tulane 188, LaSalle 112, UNC Wilmington 277)
11/25/09 – Sacred Heart (182)
11/30/09 – @ Virginia (114)
12/05/09 – @ Temple (30)
12/08/09 – Maryland Baltimore County (163)
12/12/09 – Virginia Tech (61)
12/19/09 – Gardner-Webb (218)
12/21/09 – American (73)

I will have more on why this schedule, despite the absence of big name schools, will be loaded with RPI juice. I might not have to if David Jones’ article covers the job. I look forward to reading his relief and joy about this year’s slate after following 5 straight embarrassing schedules.

Our OOC resume will be much more appealing come next March. At the very least, it won’t prevent us from making the Dance. Unless, of course, we lose a lot of these games – which is how it should be.

Checking in on Talor

Our hero, Talor Battle, has been in Belgrade, Serbia the last week in preparation for the World University Games with the USA basketball team. It’s hard to blog about something I can’t witness, unfortunately, so I suggest if you’re interested in following Talor and the team, just keep checking the USA Basketball website. There are plenty of photos and reports from the team’s events.

Just to bring you up to speed on what’s been happening, the WUG squad had 3 exhibitions in the 2009 Serbia International Invitational last week to prepare for the actual Universiade games that begin today for the US.  They beat Canada and Russia, but lost to Serbia in the competition. Coach Bo Ryan has given Talor plenty of playing time (20.7 MPG, 4th highest on the team), but Talor’s been struggling quite a bit, at least from the floor (24% from the floor, 30% from 3, and just 46% from the foul line (sigh)). It’s tough to explain those numbers without seeing any action, but I would have to assume Talor is struggling to adjust to the officiating and physicality of the foreign game. Battle has only been credited for 5 assists in three games, but that leads the team. The USA have assisted just 19 of their 79 made baskets, so there’s some wild scorekeeping going on in Serbia. But typical Bubby was making plays at the end of games, especially against the USA’s close-call victory over Russia.

“The guys got it done tonight with hustle opportunities,” said USA and University of Wisconsin head coach Bo Ryan. “(Evan) Turner, (Robbie) Hummel and Deon (Thompson), those guys, especially at the end, they were everywhere. Corey (Fisher) and Talor Battle. I just really like the way they stuck their noses in there.”

The actual World University Games began yesterday, but the USA’s first game is today (at 2:00 PM EST) against Finland.  I’m not exactly sure how this tournament is set up, but there are 8 different pools consisting of either 3 or 4 teams. USA is in a pool with Finland and South Korea. According to the USA site:

The United States is set to open World University Games play on July 3 against Finland (2:00 p.m. EDT) and faces South Korea on July 4 (2:00 p.m.). Second round action is scheduled for July 6-7, quarterfinals will be played July 9 and medal semifinals are slated for July 10. The gold medal will be contested on July 11 (3:00 p.m. EDT).

There’s no video or audio coverage that I could find. Maybe that’ll change if the US gets to the finals or something. Let’s go USA!

PS: Luke Winn wrote a nice 1-page article in Sports Illustrated last week about Talor if you didn’t see it.

Tim Frazier is still an athletic freak

Tiny-mini showing off for some campers. Poor Brooks looks so average in this video when you see what Tim’s pulling off. Who knew we were bringing in another guard who was more athletic than Talor Battle? They’re going to be fun to watch. (And FWIW, the second summer session began last week, so all the incoming freshmen are on campus with the rest of the team except Talor).