Oh Say Did UC?

With so much football news, and a little basketball news, it's time to hit the links for some Bearcats news. First some site news. Tomorrow is going to be a breakdown of the Big East. Friday will probably just be the Providence breakdown, but maybe a national look at things for the NCAA tournament. If you are nice, you will get both. Let us look at the news shall we?

It's Senior Bowl week, so let's hit those links first. Watch the game Saturday to check out the Cats.

• NFL.Com did a stock report from Day 1. They had Tony Pike as a Stock up, and Mardy Gilyard as a stock down. 
• The man Josh Katzowitz wrote about how the UC trio of players, Pike, Gilyard and long snapper Mike Windt, are trying to impress NFL scouts and coaches at the bowl. 
• Wrapping up the Senior Bowl stuff, an interview with Mardy Gilyard. It retells Mardy's story of he was off the team, came back and was awesome. 
• Mardy is also on twitter, @MardyGilyard. You can follow Bearcats Blog on twitter as well. 
• One other JK item, we linked to part I of his interview with Bearcats coach Butch Jones last week, and here is part II.
• Some recruiting news as we head towards Signing Day. First, the bad. Defensive end from Wyoming High Jibreel Black switched his commitment to Michigan. First he committed to Indiana, then UC, now Michigan.
• Winton Woods standout Dominique Brown lead his team to the State championship and was the division 2 player of the year, but he might not stay in Cincinnati. He's due to visit Louisville this week. He's also visited Ohio State as well as UC.
• Good news, QB Cody Kater is coming to UC. He was a Central Michigan recruit who decided to follow Butch Jones. Kater was the QB for 2 Michigan state champs, and is the first D-1 scholarship player from his high school. There is video on the site if you want to check him out.
• The great Brian Bennett has a Big East recruiting scoreboard. UC has only 16 recruits, 8 of which are 3 star and above.
• Dennis Dodd of CBS ranked the coaching hires. Dodd ranked Butch Jones at #7. The top 6 were USF's Skip Holtz, Texas Tech's Tommy Tuberville, that new coach in South Bend, Mike London of Virginia and Charlie Strong at Louisville. 

Slow week for basketball news, as evidenced by

• The top UC basketball story being that Kahla Roudebush was named to the Big East weekly honor roll. Roudey as her friends call her, put up 20.5, 5 boards and 2.5 assists. She had 25 against Georgetown, a season high. The ladies are 9-9 (2-4) and play tonight at DePaul. 
• Former Bearcat guard Devan Downey helped South Carolina knock off top ranked Kentucky 68-62 last night by scoring 30. The Bearcats Blog curse is in full effect. Downey has stamped his name into South Carolina history according to Ron Morris. It was the first time in the 102 year history of USC basketball that they beat #1. 
• Former Cat great, and #2 best Cat of the decade, Steve Logan has backed out of the Bearcats Hall of Fame Inductions for next month. That has nothing to do with his non-existent NBA career, and more to do with the rape charges. Going into the Hall, Brad Jackson former football player. Also, a bunch of other nerds. Just kidding, they are Andrew Keen (soccer, really for soccer) and Mary Danner Wineberg (track and field mainly the track part). 

Since that last bit was depressing, here is a hilarious celebration video from Syracuse blogger HoyaSuxa after their win over Georgetown Monday. Until tomorrow, thanks for reading. Especially the person in Luxembourg.

Oh Say Did UC?

Time to hit up the Cincinnati news on this Friday afternoon. Just a quick site bit, the Louisville preview for the game Sunday afternoon will probably go up tomorrow. If it somehow doesn't, it will be up Sunday morning well before noon. Quick fact that will be be in the preview. The Bearcats have played the most, and won the most at Freedom Hall more than any Louisville opponent. Plus, the Cats won the 1962 National Title in Freedom Hall. Let's hit some news.

• I can't find anything on the status of Lance Stephenson. Since Born Ready was labeled day to day, I expect him in the lineup Sunday at noon.
• Speaking of Lance, here is an SI article that (coughhackcough) Paul Daugherty wrote. This is like a week old, but I'm pretty sure I didn't post a link and I know you get all your UC news here. Right? Say yes for my fragile ego. 
• This article from CNati questions if Jaquon Parker is the missing piece. I hope that he can step in and play the point, and that would be huge. I'm not totally against giving Cashmere Wright another look in spurts. I'm all for Parker starting Sunday.
• Louisville was taken down by Seton Hall last night in a nightmare scenario. There was some controversy at the end. Jerry Smith made a 3 with .7 remaining. As Seton Hall was set to inbound, there was a whistle and the player with the ball took 2 steps on the court. All the players turned towards their benches, so that could be chalked up to confusion. However, Seton Hall's inbounds pass was tipped back out of bounds. The inbounder would run the line, an absolute clear violation, and Seton Hall would inbound and make free throws. Youtube: here. 
• The Wall Street Journal decided to have their yearly piece about how awesome the Big East is. Worth a read, or otherwise I wouldn't have linked to it. 
• Luke Winn writes a great Power Rankings on SI every Thursday. UC isn't mentioned, but it's one of my favorite reads of the week. Good job Luke.

That about does it on the basketball news. Let's hit the gridiron.

