111810Picks

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To me the real feature game of the night is Notre Dame versus UCLA

UCLA has been ranked pretty high in a PAC 10 which really hasnt earned its major status lately except of being lucky that they have Stanford in it. UCLA has some players though and NIkki Caldwell has done a fantastic job building up that program in such a short amount of time allowing kids to have an option to stay out West in So Cal to go to school.

Notre Dame is good though, one player who's been left out of too many conversations is freshman Natalie Achonwa who played on Canada's Senior National Team at 16 years old, the front court player could develop into one of the better players for the Irish who've had a good Devereaux Peters for sometime but Peters really has had issues staying healthy. Add in All-Word Skylar Diggins and Notre Dame could be better then they were last year.

I expect this to be a pretty fast pace high scoring game in which Notre Dame playing at home in South Bend should pull out. My Pick: Notre Dame 83 UCLA 72

Duke vs Auburn

Second dose of high level ACC play for Auburn in less then a week, coming off a close loss to Florida State at home Auburn travels out to Louisville again to play Duke. Duke is coming off a pretty convincing win against USC where they won by 25. I think this game could be around the same, likely for Duke to be winning by high double figures. Duke grinds it out on you and looks like one of the more balanced teams in the country at this point. My Pick: Duke 71 Auburn 56

Tennessee vs Virginia

Tennessee is good this year, it'll be interesting to see how many consecutive games that Simmons can put up 20 or more and tonights guard match up with Chyna Crosby will be her second test and the first one she passed pretty easily versus Shoni Schimmel (Louisville). Tennessee's overall size and athleticism is going to cause big problems for UVA who lacks an offensive weapon like Monica Wright they have had in the past. If Virginia can keep this close they might be a top half of the ACC team but at this point I am not really convinced of that.

The Pick: Tennesse 81 UVA 57

Other Notes: Look for Samford who plays a similar style to Vandy to possibly keep it close in that game tonight both teams are execution fundemental teams obviously Vandy's got more soldiers but Samford's well coached.

South Carolina and Clemson battle for the State bragging rights, Clemson has a new coach and South Carolina has a pretty new team I like South Carolina in this one but not sure by how much. South Carolina had a pretty good win over Illinois the other day at home and looks to be better then many predicted at the start of the season.

Florida vs Depaul - Florida's beat two mid majors that arnt going to win their league now roll up to Chicago to play an expirienced DePaul team many have high expectations for in the Big East. Florida's lack of skilled guard play and post offensive capability make this first game against a BCS opponant a bad match up for the Gators. The Pick Depaul 77 Florida 51

Princeton vs Rutgers - You have defense versus offensive execution ... Rutgers comes back from a 0-2 road trip to play the defending Ivy League Champs and I'll pick my upset special Princeton 49 Rutgers 46 in a low scoring game.

Ole Miss vs Arizona - Valencia McFarland is a player to watch for Ole Miss who's had some close calls but still is 2-0 as is the visitor Arizona who rolls in to Oxford tonight. I think that Ole Miss is pretty well coached and will continue to improve throughout the season and if McFarland has a strong offensive game they'll prevail at home. The pick Ole Miss 66 Arizona 59

Other Games to watch

Green Bay vs Wisconcin - The Pick Green Bay by 7
NC A&T vs Old Dominion - The Pick NC A&T by 3
Memphis vs Indiana - The Pick Memphis by 4

FAUJU

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Back on the scene for a little college basketball action

Jacksonville nearly beat South Florida the last time out only to fall in the end. FAU after routing Webber on Friday, were upset by Kennesaw State.

Talking with Coach Dugan, FAU will be missing their top returning player, Lyrell Barfield 5-8 G SR for an extended period of time. This is FAU’s real play maker in the back court and from the looks of the game will really hurt them as long as she is out. That being said their freshman will need to keep stepping up, freshman Kim Smith (Minneola, Fl), Latavia Dempsey (St. Petersburg, Fl), and Chaquera Kent (Titusville, Fl) are averaging 24.5 points per game more then 25% of the teams offense and averaging nearly 50 minutes per game collectively.

