Tuesday, November 30, 1999
BEARCATS NOTEBOOK
Bearcats survive November
BY MIKE DeCOURCY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
HILO, Hawaii — November is hazardous to ranked college basketball teams, but the Cincinnati Bearcats managed to escape the month without harm.
UC is one of only three teams that were ranked in the top 10 in the Associated Press preseason poll that have yet to lose a game. The others are North Carolina and Arizona, which won the championships of the Maui Invitational and Preseason NIT.
Led by center Kenyon Martin's 22 points, nine rebounds and nine blocks — an MVP effort — the Bearcats won the championship of the Big Island Invitational with their 75-60 victory over Iowa State in Sunday's title game. It was their third in-season tournament title in the past four years.
“We wanted to win this,” senior forward Ryan Fletcher said. “This is a big steppingstone for us, to prove we deserve the No.1 ranking. To beat a pretty good Iowa State team means a lot.”
TAKING SHOTS: Although the Bearcats shot 84-of-152 from the field in the tournament (.552), UC coach Bob Huggins believes they have considerable room for improvement on offense.
“We have to do a better job with our continuity, being able to take advantage of what the defense gives us. We've got to learn to read situations a whole lot better,” Huggins said. “We can make shots. Think how good we're going to be when we understand what we're doing.
“I mean, right now, when we get in trouble, we throw it to Kenyon. That's not the answer all the time.”
DEEP THOUGHTS: Huggins used only seven players against Iowa State, indicating he's not as trustful of his bench as he'd need to be for the Bearcats to have a deep team.
Left out of the rotation were freshman guard Leonard Stokes and redshirt freshman center Donald Little, who combined to play 21 minutes in the semifinal game against Santa Clara.
Stokes scored eight points in the opening win over Cleveland State but missed two shots in the second game. Little has not made a field goal and has three rebounds.
“I'd like to play nine,” Huggins said. “If they don't do it in practice, they're not going to do it in games. And right now, they're not doing it in practice.”
PREP WORK: UC does not play again until Saturday, when it meets its first Top 25 opponent, Gonzaga, in the Rock-N-Roll Shootout at Cleveland's Gund Arena.
The Bearcats do not have a full week to practice for that game, however. They spent most of Monday in Honolulu and were given the day off. They will have a light workout today after arriving in Cincinnati in the morning on a red-eye flight and then resume regular practices Wednesday.
They plan to depart for Cleveland after Thursday's workout.
STAR GAZING: Martin was joined on the all-tournament team by UC freshmen guards DerMarr Johnson and Kenny Satterfield.
Missing from that collection was UC guard Steve Logan, who averaged 15 points a game and passed for 12 assists while turning over the ball just twice. He made 16-of-16 from the free throw line for the tournament.
None of the basketball writers visiting the island were asked to vote on these awards. Logan's late effort in making six consecutive free throws to help seal UC's victory after Iowa State closed its deficit to 65-60 with 1:58 left was not acknowledged, because the balloting was done by halftime of the title game.
TAKING REJECTION: The nine blocked shots by Martin set a Big Island Invitational record. That was one short of the school record Martin holds in conjunction with Jim Ard (1968-69) and Rick Roberson (1966-67). The teams' 13 blocks set a tournament record and was the second-best total by a UC team; the record is 14 against DePaul in 1997-98.
Logan also left the island with a tournament record for hitting 12-of-12 free throws in the title game and for hitting all 16 attempts in the tournament.
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