But neither won the MVP.

The man who did win, where voting is predicated on many things, none of which are criteria prescribed by the league, is both. He is Kobe Bryant.

Bryant’s statistics were not as eye-popping as Paul’s, though he did average 28.3 ppg, 6.3 rpg and 5.4 apg. As far as shooting guards go, his 28.3 ppg are first over second-place Kevin Martin by nearly five points, his 6.3 rpg are 1.5 more per game than his next competitor (Manu Ginobili) and his assists are .7 per game more than the 4.5 averaged by Ginobili. He also led all shooting guards in steals and blocks per game. If you throw in guard-forwards, he is second in rebounds to Josh Howard (7.0) and second in assists to Tracy McGrady (5.9).

What Bryant did far better than any other player in the league according to voters, is lead his team. While Garnett is publicly known as the leader of the Celtics, reporters familiar with Boston say that behind the scenes Ray Allen is the true leader of the team. The leader of the Hornets is said to be iron-fisted but extremely fair headed coach Byron Scott.

With Los Angeles, Bryant is the man. Period. Yes, he has a constant mentor in Phil Jackson, but make no mistake, it is Bryant who every teammate is watching. Bryant is the person with the most experience and is therefore the person who has the ear of every player. And it is Bryant who can, on the floor, choose to involve every other player or take the game into his own hands to the detriment of the players around him.

Sure he has his detractors in the press. Rob Parker of the Detroit News, for instance, says Bryant is “a sham.” He says that “when things are good he says all the right things.” But that’s “only when things are good. I wanna see him be a good teammate when things are bad.”

Parker, though, through his numerous appearances on ESPN programs, 1st and 10 as well as First Take, and in his columns with Detroit News, is prone to delving into hyperbole and making gross blanket statements without backing them with substance.

The question about Bryant, for sportswriters like Parker, is how many truly great players take losing well?

The short answer is none.

A more complete assessment of Bryant’s performance this season by Parker and those writers who share some or all of his beliefs would reveal that Bryant has made fundamental changes in his attitude toward his teammates and the system in which he plays. Superstars calling out teammates or coaches is nothing new for superstars in the NBA. Magic Johnson did it and got Paul Westhead fired. After losing unexpectedly to the Houston Rockets in the first round of the 1980-81 playoffs, Johnson said flatly that his teammates needed to be more professional and take teams seriously and that they needed to get better.

Michael Jordan was known for excoriating teammates during practices and in games; behind closed doors Jordan was willing to engage in fisticuffs if he felt a teammate was failing to give maximum effort. He also got Doug Collins fired. No sooner than did Jordan assume the mantle of the NBA’s best player did he begin to demand that Chicago’s management build a championship team and that his teammates match his fire and play like champions.

Today it is an annual exercise for the Cleveland and some of the New York press to engage in the, what will the Cavalier management do to bring in the players to place around LeBron James necessary to bring a Larry O’Brien trophy to Cleveland? James himself has consistently made sly references to his preference to play in New York – and probably in Brooklyn where his friend Shaun Carter – better-known as Jay Z – is part owner of the New Jersey Nets and has worked feverishly with majority owner Bruce Ratner to move the Nets to the NYC borough.

Yet Bryant’s on and off-court demands and personal foibles have, in the past, been met with skepticism, at least by the press. And they might have cost him one or two MVP awards when he has hands-down been the best player in the NBA for the past five years.

What separates Bryant from his MVP competitors this season is that he has figured out, with the help of head coach Phil Jackson, the keys to squeeze out the best from a team, which until the arrival of Pau Gasol with 30 games remaining in the season, was without another All-Star.

As Jordan had a mentor in Phil Jackson, so does Bryant in the same, but evolved man. Through Bryant we can see that Jackson has, when most people are staid and unmoving, evolved and realizes that today’s young player and young veteran player are of a completely different psychological makeup than the men who surrounded Jordan. And as a result, these players must be motivated in a completely different manner. Bryant, rather than rankle at Jackson’s motivational methods because they might be at odds with his extra-human want to win and the abject anger he feels when he see anything less than personal excellence around him, has too evolved.

The Kobe Bryant we see today and the Kobe Bryant sports journalists with MVP voting capacity see is a man who leads by instructing, prodding and opening himself to playfulness – all with the purpose of emphasizing strengths almost to the exclusion of concentrating on weaknesses. There is no more of the, “tear them down to build them up,” mentality from Jackson or, more importantly, Bryant; no more snide remarks to the press about the inadequacies of teammates, no more on-court berating by the team’s superstar.

The result is a team that, of its 12 players who received meaningful playing time during the regular season, only three were born before 1980, Bryant (1978), Lamar Odom (1979), and the “old man” Derek Fisher (1974). It just so happens that this team successful beyond both its wildest dreams and its collective ability.

Just think of the five main players around Bryant. Lamar Odom has been known as an injury-prone underachiever, Derek Fisher is thought to be too old to keep up with the league’s bevy of young and accomplished point guards, Gasol came to the Lakers with the tag of being gutless in the clutch, Vladimir Radmonovic is the flake who wrenched his leg snowboarding and lied about it to Lakers management, and Luke Walton was thought to be too slow afoot to be anything other than the third or fourth player off the bench on any team.

By no means is this a stellar cast. Without Bryant, it is much more a 30 to 35-win team than it is a Western Conference leading, 57-game winning team. However, with the Phil Jackson and Kobe Bryant of last season, the team would look much more like the Denver Nuggets of this season playing.

And this is where I, in my own assessment of the league’s MVP, leave the at least 50-win criteria, the personal stats and the rest behind. The criteria that I feel should be universal, that is largely ignored by pundits and fans alike, is what type of leader the player is. And the question here is, if the team’s leader is an MVP candidate, is he the catalyst for his teammates maximizing their talent that season?

That is what separates Kobe Bryant from Chris Paul and Kevin Garnett.

With Bryant, this season there was a fundamental change in his coach’s personality. Before training camp began Phil Jackson approached Bryant with this new approach and Bryant saw its value and became the player go-between Jackson and the team.

Jackson, through Bryant, has been able to understand that the present generation of NBA player does not take kindly to screaming and performing a job just because someone with a title of authority tells them it is their job. However, true credit must be given to Jackson for seeing this, understanding it, and passing this knowledge on to his team’s leader. Bryant must be credited with embracing Jackson’s change and channeling it to his younger teammates. It is Bryant who is responsible for fostering a team climate that makes for selflessness on the court, the ability to explore and embellish on the nuances of the triangle offense, and to praise each other no matter the teammate’s strengths and weaknesses.

