Big 12 Appears To Be Cut From Basketball Mold

The Big 12’s inaugural football season got off to a rough start, with the teams winning only 12 of the first 19 non-conference games.

The basketball teams have started with a bit more success, going 45-7 through Thursday night’s games, and that includes Nebraska’s loss to Texas in a non-conference game between league members.

The basketball coaches also have to hope to do better with postseason bids than their football counterparts, who fell one short of filling the six bowl berths allotted for the league.

“The teams in the Big 12 are as good as any of the teams in the country,” Colorado coach Ricardo Patton said. “There are some good programs in this league. That will be the case year in and year out because of the caliber of the programs and the coaches in this league.”

Top-ranked Kansas leads three league teams in the Top 25, joined by No. 9 Iowa State and No. 18 Texas. Texas Tech appears ready to enter the rankings after beating then-No. 25 George Washington and No. 11 New Mexico in a five-day span.

Smooth Rhodes

One of the most talked-about transfers in recent years had a successful start to his second career.

Rodrick Rhodes left Kentucky following his sophomore season after he had entered his name for the NBA draft, then withdrew it, amid rumors he was pushed out of the program in a scholarship numbers crunch.

The 6-foot-7 swingman had 29 points and nine rebounds in his debut with Southern California, a 77-70 victory over Long Beach State.

Kentucky won the national championship in the season Rhodes had to sit out as a transfer, with freshman Ron Mercer, the player who took his spot, playing a key role for the Wildcats.

Some WAC

The Western Athletic Conference is easily college basketball’s biggest conference with 16 teams. It is also one of the best.

For the first time in its history, the WAC has four ranked teams: No. 3 Utah, No. 11 New Mexico, No. 13 Fresno State and No. 21 Tulsa.

New Mexico had an impressive first for the conference last week, with an 84-77 victory over Arizona. It was the WAC’s first win over Arizona since New Mexico beat the then-No. 1 Wildcats 61-59 on Jan. 2, 1988.

Same score

Ochenta y tres a setenta y cuatro. That was the score seen or heard by anyone who attended one of Tennessee-Chattanooga’s three games at the San Juan Shootout last weekend.

The Moccasins lost to Missouri in the opening round, 83-74. They followed that with an 83-74 loss to Delaware in the consolation semifinals. In the fifth-place game, Tennessee- Chattanooga beat the University of Puerto Rico-Mayaguez 83-74.

Opposite Orange

Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim had to know it would be up and down early with such a young team. Games 2 and 3 were quite a ride.

The Orangemen opened play in the Great Alaska Shootout against Kentucky, the team they lost to in last season’s national championship game. With a season-opening squashing of Winthrop under its belt, Syracuse was thrashed 87-53 by Kentucky and went 1-for-11 from 3-point range.

Less than 24 hours later, the Orangemen rebounded with an 85-65 victory over Maine, a game that saw them go 13-for-25 in setting a school mark for 3-pointers made.

Since then, Syracuse has lost to West Virginia and Miami.

Any Volunteers?

This has been a tough couple of months for Tennessee fans.

Memphis beat the Volunteers 21-17 last month, its first football victory over its in-state rival after losing 15 consecutive games, a streak dating to 1968.

On Wednesday night, Tennessee Tech beat the Volunteers 73-62, its first basketball victory over its in-state rival after losing 16 straight games, a streak dating to 1939.

Brochure envy

As a playing host of the annual Maui Invitational, Chaminade, a 1,000-student Division II school in Honolulu, knows it’s going to be at a big disadvantage with seven prominent Division I programs making up the rest of the field.

Still, first-year Silverswords coach Al Walker was a bit taken aback when he saw the media guides from Kansas, Massachusetts, Virginia, South Carolina, California, Iowa and LSU on a table with his school’s.

“I think your media guide budgets are bigger than the athletic department budget at Chaminade,” he said.

The Silverswords lost all three games this season and are 3-34 in serving as host over the 13 tournaments, the first two with only four-team fields.

Changing colors

When Georgetown beat Seton Hall last week in the Big East opener for both, the Hoyas were wearing white uniforms, something they hadn’t done since the 1981-82 season.

Since then, Georgetown’s uniforms have been gray at home and dark blue on the road. The gray uniforms will still be the traditional home color, although the white ones could still make an appearance or two during the season.

Anchors aweigh

Navy’s 68-62 victory over VMI on Thursday gave the Midshipmen a 5-1 record, their best start since the 1986-87 season. That was the senior year of the best center in academy history, David Robinson.

Big numbers

Duke’s 72-66 overtime victory over Florida State on Thursday night made it the fifth school to reach the 1,500-win plateau, joining North Carolina, Kentucky, Kansas and St. John’s.

The door to the exclusive group won’t open again until at least late in the 1997-98 season. Temple is next on the list, with 1,455 victories.

The rest of the Top Ten entering this season were: Oregon State (1,434), Syracuse (1,432), Penn (1,425) and Notre Dame (1,398).

Relative coaching

When Canisius won its opener over Western Michigan, fifth-year coach John Beilein moved into fifth place on the school’s coaching list with 73 victories. He passed his uncle, Joe Niland, who coached the Golden Griffins from 1948-53.