SAME FEDORA-NEW CROWN?

[PointGuard]

Zahara Carter, Assistant (sports administration)

A while back Coach Aura told you about Bryan Taylor, a PG on our team, and how he had set up a program that gathers extra fruit and vegetables from people’s local homes and provides it to organizations that help feed the needy. Bryan has been expanding his efforts and now has a cadre of assistants so that they can get to more homes to gather fruit and vegetables and make the resulting deliveries. Recently he was able to convince some of the farmers in the area to allow his group to pick and gather leftover fruit and vegetables from their farms after those farmers have completed thier commercial harvesting. That has allowed Bryan to dramatically expand what he was doing for the needy in San Luis Obispo and nearby Paso Robles to include a much larger city to our south, Santa Maria. That city has many more low-income residents and a sizeable number of homeless.

While Bryan isn’t a starter for us, he’s definitely become a star within of our Cal Poly student body and developed a much needed and beneficial humanitarian service. We’re very proud of him.

[PointGuard]

Coach Fred Aura

We spent more time and money than I wanted in our pursuit of transfer players. But we landed two who I believe will help make our team successful. So we’ve now filled all available scholarships as we prepare for the upcoming season.

PG Edouard LaTouche is a 6’4” sophomore from France who is transferring from Rider where he averaged 8.7 ppg, 4.7 rpg, and 4.5 apg. While not a great shooter, he’s a strong ball handler and passer and is a solid defender, although his aggressiveness can get him into foul trouble. He’s tough and durable plus he has an excellent work ethic. I anticipate he will be a very good backup this season at both PG and SG and compete well to start next year.

C Victor Collier is a 6’10” sophomore from Wyoming who played last year for UC-Santa Barbara where he didn’t play much so averaged just 2.2 ppg and 2.5 rpg. But he’s developing quickly and is likely to challenge to be a starter for us this season. He’s a strong rebounder and defender who should score well for us inside and his height will be an asset for us both offensively and defensively. It’s rumored he is injury prone (although he got through his freshman year injury-free) and his work ethic is questionable so we’ll need to keep on him. With our 4 strongest interior players being seniors this year, we’ll definitely need him producing well for us next season.

We also welcomed two new walk-on players to our squad. Both are SG’s. Malik Turner is a sophomore and Jeff Manley is a senior.

Both SG’s who transferred away from us got picked up by exceptionally strong programs. Ryan Jackson transferred to Syracuse and Roderick Chatman is headed to Gonzaga. While it’s great they will be playing on excellent teams, they both indicated they wanted an opportunity to have a better chance to start at their primary position. Looking at the SG’s who were already at those two schools, I’d be surprised if either Ryan or Roderick get much playing time, let alone start. But hopefully things work out for them. At least both will likely get to the NCAA Tournament regularly.

[PointGuard]

Janeka Aura

Our entire family is thrilled. The NBA’s pro draft was held today and Malik was selected by the Denver Nuggets in the first round as the 11th overall pick in the draft. Fred was with him at the Barclay Center in Brooklyn where the draft was held. Both were extremely excited when we talked right after Malik was selected. Omari got in touch with me soon after saying how proud he was that Malik will be joining him in the NBA. Since Malik was selected so highly, Omari expects that Malik will immediately be a roster player for the Nuggets. I got the feeling that Omari would like to be traded to the Nuggets so he could play with, rather than against, his brother. We all felt that Malik would possibly be a 1st round pick, but I think we all were surprised that he was selected as high as he was.

PF Ben Schau of Boston College was the 28th player selected and Fred again called me right after that selection since Ben was one of Fred’s favorite players while he was coaching the Eagles. PG DeWayne Allen (who also played for Boston College but was recruited after Fred left) was the 50th selected player.

[PointGuard]

Bryan King, 1st Assistant Coach (recruiting)

July:

Without buying any scouting reports or attending any camps, we began our recruiting efforts pretty much in the blind. We have 8 scholarships to fill this year. We definitely need a couple guards, a SF, and a couple interior players.

Our recruiting budget is likely too small to be able to successfully land eight recruits. But we are concentrating much of our efforts, at least initially, on recruits from within California to keep our expenses as low as possible. To also conserve funds we’re incrementally adding recruits to our list and will be pretty quick to drop those who are unqualified or who we can not get interested in coming to Cal Poly.

Follow up at the end of October:

We have verbal acceptance of scholarship offers from 3 players:

C Dekkar Chambers, 6-8, JC, Potter Valley, CA, 16.8 ppg & 11.7 rpg last season, Excellent rebounder and inside shooter, good shot blocker, good passer, 96th ranked and 4 star recruit.

PF Darcel Aygar, 6-6, HS, Healdsburg, CA, 16.1 ppg & 6.9 rpg last season, Excellent inside shooter and scorer, very strong defensively, 94th ranked and 4 star recruit.

C Justin Clausen, 6-10, HS, Gustine, CA, 15.3 ppg and 6.1 rpg last season, Excellent shooter from inside and outside, strong scorer, good defensively, hard worker, 196th ranked and 3 star recruit.

We’re pleased with our success at recruiting a good crew to replace the numerous losses we are incurring amongst our present strong group of big men. But we missed out on getting recruits for the perimeter to accept our offers. We still have some offers on the table and will try to nurse those over the next few months to get acceptances. But we’re also trying to create and develop interest in number of available recruits we’ve recently added to our list.