The result of this implausible transformation is a team with the best record in the Western Conference where the Lakers were separated from the eighth-placed Denver Nuggets by only seven games. Yet when they met in this season’s playoffs, Los Angeles reduced the Nuggets to quitters.

Now Los Angeles is up 2-1 on Utah. Despite the Jazz’s clutch-and-grab tactics and borderline dirty play the Lakers have so far “routined” Utah. They are playing with such a confident ease that all six of their playoff wins more resemble regular season blowouts than they do titanic postseason struggles. In fact, after Game 2 against Utah, Jackson said his team was never threatened offensively.

Few outside of the basketball world realize how monumental a statement that is, especially to make during the playoffs. Jerry Sloan’s teams pride themselves on their tough defense but LA has eased away to 109-98 and 120-110 victories to open the series.

It is Bryant who controls these playoff contests like a master puppeteer, just as he did for 57 wins this season with a young, still in the process of developing, team. Beyond statistics and beyond wins is that which cannot be seen but is the thread that runs through every team and separates the successful season from the underachieving campaign or the bust. It is the nature of the leader. The individuals on the team can progress, players can be added and subtracted to aid chemistry or to fill needed roles, but it is the team leader who conducts this orchestra and makes the parts work night in and night out. And while Paul plays a beautiful game and while Garnett prowls the lane area like an angry lion, Kobe Bryant has elevated himself as a human being.

And because Kobe Bryant embarked on and succeeded in making one of the greatest personality changes in recent NBA history – and this includes the Jordan years – he is, hands down, the 2007-2008 NBA MVP.

Photo Credit: Icon Sports Media

Oddly, that 1971-72 season mirrors this season in more ways than just the Warriors’ and Suns’ records. Today there are 30 NBA teams. Thirty-six years ago there were 17. Today a total of 16 teams compete in the playoffs for the Larry O’Brien trophy, in 71-72 just eight teams advanced to postseason play. Like this season, the 1971-72 Western Conference dominated regular season play, record-wise. Each Western team won at least 50 games and two won more than 60. The playoff teams representing the Western Conference were: Los Angeles – 69-13, Milwaukee – 63-19, Chicago – 57-25 and Golden State – 51-31. The Eastern Conference was represented by only two teams with winning records: Boston – 56-26 and New York – 48-34.

And like this season, the number one seeds from each conference in 1971-72 were the Boston Celtics and the Los Angeles Lakers.

That season the Lakers, while on their way to winning the NBA title, ran off a 33-game winning streak, the longest in NBA history. This year, Houston won 22 in a row, the second longest. Unfortunately for the Rockets they finished their season with 55 victories, good enough for a fifth-place finish but are by no means the favourites to win the title, nor are they favoured to come out of the morass of closely-bunched Western Conference teams and reach the Finals. Yet the Rockets finished just two games behind the first-place Lakers.

Also in 1971-72 the dominant big men in the game resided in the West. They were an aging Wilt Chamberlain and a young Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. This season, the dominant centers are again west of the Mississippi; an aging Shaquille O’Neal and a much younger Yao Ming – though Yao is injured and out for the season.

The MVP that season was Abdul-Jabbar and the MVP this season is likely to come from either New Orleans – Chris Paul – or Los Angeles – Kobe Bryant. Paul has 30 games with 20 points and 10 assists, the most since Tim Hardaway did the same in the 1991-92 season with Golden State. Bryant was out the Lakers’ door and on his way out of town before the season began, but stayed in L.A. and has been the driving force behind a very young Lakers team to the Western crown. And though Kevin Garnett is sure to garner his share of consideration for the award, because he played on a team with perennial All-Stars Paul Pierce and Ray Allen, his accomplishments pale in comparison with those of Paul’s and Bryant’s, who played on teams with only one other All-Star between both of their teams – David West of the Hornets.

Despite the similarities between the two seasons they are different in one major way. In 1971-72 the Lakers were the dominant NBA team and proved it by cruising through their opponents on the way to a title. This season there is no truly dominant team. Los Angeles finished just seven games ahead of eighth-place Denver.

The likeliest teams to advance to the Finals from the Western Conference are the Lakers, defending champion San Antonio, Phoenix and Dallas. At the moment Dallas is seventh, the Suns are sixth, and the Spurs are third. And it’s not as if it is impossible for three of the other four teams, New Orleans, Utah and Houston to make their way into the Finals. Only Denver, a team that does not generally play consistent defense, would be a shock to come out of the West.

That being said, the Nuggest are – potentially – a very dangerous opponent. With Allen Iverson and Carmelo Anthony each able to score 30 to 40 points on any given night and with Marcus Camby in the lane to wipe away shot attempts and score from as far out as 15-18 feet, Denver is a tough out. Add the mercurial Kenyon Martin, rising star J.R. Smith and a capable bench to the Nuggets’ mix, and head coach George Karl is only the right motivational speech and a little team discipline away from a run to the NBA Finals.

In the Eastern Conference Detroit and Boston are the prohibitive favourites to reach the Finals, but defending conference champion Cleveland has something to prove as most NBA writers talk about the Cavaliers as if they are an afterthought. Any team with LeBron James cannot be overlooked.

This means that, unlike the 1971- 72 season when the Lakers were heads and shoulders above their competition, this season, potentially eleven teams have a realistic shot at the title in what should be, arguably, the most exciting and competitive NBA playoffs in league history.

Saturday, UCLA Boa Constrictor-ed Xavier, 76-57. The Bruins choked off most forays to the basket and in the process made 5’7″ Musketeer point guard Drew Lavender look like a 4’7″ Mouseketeer. Each time Lavender drove through the lane he would vanish like a UFO abductee. He would disappear; the ball would be spit out to the wing minus the point guard, and the next time Lavender would be seen was a time leap later chasing down UCLA’s Darren Collison on the defensive end of the floor.

Kevin Love was simply dominant on both ends of the floor while Russell Westbrook shot 7-11 from the floor. Throw in Luc Mbah a Moute’s 13-point 13 rebound performance and Collison’s 19 points and the defensive job he did on Xavier’s catalyst, Lavender, and UCLA barely missed Josh Shipp’s dismal 1-7 from the floor disaster of a game.