• Another SI bit. Stewart Mandel, from Cincinnati, did a report card of the coaching hires. Spoiler alert: Butch Jones got an A-. Louisville's Charlie Strong got the best grade, A+, and South Florida's Skip Holtz received an A-. Big East AD's are hitting it out of the park this year on paper.
• Dyjuan Lewis, a 4 star receiver from Indianapolis, recommited to Cincinnati. Nice job getting him back Butch Jones. Great decision Dyjuan.
• Here is a slightly dated Big East recruiting breakdown. Lewis answers a question asked in the piece, and is UC's best recruit. 
• QB recruit Luke Massa is being wooed by Notre Dame. The St. X star said "Then (on Thursday) Notre Dame offered (a scholarship). I was definitely pretty excited. Who wouldn't be excited about an offer from Notre Dame? I'll be visiting there Jan. 30, and then make my decision after that." Great. Sounds like he might be going.
• Alex Daniels and Aaron Webster were named to the Texas vs. The Nation all star game. Good for them. 
• Mel Kiper has his rankings up. They are insider so no link. Tony Pike fell out of his top 5 QBs. Mardy Gilyard is his 4th best WR. Armon Binns is 2 on the list for next year.
• Our main man Josh Katzowitz has an interview with Butch Jones up on GoBearcats. 

Finally, Brian Bennett at ESPN's Big East blog has a shit load of UC related things. You should read his blog, but then forget about it when I link to stuff about it. The following bullets are all his.

• Big East games of the Decade: UC v. Pitt #3. UC vs South Florida from October 2007 #9.
• Coaches of the Decade: #1 Brian Kelly. Don't boo or get angry, just let the last BK mention be a good one.
• Programs of the Decade: UC #5. Top 4: Miami, West Virginia, Virginia Tech and Pittsburgh.
• Half Decade Team: WR Mardy Gilyard, OG Trevor Canfield, CB Mike Mickens and P Kevin Huber.
• Big East Game of the Year: 

1. #7 Cincinnati vs West Virginia. 
2. #5 Cincinnati vs Connecticut
3. #1. Cincinnati at Pittsburgh

That didn't end confusingly at all. Thank you so very much for taking the time to read the blog. Shout out to whoever read this in Belgium. Don't forget to check back tomorrow for the Louisville preview. It won't be up in the morning, probably the afternoon. There will be the normal quick result post and the full reaction Monday. As for the rest of the week, I'm not sure. The Cats don't play until the next Saturday, so if you have any ideas for what you want me to write about, leave a comment. 

The Oscar Problem

The Oscar Problem is something that I'm sure many Cincinnati fans and people who don't attend games aren't aware. Oscar Robertson is one of the greatest basketball players of all time. The Big O played collegiately and professionally in Cincinnati. He is a Cincinnati legend. His jersey is in the rafters, his statue is outside 5/3 Arena, and he is parked courtside nearly every game. That all sounds nice, but the problem is this.

From Josh Katzowitz: "Mick gets in Stephenson's face after a mistake, and Oscar yells at him to sit down."

And again from JK: "Mick is yelling at/instructing his players, and Oscar yells, "Shut up!"

This isn't a one time thing, it's happened all season. There aren't any stories of the Big O yelling at Bob Huggins to shut up and sit down. Or Oscar yelling at Andy Kennedy.  I love Oscar as much as the next man who loves Oscar, but this can't happen. I doubt this will ever be a national story, but it's a local one, it is another distraction for the UC program. It doesn't matter if Oscar is right or wrong in his Mick Cronin criticism, you can't be yelling this at a game. I don't agree with everything that Mick Cronin does, but I wouldn't go to a UC game and yell at him to shut up when coaching. You expect some class from the home crowd, and Oscar is not showing much. I'm not going to put Oscar on blast out of respect for all he's accomplished, and what he means, but it would be nice if he saved all his yelling at Mick for the car after the game, or when he's watching the road games on tv. Mick has said that the Oscar yelling is no big deal, but it's gotta hurt. I don't care what your profession is, if a legend sat across from you and undermined you, you would have some hurt feelings. Just like if you were going to buy a wet suit to scuba dive and the attendant suggested you tried a ladies size. You'd have hurt feelings, you'd have hurt feelings. The problem in my eyes is 2 fold.

1. Oscar Roberston is a great resource for the basketball program, and as long as he's unhappy with Mick, he's not going to be. The players of today might not be seeped in tradition, but Oscar is everywhere in UC, and at UC. I'm not saying that he's a recruiting tool, but he could be in a mentor type role if he wanted to. Right now, he's ignored for the most part because he's not on the same side as the coaches. It would be great if they could team together, but I'm not sure Oscar is that type of person. Especially with this relationship with Mick.
2. Oscar popping off is going to get caught on camera, and it's going to become a national distraction. There are cameras everywhere, and they always show Oscar when he's at the games. They are bound to catch him saying something disparaging towards Mick, and eventually I think they will show it on tv. This could end up with Oscar not going to games anymore, which would be a shame because it's cool seeing Oscar at games. 

The situation can be resolved rather easily. Oscar can either, a) stop yelling at Mick, or b) stop going to games if he can't keep his mouth shut. Knowing what I've heard about Oscar, he'll definitely keep going to games and yelling at Mick. There is a reason that Oscar is known as the bitter old man around UC circles. Oscar has gone through a shit load of things that would make any man bitter, but that's no excuse for being a jackass when you are the ambassador for the program. That's no excuse when you are a Cincinnati icon pulling the same act as drunk fans on road trips.

It's naive to think that UC basketball should be one happy family. I don't think that's it too much to say for the Cincinnati family to keep their problems hidden under the rug and kept in private. Mick has enough on his plate than to answer questions about this. Yes, it's a slow Tuesday.