Griz center Darko Milicic participated in a full-contact practice today and wasn’t bothered by the sprained left thumb that’s kept him out of action the past two weeks.

Team brass continues to say that Milicic will be a “game-time decision” when the Griz host Minnesota tomorrow. But all signs point to Milicic returning after a seven-game layoff.

“It’s fine,” Milicic said. “My conditioning feels good. I’m ready.”

Milicic re-iterated that he won’t play with the thumb heavily taped nor will he wear a protective brace. The 7-footer is left handed so he wouldn’t be able to catch the basketball.

He’ll deal with some pain and hope the thumb doesn’t get whacked again.

Griz head coach Marc Iavaroni said he’s still toying with whether to re-insert Milicic into the starting lineup or continue to play a small group with Juan Carlos Navarro at shooting guard and Rudy Gay at power forward.

Funny how winning games and going to bowls makes me more talkative. My wife is complaining so I have to write it out here.

Here’s an interesting little tid bit that will make you Memphis Tigers fans smile. The rest of the regional fans not so much. Thanks to my good friend JH, I found out that University of Memphis is one of seven schools to see their baseball team play in the NCAA baseball regionals; basketball team play in the NCAA mens basketball regionals; and have their football team play in a bowl game. Mississippi can’t say it. The folks in knoxville can’t say that. In fact, no one else in the country can say it except Ohio State, Texas A&M, Texas, UCLA, Arkansas, Louisville and we little ole Tigers. Hahahahahahahaha
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Regardless of which players leave early for the NBA, we all know one who certainly won’t be around next season. Memphis will not be the same team without senior forward Joey Dorsey. John Calipari knows that, and he wouldn’t pretend otherwise. So what do the Tigers do to fill that hole for 2008-09?

Though Angel Garcia is 6-11, almost 7-foot, he is more of a skilled wing/power forward rather than a shot-blocker/rebounder in the post. So should the Tigers just hope and pray that Pierre Niles gets in shape and is ready to play next season? Do they bet on Hashim Bailey improving? Or do they bring in somebody who can play center?

The problem is that the 2008 recruiting class — which isn’t particularly strong to begin with — has pretty much been picked over. Very few top-100 players remain. There is one, however, who could fit Memphis’ needs. Don’t be surprised if the Tigers try to make a strong late push for Matt Simpkins, a 6-foot-8 power forward ranked 47th in the country by Rivals.com. Simpkins is one of just a handful of top players who has not yet committed. And despite the fact that recruiting services have not listed Memphis among his college choices, there is one factor working in the Tigers’ favor. Simpkins attends The Patterson School, where he is coached by Chris Chaney. That name should sound familiar to Memphis fans, since Chaney has coached several current and former Tigers: Robert Dozier, Antonio Anderson and Shawne Williams, among others.

Griz fans, are you missing Mike Conley? If you want to see just how good he is at dribbling the basketball, click here.

THE BIG STORY

Incoming Arkansas athletic director Jeff Long broke his silence Wednesday regarding his search to find Houston Nutt’s replacement. Long spoke in mostly general terms during an impromptu news conference held during halftime of Wednesday night’s basketball game between Arkansas and Missouri in Bud Walton Arena.

“I would say coaches in the SEC have expressed an interest in our job, yes,” Long said during the 12-minute news conference in front of a room full of reporters.

While Long didn’t mention any candidates by name, Oakland Raiders coach Lane Kiffin and Auburn coach Tommy Tuberville appear to be at the top of his list to be Arkansas’ next football coach. Tuberville reportedly agreed in principle to a contract extension with Auburn earlier this week, but there are some contractual issues that need to be resolved before a deal can be finalized.

Speculation about Tuberville’s future intensified Wednesday when he didn’t meet with Auburn athletic director Jay Jacobs as expected. A source close to Tuberville told The Morning News on Wednesday afternoon that the Auburn coach remains a candidate to replace Nutt at Arkansas. Long avoided directly answering a question about whether any SEC West coaches, presumably Tuberville, have expressed an interest in Arkansas’ coaching vacancy.

“I won’t narrow it that far, but I will say that many of the reports about an SEC West coach are extremely premature and actually aren’t even premature,” Long said. “They’re fantasy.”