Earlier in the day UNC held off Louisville, 83-73. The Tar Heels controlled all but about seven minutes of the game. Though the Cardinals, aided by three turnovers by Tyler Hansbrough, tied the game at 59 in that time period, Hansbrough did more than redeem himself by hitting clutch shot after clutch shot. Package Hansbrough’s play with point guard’s Ty Lawson key three-pointer to push a four point lead to seven and UNC eased away with a win.

Had North Carolina’s defense not been MIA for long stretches of the game and had they made even two more three-point field goals (they were 3-11 from behind the arc), this game would have been a complete blowout. Louisville shot 52.7% from the field – and for the most part we’re not talking contested shots here.

As it was, even with 3-11 three-point crooked shooting and Wayne Ellington’s mediocre 5-14 night, the Tar Heels still shot 53.4% from the floor.

—–

Sunday, it was thought that Texas would use a Houston almost-home town advantage to move on even closer to home – San Antonio – with a Regional Finals win over Memphis. But John Calipari unleashed his “Princeton on steroids” offense with his grip of NBA-to-be players on the Longhorns, and the game that was to be a titanic struggle wasn’t much of a game – 85-67 – at all.

Freshman point guard Derrick Rose played second fiddle to teammate Chris Douglas-Roberts all season. But in the tournament Rose showed exactly why he’s one-and-done by averaging 20.3 points (55% shooting) and six assists a game to snatch the headlines and the South Region’s MOP from Douglas-Roberts.

Rose totally shut down heralded Texas point guard, D.J. Augustin (4-18 for 16 points), while scoring 21 points on 7-10 shooting and dropping nine dimes on a clearly shocked and dismayed Augustin and his teammates. Douglas-Roberts, with 25 points, was the primary recipient of Rose’s largesse. Douglas-Roberts and Rose outscored Augustin and fellow guard A.J. Abrams 46-33.

Inside, the Tigers were equally dominant. Joey Dorsey and Shaun Taggart, who played only 18 minutes, combined for 23 points and 15 rebounds (Dorsey had 12 of those boards).

What was most interesting about this blowout was how much bigger the Tigers compared with the Longhorns. The Memphis players resembled professionals led by their 6’5″ 215 pound point guard (yes, it is said that Rose has grown from his 6’3″ 205 pound beginning of the year height and weight). Every Tiger seemed to dwarf their opposite number, if not in height, then in build.

And they played bigger against Texas in every way.

The final game of the Elite Eight, Kansas vs. Davidson, was slotted to be the most lopsided. It turned out to be the closest. Bob McKillop knew his Wildcats could not play their normal up-tempo style and keep up with the bigger, faster, stronger Jayhawks, so he slowed the games pace to a trot.

Throughout the game this change in game plan appeared to thoroughly befuddle Bill Self and his Kansas team. Each time Kansas pushed the tempo, Davidson would slow the game back down and run scoring savant Stephen Curry off of a seemingly indeterminable number of screens and other players on pick-and-pop plays in search of the best shot possible.

And if the Jayhawks were not so committed to stopping Curry, so committed to and able to switch defenders on screens, Kansas would have lost this 59-57 game.

McKillop needs to be duly lauded for recognizing that his team needed to minimize the number of Kansas possessions. His team needs to be equally lauded for their ability to execute his strategy.

The Jayhawks were never in rhythm, never able to run, and rarely able to get off shots in the normal flow of their offense.

The game got so ugly that it allowed the most unlikely Jayhawk to be one of Kansas’ most valuable players – Sasha Kaun. The ungainly center was a perfect 6-6 from the floor and made many of the game’s key hustle plays, procuring loose balls and tipped rebounds for his team.

With defense as the Jayhawks’ calling card, Kansas harassed and harried Stephen Curry with a four-man rotation that, by game’s end wore down the slight 6’3″ shooting guard. Curry ended the night scoring 25 hard-earned points on only 9-25 shooting.

And despite McKillop’s brilliant game-slowing strategy he cracked in the end. With just under 15 seconds remaining in the game the Davidson coach took the ball out of the hands of Jason Richards, his senior point guard who had done damage to the Kansas defense with his ball-handling and ability to get to any point on the floor with his dribble and let Curry handle the ball. The sophomore ran into a double-team and ended his season, not with the ball in his hands for the potential game-winning shot, but watching Richards toss up a hurried 30-foot off jumper that was far off the mark.

It makes sense that Curry will return to Davidson for his junior season. He will switch to point guard because he knows that is the position he will have to play to get drafted by an NBA team.

He could have used some added ball-handling skills on that last, ill-conceived play.

—-

So, we end where we began the selection process. The four number one seeds were announced first by the selection committee. And the four number one seeds will end the 2007-08 NCAA Men’s Basketball season.

UCLA will play Memphis in game one, followed by the battle of Roy Williams versus Roy Williams as his North Carolina team will face his former Kansas team now coached by Bill Self.

Though Ben Howland will have his Bruins attempting to make this a grimy, Big East-style game (Howland previously was the head coach at Pittsburgh), his team will be hard-pressed to defend the Tigers. In the tournament, Western Kentucky’s players had the ability to take the UCLA defenders off the dribble, penetrate into the lane and kick out to the wings for open three-pointers. Once the Hilltoppers relaxed, this style presented the Bruins with matchup difficulties. Darren Collison fouled out with five minutes remaining in the game and shot only 1-6, scoring four points. The game plan will be repeated, but much more proficiently be Memphis.

Howland cannot allow the Tigers to dictate tempo or UCLA will be lost. Knowing that center Joey Dorsey presents singular problems for Kevin Love, the Bruins can be expected to go inside early and hope Love can use his array of low post moves to get Dorsey into early foul trouble. Though Memphis has adequate backups for Dorsey, none have his strength of Dorsey and will have difficulty guarding Love on the low block. This will also allow Darren Collison, the times he does get by Derrick Rose, to have a much clearer path to the basket.

Also, between now and next Saturday, Josh Shipp (8-27 the last four games) must find his shooting stroke if the Bruins are to be successful. Working inside out might be the plan but hitting outside shot will make the interior a much friendlier place for Love and UCLA.

If Dorsey stays out of foul trouble, Memphis will win this game almost as easily as they did their regional final. However, should Love get the best of Dorsey, particularly early in the game, UCLA will advance to the championship game.

In the second game, I will make the bold prediction that North Carolina will run away with their game against Kansas. Because they let Louisville back into a game that should have been a wood shedding, the Tar Heels should have learned the value of defense enough to take advantage of their depth and ability to play at an even faster pace that Kansas.

Additionally, Tyler Hansbrough will absolutely wreck Sasha Kaun, who is a reminder of times gone by – a less athletic Rony Seikaly.

