Friday, October 13, 2000
Madness begins without talk of Final Four
By Michael Perry
The Cincinnati Enquirer
The Madness starts tonight. College basketball programs nationwide can begin practicing when the clock strikes midnight, and in the hoops hotbed that is the Tristate area, most will do so in front of thousands of fans.
On Saturday, the teams go to work for real.
There should be no Final Four talk around here a this preseason.
Not from Cincinnati, where 12th-year coach Bob Huggins must replace four starters, including college basketball's player of the year Kenyon Martin.
Not from Kentucky, which last March was ousted in the second round of the NCAA Tournament and returns minus Jamaal Magloire and with continued questions about its outside shooting.
Not from Xavier, which has been to two straight National Invitation Tournaments and is trying to avoid missing the NCAA Tournament three years in a row for the first time since its 1962-82 drought.
Not from Miami, which will try to blend five talented newcomers with three battle-tested seniors and return to the postseason after a 15-15 finish last year.
Not from Ohio State, which lost its formidable backcourt of Scoonie Penn and Michael Redd and will be in a bit of a rebuilding mode.
Not from Indiana, which lost its legendary coach Bob Knight but could have more fun under interim coach Mike Davis, who said this week he wants Midnight Madness in Bloomington to be more of a good time and less about drills.
Not from Dayton, which will try for back-to-back NCAA appearances for the first time since 1984-85.
Rest assured there will be some great basketball around here. Kentucky is picked in preseason publications anywhere from No. 9 to No. 16 in the country. The UC is picked between No. 13 and No. 26.
The national spotlight, clearly on the Bearcats a year ago, now turns to Duke and Arizona, the consensus top two teams in the country.
Put the rest of the top 10 in any order you wish: Illinois, Kansas, Maryland, Michigan State, North Carolina, Seton Hall, Stanford and Tennessee.
The Bearcats and Wildcats could work their way into that group if some of their newer players develop quickly. Kentucky is hurt, of course, by the loss of 6-foot- 11 Jules Camara, who is suspended indefinitely after being convicted Tuesday of driving under the influence.
UC is relying in part on a group of newcomers to help out what will be a somewhat inexperienced club. Only returning guards Kenny Satterfield, a sophomore, and Steve Logan, a junior, saw significant playing time last season.
“Last year, it was like we had a target on our back,” Satterfield said. “Now, we look at other teams like they're our targets, so we're coming after them. A lot of people are doubting us. We've just got to believe in each other. We can have the same success as we had last year; it probably won't come as fast as it did, but come (NCAA) tournament time, I think we're going to surprise some people.”
Said Logan: “I feel as though we're by ourselves, everybody's counting us out. But everybody's still going to play us as hard as they can just because of the many years we beat them ... I'm ready to go. I'm sick of all this running. I'm ready to get on the hardwood and get things flowing so we can get some chemistry with these young guys.”
The interest at Xavier is sky-high with the new on-campus Cintas Center. The Musketeers now get to lift weights and practice in their own building.
Skip Prosser, entering his seventh year as XU's head coach, said the new facility already has had a positive impact on the players.
“How all that's going to translate into wins and losses, I don't know,” Prosser said. “That's the bottom line here; we have to be able to fight.
“As pretty as everything is, and as aesthetically pleasing as it is, ultimately it's going to come down to a basketball game — blocking out and guarding, making shots, things like that.”
XU was 53-3 at the Cincinnati Gardens the past four seasons. It's going to be a challenge to top that.
Though the Cintas Center opened six months behind its originally scheduled date, meaning Xavier had to play last season in the Gardens, senior point guard Maurice McAfee says it was worth the wait.
“I'm just thankful to be able to play here this year, to see it finally all together and actually get out here on the court,” he said. “This is my last year. To be able to end it in this place, I cherish every moment.”
Time for all the teams to get to work.
Neil Schmidt contributed to this report
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Madness begins without talk of Final Four
