John Clay's Sidelines

Big Blue Links for Thursday:

• Christian Laettner coming to Lexington to coach in Villains game.
• Kentucky staff visits No. 1 prospect Shabazz Muhammad.
• Kentucky recruiting could experience a slight letdown, says SI’s Luke Winn.
• Kentucky officially off Mitch McGary’s final list.
• South Carolina’s point guard Bruce Ellington is now returning footballs.
• Matt Roark follows his early drops with his first touchdown catch.
• Wide receiver LaRod King wants everybody on the same page.
• South Carolina’s offense is behind new starting quarterback Connor Shaw.
• Don’t count Stephen Garcia out just yet, says Brad Senkiw.
• Raymond Sanders: Dap King.
• Previewing Saturday’s Kentucky-South Carolina football game.
• Doron Lamb returns for his sophomore season with a purpose.
• Kentucky’s point guard transfers are working to improve.
• John Calipari has a bad case of Rick Pitino envy, writes Rick Bozich.
• The hilarious whine from many quarters over Calipari’s comments.
• John Calipari’s subtle geography lesson.
• After knee surgery, Jon Hood wants to use recovery time to improve.
• UK freshman Anthony Davis grew into a big man overnight.
• More details on those Big Blue All-Stars games.
• UK women’s soccer reaches highest ranking in school history.
• It’s tough to hate the most hated man in Kentucky.

Mitch McGary has written in his espn.com blog that he is canceling all his visits, including the one to Big Blue Madness.

The 6-foot-10 center from Indiana writes:

As far as more visits, I don’t think I’ll be making any. I’m not gonna go to Kentucky’s Midnight Madness, I feel like I have all the information that I need to start to think about a decision. Within the next month I hope to have a decision made.

Continue reading ‘Mitch McGary cancels visit to Big Blue Madness’

Ryan Mossakowski

Big Blue Links for Wednesday:

• Mitch McGary and T.J. Warren to visit North Carolina this week
• DaJuan Coleman to visit Ohio State on Sept. 23
• Former UK quarterback Ryan Mossakowski happy to be back on his game
• Offensive line gets poor grades in opening win over Western Kentucky
• My notes column: Lack of practice showed in O-line’s performance
• Central Michigan to have all three of its linebackers for Kentucky game
• New faces will attempt to spark Kentucky offense is Game 2
• Danny Trevathan glad to finally here a Kentucky defense won a game
• Ronnie Sneed, Martavius Neloms among unsung heroes on defense
• Cats’ O-line not the strength of the team quite yet
• Should Joker Phillips consider changing his message?
• With UK looking for receivers, why not Aaron Boyd?
• Since 2007 with UK football, we have witness a tale of two units
• Dominican Republic team will advance to tournament semifinals

The great Michigan blog, MGoBlog, normally concentrates on Wolverines football, but does have some basketball-related news to go along with Michigan’s win over Central Michigan last Saturday.

Turns out UK basketball target Mitch McGary was making his visit to Michigan over the weekend and attended the game.

According to @umhoops, McGary had a big time. It tweeted: “Sat frnt row w/ McGary at FB game. He went nuts all game,Sang Victors. B4 he left, jumped around w/ us n rain talkn abt “next year”

MGoBlog also has a report on the visit.

That is McGary, at right, in a Detroit News picture, cheering on the Wolverines. Click here to see the picture and photo gallery. The MGoBlog report also has a picture of McGary at the visit.

Remember, there was talk that McGary would visit UK this past weekend, but the family said it would rather visit when John Calipari was in town. Cal is coaching the Dominican Republic National Team in a tournament, at present. So McGary is now scheduled to visit UK during Big Blue Madness.

Mitch McGary

Scout.com’s new Top 100 is out, and while Shabazz Muhammad and Andre Drummond held on to the top two spots, Mitch McGary moved up from No. 5 to No. 3.

The 6-foot-10 McGary, a native of Indiana, is on Kentucky’s list and it is expected he will visit the UK campus in the near future. McGary was scheduled to visit Florida today.

McGary is also ranked No. 3 by ESPNU. He is fifth in the Rivals rankings.

He is down to Florida, Maryland, North Carolina, Michigan, Duke and Kentucky.

Perry Ellis, who dropped to 38th in the ESPNU rankings, is No. 34 in Scout’s rankings.

UK target Mitch McGary told Adam Zagoria of Zagsblog that he will visit UK, probably within the month.

Excerpt:

“He’s going to go to Florida this week. And we’re going ty try to visit Kentucky and North Carolina and Duke. He’s already been to those other two [Maryland and Michigan].”

Tim said the Kentucky visit could happen “before he goes back to Brewster [Sept. 10], as soon as Coach Cal comes back. Probably at the end of the month.”

Dave Telep had reported that McGary had cut his list to six schools: Florida, Maryland, North Carolina, Michigan, Duke and Kentucky.

Rivals has the 6-foot-10, 250-pound McGary ranked as the fifth best prospect in the Class of 2012. The Indiana native is playing at Brewster Academy in New Hampshire.

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Big Blue Links for Saturday:

• Kentucky target Devonta Pollard is fighting through adversity, reports Jerry Tipton of the Herald-Leader.
• Chris Walker likes the Cats and other NCAA camp notes, reports Tipton.
• Rodney Purvis’ narrowed list doesn’t include UK, reports the H-L.
• NBA camp notes, day two, from Jody Demling of the Courier-Journal.
• Cats Illustrated has a photo gallery from the NBA camp in Virginia.
• Contract signed for upgrades at Commonwealth Stadium, reports Matt May of the Cats Pause.
• Doron Lamb still thinks about the UConn loss every day, says Larry Vaught of the Danville Advocate-Messenger.
• Enes Kanter’s workout with the Wizards went well, reports Michael Lee of the Washington Post.

Continue reading ‘BBL: Devonta Pollard video; more NBA camp notes’

Alex Bozich of Inside the Hall has the scoop on Indiana center Mitch McGary, a 6-foot-11 prospect in Class of 2012 who has overcome academic problems to be a coveted recruit.

McGary transferred out of his home state to a New Hampshire prep school to get his grades in line, and now Kentucky is among the schools showing lots of interest in his services.

An excerpt:

“It’s been blowing up actually the last couple of weeks,” McGary told Inside the Hall on Sunday at the adidas May Classic. “I think it’s been mainly because I moved out to Brewster. The transition out there got me better on and off the court. Grades were a factor for most schools last year, but now my grades are well.”

The list of schools in regular contact with McGary is impressive. He reeled off Duke, Texas, Arizona, Florida, Florida State, Michigan, Indiana, Purdue, West Virginia, Connecticut, Kentucky, Kansas, Memphis, Louisville and Maryland as schools showing interest.