With Hansbrough having a field day against Kaun and Ty Lawson wrecking whoever guards him, North Carolina should win by double digits. Afterward, Roy Williams can cry — all the way to the championship game Monday night, where his Tar Heel team will face Memphis.

And the winner will be?

As a guy named Bill said long, long ago, “What’s in a name? That which we call a Rose.”

Photo Credit: ICON SMI

However, there is something more than just a difference of perspective that led Summit and the Volunteer program to refuse to sign an extension for the teams’ annual meetings. The obvious question is why, but when that question was put to Summit, she refused to answer. For his part, Auriemma said that it comes down to an intense dislike on Summit’s part: “Sometimes you wonder why [somebody doesn’t like you]. I don’t know. I like me.”

It is widely rumored, though, that Summit is deeply angered by the fact that when Connecticut arranged for recruit Maya Moore to visit and tour ESPN and its studios, a secondary NCAA violation, that the Huskies program stepped over the line into an ethical gray area and is using unethical practices in its recruiting processes.

Now, it is a recent phenomenon that the two schools even talk with the same high school players. Until the last three years or so of the teams’ 13-year rivalry, Summit and Auriemma had unspoken areas of regional recruitment areas throughout the nation that neither coach breached.

Now, though, the game has changed. The stakes are higher. Top high school players are coveted by not only the Volunteers and Huskies programs, but many colleges and universities across the country. And many of the “lesser” programs do engage in shady tactics, from insinuating a rampant lesbian culture at some schools’ programs to implying that some schools secular ways or religious affiliation is antithetical to the recruit – and particularly her parents – and somehow generally immoral.

Moore’s recruitment exemplified this new recruiting climate.

That UConn had no history of providing recruits with visits to the Bristol, Connecticut ESPN complex some 100 miles from the UConn Storrs, Connecticut campus was apparent in the NCAA’s ruling that a singular, secondary violation had occurred. But the fact that they felt it necessary to arrange the visit for Moore to be ingratiated into the high-profile media culture that would be inadvertently responsible for the bulk of the coverage of her and her team and help form her collegiate image and perhaps her worth as a professional, is illustrative of the pressure Auriemma, or someone in the UConn women’s basketball program or athletic department felt to be ensured that Moore signed on the bottom line of a University of Connecticut scholarship.

That Summit, or someone in the University of Tennessee’ women’s basketball program or athletic department had “moles” established somewhere around Moore (at ESPN?) to learn of and report the visit, then, though the visit was an admittedly very minor violation report it to the NCAA is indicative of the progress made by women’s basketball and its revenue-producing potential for collegiate programs and its growing place in our sporting consciousness.

Moore’s UConn-arranged visit and UT’s reporting of that visit also represents something deeper between with the schools.

In some circles, the sudden rise of the University of Connecticut’s men’s basketball program was built on shady and unethical practices.

For nearly three decades Connecticut Men’s Basketball was the regional power in the defunct Yankee Conference. The Huskies won 18 championships between 1947 and 1975. Despite its success the program was dropped by the university. But in 1979 the program was revived as one of the seven founding member of the Big East Basketball Conference.

For the next 10 years, the program flagged behind the upper-echelon Big East schools. As a result, the inclusion into the conference of UConn and fellow perennial doormat Seton Hall was questioned. The hiring of Jim Calhoun in 1987 represented a watershed moment in the program. Though UConn suffered through a 9-19 first season, the following year the Huskies went on what seemed to be a magical run led by guard duo and first nationally-recognized recruits, Tate George, Scott Burrell, and Chris Smith, and won the NIT Tournament defeating Ohio State, 72-65. In 1990, UConn opened the Gompel Arena and began the season unranked. They ended it as Big East regular season and tournament champions, earning a #1-seed in the NCAA tournament. They advanced to the Sweet 16 and there beat Clemson, 71-70, on what is known in Huskies lore as “The Shot by George” but were defeated in the Regional finals in overtime, 79-78, by Duke. That year propelled Connecticut on what has been an 18-year run of excellence.

But the question surrounding the Huskies program was and remains, at what cost is this excellence achieved? Because Storrs is an outpost of a town, it has been a mystery as to how Calhoun was able to recruit players, particularly black players from big cities to the campus “in the middle of nothing to do.”

There have been whispers of money payments to players, car, and other illegal amenities given to high school recruits to not-so-subtly encourage them to join Calhoun’s teams. The whispers reached a head in the recruiting battle for high school All-American point guard Khalid El-Amin (1997-2000). It was widely held that El-Amin, a product of North Minneapolis, Minnesota, was headed to the University of Minnesota to play for Clem Haskins. El-Amin had a child and was engaged to his high school sweetheart and, despite being recruited by schools across the nation, wanted to stay close to home to be near his family.

However, out of the blue, El-Amin signed with the Huskies. Haskins was irate. It was said that Haskins knew that there were improprieties in El-Amin’s almost secret recruiting by UConn. The whispers became shouts when the point guard arrived on campus only to be housed in an apartment with his – by then – wife and child. In an ironic – and some would say equally mysterious – turnabout, it was Haskins who found himself under fire just two years later when a female graduate assistant made public a grade-fixing scandal within the basketball program. Haskins was blamed and summarily fired.

The burgeoning shouts and ever-probing questions into El-Amin’s circumstances – and of recruits before 1997 – were silenced. Nothing more has been made of this issue in relation to UConn.

Until Maya Moore. The whispers surrounding the basketball program at Storrs have again arisen. The thought is that this might have been a trend – perhaps not visits to ESPN’s campus, but other illegal “gifts” to female recruits – in the long-held mold of the men’s program is the backdrop to Summit’s anger.

However it must also be said that Tennessee is not at all an innocent in this tale. Summit’s reporting of UConn, though for a mush lesser violation is eerily similar to the recent shenanigans between Tennessee football head coach Philip Fulmer and the University of Alabama. When Crimson Tide recruiters and recruiters from rival SEC schools began making deep inroads in the recruiting of players from Tennessee, Fulmer illicitly taped phone conversations with Tom Culpepper, a former Rivals.com recruiting analyst. After having his insider status at Alabama cut off by Ronnie Cottrell, Former rivals.com recruiting analyst. Culpepper, after having his “insider” status at Alabama cut off by then-Crimson Tide assistant coach Ronnie Cottrell, approached Fulmer about violations in the Alabama program.

