The Madness hits early -- now start recruiting
Posted: Friday, October 10, 2008 10:43 AM
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Midnight Madness
The 2008-09 college basketball season is here. Well, almost.
Kentucky, Illinois, West Virginia and a handful of others jumped on an NCAA rule that allows schools two hours of team workouts per week (since mid-September) to host their Midnight Madness festivities a week before the season’s official start date of Oct. 17.
The early starts aren’t a big hit with the National Association of Basketball Coaches board, who see it as flouting a rule that was meant to let coaches work with their players more, not parading them around.
“We don’t want to hurt further (NCAA) legislation in trying to have coaches have more access to their players,” NABC spokesman Rick Leddy told the AP.
The NABC’s heart is in the right place – coaches should have more access to their players – but it’s head got in the way. As the Sporting News’ Mike DeCourcy writes, these schools aren’t breaking any rules, nor are they doing anything remotely wrong. It’s just a way of kicking off the season with fans and recruits in mind.
For those who have never attended a Midnight Madness event, it’s not a typical practice, but a way to introduce players with a little fanfare. It’s food, contests, some showing off and a scrimmage. Consider it a cousin to college football’s spring games.
But mostly, it’s great way to sell a program to recruits.
Kentucky expected 12 recruits to attend Friday’s events, including top prospect Daniel Orton. (He’s one of the top centers available in the 2009 class, according to both Scout.com and Rivals.com.)
Illinois has 16 recruits for their event, mostly with an eye on the future. Eight prospects from the class of 2011 should be on hand, notably five-star forward Mike Shaw, a Chicago native.
For more on where recruits are headed, click here.
Next week, it’ll be more of the same, just on a larger scale.
National champion Kansas will reportedly have six five-star recruits on hand (tip of the hat to Making the Dance), including Scout.com’s top prospects at shooting guard and small forward in Xavier Henry and Lance Stephenson.
Guess it’s true what Mel Brooks says.