Tuberville, a Camden native, is expected to spend the next few days duck hunting in Stuttgart. He was a finalist to coach the Razorbacks in 1997, but Nutt got the job instead. Tuberville will make an average of $3.1 million over the remaining four years of the contract he signed following the 2004 season, according to The Mobile Press-Register. His contract also includes a $6 million buyout.

Long said he’d be willing to work on a buyout if one existed with a potential candidate.

“We haven’t gotten to that point in any conversations,” Long said. “And we’ll deal with that when we get there, if there is an issue there to be dealt with.”

Long said he’s already interviewed “lots” of candidates on the phone, and had several face-to-face meetings since Nutt turned in his resignation Monday morning.

A look at the league: Read the rest of this entry »

I was going to keep going on my recaps but after seeing the post-season awards come in I got really irritated, really quick. The Tigers not getting any players on the first team is a pure and simple rip off. Here’s the guys I think got screwed the most in the C-USA post-season awards.

1. Martin Hankins–Martin averaged over 290 yards a game passing in the games he played. Had he played all 12 games he would have passed for over 3500 yards. But you saw all the stats I reeled off earlier this week. His performance was the difference in the Tigers finishing 7-5 instead of another year at the bottom of C-USA. The last six games of the season were not only remarkable but down right OUTSTANDING. Sorry for shouting but this is pretty damn insulting to me. For Martin not to be named as one of the top 3 QB’s in C-USA goes to show you that media members aren’t as smart as they think they are.

2. Carlos Singleton–Carlos is a game changer. His presence on the field changes defenses and embarrasses DBs. There are CB’s still thinking about the nightmare they had trying to cover all six foot eight of him. I dare any media member to name six WR’s better than Carlos in this league.

3. Duke Calhoun–He’s the one they got closest to right. Duke made 2nd team. Apparantly his 850 while splitting snaps isn’t impressive enough to impress hack beat writes in Houston and the other C-USA papers who ignore the league until the end of the year.

4. Tommy West–Yes, I said Tommy West. Coach West revitalized this team to a 7-5 record after starting 2-4. The job he and his staff did taking a program that was 4-14 over 2006 and 2007 to finish 5-1 was nothing short of amazing. These same voters voted the Tigers to finish at BEST 4th in the East as ninth overall in the league. They finished one game out of first in the league. He also did it with 4 LB’s out for the season and 7 new coaches on staff. When Tommy made turned the Tigers around in 2003 he was shunned by the C-USA media and they did it again. Can you name one team that made that much of a turnaround in this league? Please, go ahead, try. You can’t do it because it wasn’t done. I’ve heard they won the conference so that’s why he won it argument. That’s male bovine feces. Was Cal Coach of the Year the last two seasons in basketball? No. But he won the conference on the way to winning 31 of 32 conference games over a two season stretch. Did O’Leary come close to that type of accomplishment?

The media members of C-USA appartantly are as smart as the space their papers give to most of the C-USA schools. Outside of us, Southern Miss and East Carolina the newspapers in home cities of C-USA bury them on the back pages. So I guess it should be expected that they vote blindly and stupidly.

I often get asked how I come up with certain angles to write about after each game. I abide by a very simple philosophy. If I were a fan sitting in the stands watching the game and going to a nearby bar on Beale Street afterwards, what’s the first thing I’d tell somebody who didn’t see the game about what I just saw?

Last night, the thing that stood out to me above all else was the Tigers’ defense. Sure, Memphis has made tons of strides offensively in the past couple weeks. But I just don’t get the sense yet that the players have made a commitment yet to being a lockdown defensive team. When I went in the locker room to interview players and coach John Calipari, the party line seemed to be that the Tigers played good defense and Austin Peay simply made shots.

Sure, statistics can sometimes be misleading. Opponents might have nights where everything seems to go in. But still, 53.6 percent is 53.6 percent, and that’s what Austin Peay shot from the field last night. (FYI, they were shooting 57 percent with 12 minutes to go.) And that comes on the heels of Arkansas State shooting 46.9 percent against the Tigers.

So for comparison’s sake, I went back and looked at last year’s games against the “buy” teams on Memphis’ schedule:

Jackson State: 20-for-61 (32.8%)
Arkansas State: 23-for-53 (43.4%)
Manhattan: 18-for-53 (34.0%)
Austin Peay: 19-for-54 (35.2%)
Middle Tennessee: 18-for-55 (32.7%)
Lamar: 20-for-64 (31.3%)

I think it’s pretty black and white, but feel free to draw your own conclusions.