In May and August of 2000, Fulmer, against NCAA regulations, initiated two phone conversations with NCAA investigator Rich Johanningmeier, to discuss what Fulmer felt were potential NCAA rules violations at Alabama. During the Aug. 7 call, Fulmer told Johanningmeier that, “with his lawyer’s advice,” Fulmer secretly recorded 90 minutes of an eight-hour conversation with Culpepper in Chattanooga during the summer of 2000 in which Culpepper discussed information he could provide regarding NCAA rules violations at Alabama.

Fulmer alleged knowledge of a laundry list of violations committed by former Alabama head coach Mike DuBose, ‘Bama players, boosters, Auburn, Kentucky, Georgia, and the University of Alabama, and even the venerable (and deceased) Bear Bryant. Each university had made the mistake of impinging on Fulmer’s self-perceived recruiting “territory.”

Though Summit followed NCAA regulations by reporting UConn’s transgression with Moore through the University of Tennessee’s Athletic Department, the context of the reporting of this violation by Pat Summit smacks of the same type of “territorial imperative” with athletes felt by her longtime UT cohort, Fulmer.

It will be worth following and noting the continued fallout from Moore’s visit and Summit’s reporting of that visit, and its impact on the two schools. The public nature of the events and the exposing of widespread unethical recruiting tactics in what is now big-time women’s collegiate basketball acts as a “welcome to big-leagues” for the sport.

Surely, though, because women’s basketball is seen as a “purer” form of the hyper-athletic nature of the men’s game, this is not the sort of welcome the sport imagined.

However, it is the reality of sports on college campuses everywhere and women’s basketball is not immune to the petty jealousies and outright corruption that goes with the promise of massive revenues for money-starved universities across the U.S.

Like the two schools that dragged the women’s game into the nation’s consciousness, University of Tennessee and the University of Connecticut, it is – sadly – fitting that these two schools would be the ones to also introduce us to the seamier underbelly of the women’s game.

Hooray for March Madness.

Photo Credit: ICON SMI

East

#6 Oklahoma Sooners 22-11 vs. #11 St. Joseph’s Hawks 21-12, Friday, 7:10 p.m.

Has Blake Griffin fully recovered from minor knee surgery? Has Longar Longar fully recovered from his broken leg? Can Taylor Griffin continue to play well in his brother Blake’s stead? Can the Sooners three-guard attack make up for the questionable inside play and lack of scoring punch? These are all very real questions Oklahoma head coach Jeff Capel must find answers for by Friday.

Blake Griffin showed enough progress during the Big 12 tournament to allow me to think he’ll be close to 100% by Friday. And the Hawks have no one who can handle him inside. With help from his brother, the Griffins should dominate this game.
And playing against a St. Joe’s team led by cagey head coach, Phil Martelli. The Hawks were second in Atlantic 10 field goal percentage (47.7%) to #3 seed Xavier (47.8%). But defensively they were third to last in the A-10. Martelli’s team is led by Pat Calathes, older brother of Florida standout Nick Calathes. Though Pat can light it up with his up to three-point range, he can be pushed off the block on the offensive end of the floor and pushed around on the block on the defensive end of the floor. St. Joe’s is thin on the bench.

If it sounds like I don’t have much good to say about the Hawks it’s because I don’t. They were one of the last teams in the tournament. And despite the questions the Capel and his Sooners must answer before Friday night, they will defeat the Hawks.

#8 Indiana Hoosiers 25-7 vs. #9 Arkansas Razorbacks 22-11, Friday, 9:40 p.m

Immediately following the firing-buyout-leaving of former Indiana head coach Kelvin Sampson, the Hoosiers played with the efficiency and emotion befitting a #2 or #3 seed. However, once the ardor died down, Indiana limped through the remainder of their season and was upset by Penn state in the Big Ten tournament, earning themselves an eight seed.

Dan Dakich might be a fine coach but he is not the head coach for these players. For whatever reason(s) the Hoosiers are not responding to whatever it is Dakich is using as motivation for his team. The young players seem to respond far better to 6’9″ 251 senior power forward D.J. White. Super freshman guard Eric Gordon looks like he’s playing out the string as a one year-and-done college player and the rest of the baby Hoosiers are in disarray.

Meanwhile Arkansas finished its season by defeating #18 Vanderbilt and #3 Tennessee in back-to-back games in the SEC tournament before losing in the tourney finals to Cinderella team, Georgia. The Razorbacks sport an athletic front line led by 6’10″ 245 pound center Darian Townes (11.9 ppg, 5.2 rpg) and 6’6″ swingman Sonny Weems (14.3 ppg, 4.6 rpg). These two are complimented by 6’10″ Vincent Hunter, 6’8″ Charles Thomas, and 7’0″ backup Steven Hill who hit the game winner against Tennessee in the SEC tournament.

Razorbacks coach John Pelfrey uses eight players who average more than 14 minutes a game. He uses multiple players and lineups to employ different defensive strategies so as to continuously swing tempo in his team’s favor.

With a turnover-prone and perhaps disinterested Gordon handling the ball for Indiana, look for Arkansas to force Gordon to make decisions with which he is not comfortable and ultimately break down the Hoosiers.

I feel that if Indiana gets down early, they will fold. And Arkansas is 18-0 when leading at halftime. It’s one-and-done time for the Hoosiers in Dan Dakich’s last game as Indiana Hoosiers head coach.

#5 Notre Dame Fighting Irish 24-7 vs. #12 George Mason Patriots 23-10, Thursday, 9:50 p.m.

This game can be close only if Notre Dame’s outside shooters go south. The Patriots depend on the inside scoring of 6’7″ 230 pound forward, Will Thomas. The senior leads GMU is scoring and rebounding with 15.8 ppg and 10.5 rpg. He was the leader of the Cinderella Patriots team that advanced to the Final four just two years ago. Thomas brings toughness and the ability to score against defenders of any size.

Notre Dame will counter with 6’8″ 251 pound, Luke Harangody. The Irish sophomore averaged 20.8 ppg and 10.2 rpg this season and he’s tough around the bucket but can step out and can a 15-foot jumper with regularity. If Harangody’s output is augmented by Kyle McAlarney (15.2 ppg) and his three point shooting, and back court mate Tory Jackson (8.1 ppg, 5.0 rpg, 6.1 apg) penetrates at will, the Irish win in a walk.