FAU I predicted to be one of the better teams in the Sun Belt this year, I still believe that to some extent but a lot will depend on their trip to Jacksonville, nothing more then 3-1 would really make me think that. While I am a little more optimistic then most, FAU has lots of new players.

JU had a down year by their standards last year but looks strong with a route of the University of Tampa in the pre-season and playing USF close in the first part of the year.

I told Coach Dunn earlier in practice whoever signed Crystal Bell 5-8 JR should get a bonus because the kid is just making plays all over the court and while she doesn’t have a ton of skill scoring the ball she is big on both the offensive end (rebounding) and on defense where she’s a freak athletically.

Kim Smith 5-8 G from Minneola, Fl makes her first start tonight as a freshman for FAU tonight, Smith led FAU with 23 points in their first game and has been first or second in minutes played their first two games as well.

The story of the first half was the ability for Jacksonville to take 17 more shots then Florida Atlantic and while JU Just shot 33% from the field they had four more makes then Florida Atlantic who shot only 39%. Florida Atlantic turned the ball over 13 times and allowed 14 offensive rebounds in the first half alone.

Ashanti Williams busted out with a big first half for the Dolphins with 12 points hitting 2 3’s and four freethrows while going 3 for 5 from the field. FAU was more spread out with their point distribution and had had 9 different players score in the first half. Jacksonville lead Florida Atlantic 40-34 at the break .

Florida Atlantic was somewhat handcuffed by the scouting report and played Jacksonville a lot of 2-3 zone but the reality is that you probably should pressure JU they really lack point guard play with only having a freshman in Ronisha Mitchell and Jennifer George a junior who isn’t particularly athletic. Also in the book was stopping GiGi Thomas and FAU did a pretty effective job of that limiting her to just 2 freethrows on 0-2 shooting from the field in the first half.

FAU isn’t really dominant in the paint or at point and really you have to have one or the other, their freshman are a little passive right now you can tell there is a lot of indecision on who’s job it is to carry the team.

FAU struggled to handle the ball and get rebounds which really cost them the game. Defensively they’re so new and havnt really got a lot of team defense going yet and have a lot of new kids who don’t really understand the need for intensity on defense they couldn’t really come back and force turnovers when they got down at the end. They made a few plays on defense before just falling apart with 3 turnovers and 2 offensive rebounds in the last minute of the game only trailing 6. The final score ended up being 78-66.

Terri Stamps led FAU in scoring but they really needed her more on defense and to attack to get others involved for the team’s success.

Enough about FAU….JU is much improved from last year super athletic and playing really hard. It’d be hard for me to imagine they’d finish worse then 4th in the ASUN and have a chance to knock off Wake Forest in a few weeks when the roll into town. Some of the stats for JU where pretty impressive . Ashanti Williams finished with 22 points on 7 of 12 from the field. Both Taneskei Richardson and Lynsey Paschal finished with double doubles …. Paschall 13 & 10 and Richardson 11 and 17. Fau committed 22 turnovers and gave up 24 offensive rebounds and everyone knows as long as that happens you cant win.

MorganTuck

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Keil Moore from Peach State Basketball reports that Morgan Tuck 6-1 F Boilingbrook, IL has committed to UConn.

Tuck was at the Baylor/UConn game last night and had taken several official visits to her top schools which included but were not limited to Duke and Illinois where her sister will attend.

Tuck's commitment is the first in the slew of top front court players that could come out in the 2012 class and to me is only behind Clarksville, Tn's Bashaara Graves in the 2012 power forward class. Graves is rumored to be heading to either Kentucky or Tennessee.

NationalFOY

Who will be National Freshman of the Year? After big performances in their first games Meighan Simmons and Bria Hartley look to be leaders for the honor but there are other candidates as well. Take the chance to vote here on the Florida Insider.



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NorcrossvWheeler

While I was up in Georgia this weekend I took a trip over to Wheeler High School to see 2013 #1 player in the country Diamond DeShields of visiting Norcross.


DeShields is #22; Wake Forest signee Dearica Hamby is #23 , Victoria Carter 2012 offers from Clemson and Florida is #24 , Jasmine Kemp and Patrice Butler are the two posts for Norcross.





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