But I think George Mason’s three-guard lineup of Folarin Campbell (15.9 ppg, 4.5 rpg), Dre Smith (8.6 ppg), and John Vaughan (12.6 ppg, 4.0 rpg) will cause problems for Notre Dame. Jackson is known to use his strength to get into the lane and cause havoc on opposing defenses. However Dre Smith at 6’0″, 185 is stout himself and will be difficult to beat off the dribble.

Notre Dame will be heavily favored. But look for this game to be much closer than expected.

Amaker replaced Frank Sullivan, whose contract with Harvard was not renewed after the Crimson went 12-16 overall and 5-9 in the Ivy League last season and 178-245 over 16 years. Harvard hasn’t played in the NCAA Tournament since 1946.

Amaker’s first head coaching stint came at Seton Hall. There for four seasons, he led the Pirates to a 68-55 record, a trip to the round of 16 in the 2000 NCAA Tournament and three NIT appearances. Michigan took one look at Amaker’s record and reeled him in to take over the reins of their blighted program.

Though he met the administration’s mandate of restoring integrity to the basketball program, Amaker’s luck never broke. It was as if, when Michigan washed the accomplishments of the Fab Five from its memory, the ghosts of Chris Webber’s past loosed themselves on the program – and on Amaker.

In retrospect, Ann Arbor was too much program for Tommy Amaker. He walked into a situation that required a seasoned head coach with vast prior experience; a coach skilled at university and athletic department detante; a coach who is diplomat enough to make disparate personalities feel comfortable in his, and each other’s presence.

Amaker also arose from “Coach K-ville.” Under Mike Krzyzewski, Duke’s program is one of the most straight-forward and smoothly-run Division I basketball factories in the nation. With Durham as a training ground, Amaker came to Michigan feeling his Blue Blood, Blue Devils sensibilities would transpose themselves onto the proud Michigan basketball program and soon enough his players would be pounding the floor and the U of M students would be waiting in tents to get the best seats for the next night’s game; to receive a “Coach A” pizza to make their wintry overnight stay outside Crisler Arena a little more palatable.

But it was not to be.

Harvard represented an opportunity for Amaker to demonstrate his abilities in a low-key situation and reaffirm the methods of being a both human and a basketball coach learned from Krzyzewski. When he was formally announced as the new Crimson head coach, Amaker joked easily about failing at Michigan, but boldly announced that he would make Harvard a an Ivy League – and national – power. Tommy Amaker told the Harvard faithful he came to win.

At the time of the hiring, Crimson athletic director Bob Scalise concurred with Amaker’s want to win:

“His experience as a player and assistant at Duke, where athletic and academic success is paramount, makes him a terrific fit,” Harvard athletic director Bob Scalise said in a statement. “We’re looking forward to the support of the Harvard community as we pursue our first Ivy League championship in men’s basketball.”

Yet after an 8-22, 3-11 season, Tommy Amaker is in roiling waters.

Somehow, despite the fact that Harvard University’s enrollment standards are among the toughest in the nation and despite the fact that Harvard does not offer traditional athletic scholarships, Amaker has prohibitively landed one of the top 25 high school basketball recruiting classes in America. And his peers in the Ivy League are none too happy about the situation.

Fellow coaches and perhaps university insiders are whispering that Harvard has lowered its academic standards to allow these players to be enrolled at the college on the banks of the Cambridge River. These same people are whispering that Amaker has broken or at least circumvented NCAA rules to recruit some of these players. Even a recruit’s father – a player not attending Harvard – is telling a story of a chance meeting that, according to the father, was not chance at all.

Harvard, like all Ivy schools, uses a complicated formula to judge the worthiness of prospective student athletes. A player in Amaker’s basketball program must meet a certain minimum score on the “Academic Index,” a measuring tool that combines standardized test scores (SAT scores), class size, exact class rank, and grade-point average (GPA) in a formula.

For example, a student with a1400 out of 1600 on the SAT exam, top three SAT scores of 600, 700, and 750, a graduating class size of 150, a top 10% class rank, and a 4.00-4.09 GPA would register a 203 score on the Academic Index (the minimum score allowed for Ivy League athletes is 171).

Frank Sullivan, the basketball team’s coach previous to Amaker, adhered to a higher standard than the Ivy League minimum. According to former assistant coaches, Bill Holden and Lamar Reddicks, Sullivan’s standard was a score of 206, which was the highest in the league. The two also indicated that Scalise mandated a score of 202 for its players. However, according to this information Harvard can lower its institutional requirements and remain the Ivy school with the most stringent academic requirements for its basketball players.

The bottom line is that Scalise is by no means bending the rules of academic standards in violation of a rule. Additionally, he feels that the information provided by Holden and Reddicks are the complaints of two assistant coaches who hoped to be rehired by Amaker, but were not rehired.

Requirements aside, Amaker still faces charges that he acted unethically or broke an NCAA rule to recruit highly-touted forward, 6?7? Keith Wright. Wright was pursued by Illinois, Davidson, and other Ivy League schools, but chose Amaker and Harvard (the other prize recruits who have not yet received letters of acceptance from Harvard are: 6?10? center Frank Ben-Eze from Bishop O’Connell High School in Arlington, Va. and Max Kenyi, a 6-3 shooting guard from Gonzaga College High School in Washington, D.C.).

In reaction to the successful recruitment of Wright and other potential Amaker players, Yale coach James Jones said of Amaker’s recruits:

“It’s eye-opening because there seems to have been a drastic shift in restrictions and regulations with the Harvard admissions office,” he said.

“We don’t know how all this is going to come out, but we could not get involved with many of the kids that they are bringing in.”

Is Jones suggesting that Harvard’s standards are no lower than those of other Ivy schools, or is this more sour grapes? Jones apparently did not elaborate. But Scalise feels there is some jealousy involved:

“Sounds like there’s a lot of jealousy and also sounds like people are trying to protect the status quo for their programs,” Scalise said.

Jealousies aside, it might take an NCAA investigation to disentangle Amaker’s dealings with Wright and Kenyi. Kenny Blakeney, a former Duke player who resides in D.C., played in pickup games with both Wright and Kenyi. The problem with this interaction is that Blakeney, sometime after the pickup games, became a lead assistant coach at Harvard. It is allegedly a frequent unehtical practice for coaches to use ‘assistants-to-be’ to make contact with players before being hired. And the NCAA has a rule about this “activity.”According to NCAA spokesman, Erik Christianson, the organization’s rules state:

“Should a coach recruit on behalf of a school but not be employed there, he or she is then considered a booster and that recruiting activity is not allowed.”

The rule is nebulous and is much of a trap to coaches and schools as is the practice. It is a, ‘which came first, the chicken or the egg’ rule from which no good can come. The NCAA should not be able to enforce such a policy without proof of wrong-doing. The NCAA also should mandate that all coaches have complete staffs before the “no contact” period.

Neither distinction exists, which means college athletics’ governing body can mete out this punishment subjectively; it can be ignored or pursued and enforced depending on the feeling of an investigator on a particular day – for the school, the coach, or even the conference.

Blakeney’s interaction with the players seems innocent enough. Wright insists that Blakeney was in Norfolk with a summer league team. He says the purpose of his visits to Gonzaga High School was to visit basketball coach and 20-year friend, Steve Turner and to stay in shape by playing hoops.

The reaction in college basketball circles to these incidents involving Blakeney, though, is negative:

The practice of recruiting in person before being officially hired is becoming more prevalent among the more high-profile basketball programs. “Assuming the coach knows exactly what he’s doing, it’s unethical,” said Jim Haney, the executive director of the National Association of Basketball Coaches.

Blakeney denied he was recruiting Kenyi and Wright then. “I was unemployed,” he said, repeating: “I was unemployed. I don’t know if it’s a gray area or anything like that. I hadn’t signed a contract. I didn’t have any type of agreement with anybody. How could I recruit them to Harvard if I’m not employed?”

Craig Robinson, the coach at Brown, said “wow” when told of Blakeney’s pickup games with high school athletes.

He laughed before saying, “I would say that would give them an advantage.”

And yet, if Robinson knew the spheres of basketball influence in the Middle Atlantic area which extends from Baltimore to the Lower Chesapeake region of Norfolk and Newport News, Virginia, Blakeney’s traveling the about 190 miles from D.C. to Norfolk to check in on one of his summer league teams and get some games in while he’s there makes perfect sense. Visiting friends who are coaches and were collegiate players and playing pick-up games with them and a variety of competition from local high school to local college players is the norm, not the exception.

No one knows, though, how the NCAA will perceive the events.

In another incident, Amaker ran into Les Rosen, the father of 6?1? point guard Zac Rosen, another Harvard recruit, at a grocery store in Trenton, New Jersey during the Eastern Invitational tournament. Amaker talked with the elder Rosen, and, according to Rosen, urged him to send his son to Harvard. This occurred at a time when coaches could only watch recruits and were not allowed to speak with recruits or their parents (or guardians) unless they met accidentally:

Les Rosen remembered Amaker saying, “We really have to get Zack up to Harvard.”

Les Rosen said he thought to himself: Who goes to ShopRite in the middle of a basketball tournament?

“It was suspicious,” he said, “but as much as it seemed obvious, he wouldn’t be found guilty in court.”

Harvard looked into the Rosen situation and determined that no violations occurred.

Unless Rosen had prior shady dealings with coaches or disliked Amaker for some reason, his statement is out of character for a parent at a high school invitational tournament. Many coaches attending these tournaments stay in suites in hotels complete with refrigerators and microwaves, or even stoves. Daily trips to grocery stores can be rituals for some of the coaches, who later gather for sandwiches and soft drinks (or yes, beers) to kibbutz and talk basketball, and basketball players.

Yet if the NCAA determines that the Blakeney situation warrants an in-depth investigation, this incident might become an issue pointing to a pattern of illegal behavior for Amaker and Harvard.

Amaker’s insertion into Ivy League basketball has fundamentally altered the way the game is played off the court. For three decades now the Ivies were universities where relatively unknown coaches came to earn their stripes and move on, where coaches who were once well-known come to sate their continuing desire to coach without the pressures of big-time college basketball. The best players in the league generally dropped into the laps of certain programs while the other schools were left to play the hands they were dealt.

Now, though, when it is possible for programs like that of “commuter colleges” like George Mason University to make a run to the final Four, Ivy League athletic departments see the chance to enhance their standing around the country by fielding competitive athletic teams. A deep run in the NCCA Men’s Basketball Tournament by an Ivy League school would result in more academic recruits and more high-visibility athletic recruits.

Amaker’s presence and his and his athletic director’s assertion that Harvard Basketball is taking a new direction – an investment in winning – makes for more pressure for all the other Ivy League coaches. It is a proclamation that the Ivies are joining the big-time.

And this forces the coaches from the Ivies to join the NCAA basketball universe of the 21st century. They must actively recruit players from regions around the country that are, perhaps, outside of their comfort zones. They must ask for more money from the university and from boosters to conduct their business. This means glad-handing, doing rounds of speaking engagements, and even attending corporate and political mixers, which is the rarified air inhabited by well-heeled Ivy League boosters.

Ivy League basketball is changing and it is dragging along its athletic programs and its basketball coaches kicking and screaming. When the coaches look around for someone or something to blame, they see Tommy Amaker.

And when they see Tommy Amaker, they see crimson ———– and Crimson.

And for all their feigned innocence, their steadfastness in maintaining the Ivy status quo, when it comes to Amaker, these coaches have moved much like their big-time brethren to whom they claim no relation. They have quietly banded together and whispered just loudly enough, insinuated just enough to ensure that Amaker and Harvard have the NCAA’s attention.

Now it is up to an organization known for willingly engaging in grandstanding and bluster to either puff out its chest and show the Ohio States, Oklahomas and the North Carolinas that they are indiscriminate in their want for fairness in amateur athletics by attacking Harvard and seeking to punish the bastion of the Ivies to the fullest extent of their law with a zeal usually reserved for an SEC football program.

Or the NCAA can recognize what it has wrought by limiting scholarships on major sport athletic teams and therefore making more quality players available to smaller colleges and universities. The NCAA can recognize that just a decade ago the wants of Tommy Amaker and Bob Scalise and Harvard were impossible. The NCAA can recognize this is the monster they asked for; they sought to create and pull back and view the happenings at Harvard in their proper context.

Note to Tommy Amaker and Bob Scalise: Move more quietly. And Beware the NCAA.

“Chris is incredibly excited to be back,” his agent, Steven Heumann, said. “He’s grateful to the NBA and the union for reinstating him and for giving him the opportunity to resume his career.”

The Hornets can re-sign Anderson at a one-year, pro-rated share of his last contract ($13 million for four years):

“We were always more concerned with Chris Andersen the person rather than Chris Andersen the player and are pleased that he has taken the appropriate measures to get himself reinstated by the NBA,” Hornets General Manager Jeff Bower said. “We will now begin the process of getting him back on the court and back in a Hornets uniform as quickly as possible.”

Anderson’s return will bolster New Orleans’ thin frontcourt. At the moment, Melvin Ely and Ryan Bowen are the primary backups for starters Tyson Chandler and David West.

For Kentucky, Billy Gillespie suffered through a horrible beginning of the season start. College coaches are not known for their adaptability (perhaps explaining why they are college coaches and not NBA coaches).

They have a coaching style and they recruit players to fit that style. For better or worse, Gillespie was dealt Tubby Smith’s hand. His teams play relentless defense and a grind-it-out style of offense that requires a deep team with everyone being in impeccable shape. It took nearly three months of play for the Wildcats to get Gillespie, to comprehend the method to his madness. Then they lost their best player, freshman forward Patrick Patterson (stress fracture, left ankle).

For Kentucky’s players, today was a game of trust – of self and of Gillespie.

So today’s game – this game on March 2, 2008 against each other – was, more than any other this season, the barometer for both the Vols and the ‘Cats.

Sunday’s meeting would show how far the Wildcats have come and, even without Patterson whether or not they are Big Dance worthy. Sunday’s would prove Pearl’s method: athletes, shooters and more athletes – we’ll throw it all at you for 40 minutes and if you can handle it, fine. If not we will beat you down.

Even after the Vols jumped out to an early 15-point lead, you could tell that the Wildcats were still patient, just trying to find their footing in a hostile environment. And once they got in a groove, once their grinding defense took hold, you could tell they’d get to within striking distance and test the Volunteers.

Kentucky came back. Tennessee responded and hung tough, the crowd imploring them to maintain their high level of intensity and execution. Kentucky inched ahead. The Vols hung tough. Even with two minutes remaining in the game when short-handed Kentucky ran out of gas, fell behind by four, and were forced to play defense, they somehow regrouped. Guard Joe Crawford still had enough in his legs left to hit a fade-away baseline three to get the ‘Cats to within one.

Though Kentucky could get no closer than that one-point deficit and though the ‘Cats ended up on the wrong end of a 63-60 score, they showed that, if they follow Gillespie and trust themselves, they can beat anyone. Should the Wildcats reach the semi-finals of the SEC conference tournament, it will be tough to keep them out of the final 64.

Though Tennessee barely escaped with a victory, they showed that they are balanced, resilient, can trust players other than Chris Lofton to score in tight situations, and can maintain their cool down the stretch. That cool was forged through the Memphis win followed by the Vandy loss. And the Vols gained this understanding of themselves in the nick of time as they have one last regular-season test against a young, talented Florida team in Tallahassee on March 5. After a home finale against South Carolina, Pearl wants his charges to at least reach the finals of their conference tournament to secure a high seed for the Big Dance; attainable goals all.

But this was a good one, this game. And it is the first of many similar tests in the very near future for many teams around the country.

Let’s hope they respond with performances like Tennessee’s and Kentucky’s

Chris Lofton Photo Credit: Icon SMI

Not true.

The Brandon Roy-less (sprained right ankle) Trail Blazers played with an urgency befitting a team in freefall in the ultra-tough Western Conference. After going 17-1 in one stretch of games, in the following 22 games the Trail Blazers went 7-15, which includes their most-recent 1-8 slide. Portland head coach Nate McMillan can’t possibly like what’s happening with his team lately but this type of roller-coaster ride is to be expected from his young, young team.

Portland ran out to a 15-point first quarter lead. LA responded by erasing that deficit, only to see the Blazers end the first half with another run to lead 51-44. The Lakers looked a bit weary. Kobe Bryant played facilitator in the first two quarters, scoring only eight points but dishing out six dimes. His supporting cast, though, missed open shots, turned the ball over, lacked offensive movement and played lackluster defense.

According to the local Lakers commentators, at halftime Kobe lit into his teammates for their first half sleep walk. Bryant informed the Baby Lakers that Portland was playing the game like it was the playoffs and the only way to win the game was to match the Blazers’ intensity. Bryant said this is playoff basketball and this is how it’s going to be the rest of the season, so the team had better get used to it.

Los Angeles responded with 23-14 third quarter and a 29-18 fourth quarter. Though they did not get clicking offensively until the final quarter, the Lakers defense, led by the point guard combination of Jordan Farmar and Sasha Vujacic, shut down Blazers PGs Steve Blake and Jarrett Jack. Farmar and Vujacic consistently forced their opposing guards to begin the offense too far out on the court and a few seconds later in the shot clock. The minor boost in intensity led to rushed shots, poor shot selection and imbalance on the boards as LaMarcus Aldridge was forced to step out for too many late in the clock jumpers from around the free throw line.

This is a sign the young Lakers do get “it.” They appear to understand that defense can carry them through shooting slumps and even aid in getting the offense easy shots that act to re-establish shooting rhythm. Bryant ended with 30 points, nine rebounds, and seven assists. On a night when starting point guard Derek Fisher had an off game (0-4 shooting, two points) Farmar had a career-high 21 points on 8-10 shooting while Vujacic heated up in the fourth quarter an pitched in with 12 points and five boards.

Bryant, Farmar and Vujacic accounted for 62 of the Lakers 96 points, 45 coming in the second half. Their play allowed Lamar Odom, who was saddled with foul trouble in the first half, get into his flow and end up dominating his position by pulling down a team-high 11 rebounds.

It is a very good sign for the young Lakers’ playoff future when their young point guards can play fearlessly enough to more than compensate for Fisher’s off performance, and to free Bryant by keeping the floor spread out of fear of Farmar and Vujacic knocking down open jumpers.

The win was LA’s 40th and allowed them to stay atop the Western Conference overall standings.

Shaq, aka the Big Statue, looked as old as Dikembe Mutombo. He was constantly late getting down the floor and had no lift on his shots. This does not bode well come playoff time when he might be forced to play three games in a row against the NBA’s best competition with only one day rest between each game.

In the meantime, Leandro Barbosa continues to prove that if he plays in an offense that requires any thought, he is as lost as a canary in a coal mine.

The only bright spot for the Suns was Boris Diaw. The versatile forward continues to show that he is a matchup nightmare for opposing teams. He can outrun most power forwards, is too big for small forwards, and has the game to take advantage of either in a half court set.

Since Shaq hit the desert the Suns are 1-2 against three of the best teams in the NBA – LA, Boston and Detroit. LA and Detroit each routed the Suns, while Phoenix exposed the Cees’ weaknesses, especially those of point guard Rajon Rondo.