[PointGuard]

Justin Traore, 2nd Assistant Coach (Player development/Practice)

Practice went well throughout October. SF Donald Brown missed almost the entire month due to a legal issue. He was accused of being involved in a robbery in his hometown but was ultimately found to be innocent. So earlier this week he returned to campus and began practicing with the team. Donald started for us all last season so he's familiar with the rest of the team and our sets, but we need to help him refocus on basketball, quickly reacclimate him to what we've been doing this past month, and get him back into the flow of the rest of the team.

We received an unexpected bonus for this practice season. Due to the recent thaw in international relations between the U.S. and North Korea, 4 college teams are going to North Korea to play what are being termed by the NCAA as “good will” games that count as practice games but will not reflect on the teams’ season records. And surprisingly, Cal Poly was one of those 4 teams invited to participate. The other 3 are Butler, Temple, and New Mexico State. We’re flying to Pyongyang the end of the first week of November. I'm excited to be going, but not thrilled about the long 14-hour flight.

[PointGuard]

Robert Theobold, Director of U.S. Diplomatic Mission to North Korea

As a way of fostering improved relations with the new government and the people of North Korea, the U.S. has established a Diplomatic Mission as a precursor to creation of an embassy in this country. Our government is planning to expose the North Korean populace to some of our sports and culture. As an early part of that, four college teams played a series of what the NCAA is terming as pre-season practice games here. Here’s my brief summary of each of those games:

New Mexico State Aggies vs Temple Owls:

The early stages of this game were a contest between the interior of the Aggies and the perimeter of the Owls with the Owl’s outside shooters besting the Aggies big men 17-14. But then both teams substituted liberally. Temple held onto a lead throughout the remainder of the half, finishing it on top 49-42. Topping the scoring was New Mexico State’s PF Todd LaFlem who threw in 18 points. Both team hit over 50% of their shots. The Aggies came back to go ahead 60-58 with 13 minutes remaining. The lead shifted back and forth over the next 10 exciting minutes. But Temple pulled away in the final minutes to win 89-81. SF Ryan Fox finished with 25 points for the Owls while LaFlem scored 20 for the Aggies. Both teams had 4 players score in double figures.

Butler Bulldogs vs Cal Poly Mustangs:

The Mustangs came out and hit 9 of their first 10 shots to spurt to a 19-10 lead with 14 minutes to go in the half. Cal Poly’s coach worked his bench in and out of the game with 12 players getting substantial playing time and came out of the first half with a 38-34 advantage. Cal Poly held onto the lead with the Bulldogs nipping at their heels in the 2nd half. Butler tied the game with 7 minutes to go, but the Bulldogs seemed to run out of gas against the fresh legs of the frequently substituted Mustangs. Cal Poly pulled away for a 73-60 victory. PG Aki Mosley’s 13 points topped the scoring by 11 of the 13 Mustangs who played. PF/C Don Seals had 12 points and 9 boards.

Temple Owls vs Butler Bulldogs:

The lead flip-flopped for the first 7 minutes, but then Butler crept ahead and came away with a 34-27 halftime lead. Most of the difference was due to the Bulldogs getting to the foul like more than the Owls. Butler held onto their small lead in the first 10 minutes of the 2nd half and then gradually extended the lead to as much as 19 before settling for a 72-59 win. The Bulldogs held an advantage in all team stats except for the Owls making 8 less turnovers. Leading scorer in the game was PG Billy Howard who scored 21 points for Butler.

Cal Poly Mustangs vs New Mexico State Aggies:

New Mexico State stormed to an 11-2 lead after 4 minutes of play. Although the Mustangs began scoring, they were unable to stop the Aggies’ offense. New Mexico state continually expanded their lead and left the court at the end of the half in total control by a score of 49-24. In the 2nd half the Mustangs fought hard to cut into the large lead but the closest they could get was 12 points. New Mexico State left the court with a dominating 84-64 beatdown of Cal Poly. C Donald Wallace was the top scorer for the Aggies with 18 points. PF Curtis Pearson scored 12 to lead the Mustangs.

Each of these 4 games was very well attended and well received. The teams provided excitement and good exposure to the American game. Since this was so successful, we’ve begun discussions to bring 2 college football teams to North Korea for a demonstration game following completion of the college football season about 3 months from now. If things go right, we’ll have a small embassy in place in Pyongyang by then. In response to our efforts to expose American sports and culture, North Korea has made arrangements for The State Circus (spectacular acrobats, clowns, tight rope, jugglers, trapeze, etc but no animals) to travel to the U.S. to do shows at a number of major cities in our country. Coach Aura campaigned for them to come to San Luis Obispo, but I told him he’d have to drive down to Los Angeles to see them. The North Korean government is also interested in sending the Mansudae Art Troupe (music, light classical operas, and dance) for a short tour around the U.S. sometime in the near future.

[PointGuard]

Justin Traore, 2nd Assistant Coach (Player development/Practice)

We’ve been picked to finish 4th in the Big West…behind UC Santa Barbara, UC Irvine, and UC San Diego. I personally think we’ll do better than that, but agree that UC Santa Barbara continues to be the favorite to come out on top. I like our depth and experience this year.

While Aki Mosley and Terrell Alexander will again start at PG and SG, there will be little drop off when Bryan Taylor and Edouard LaTouche come in off the bench and both can play well at either PG or SG.

At SF Donald Brown will start as he did last season, but Richard Lawson has been particularly effective at SF during practice.

Any of our 4 big men could start at either C or PF. Victor Collier looks to have the greatest potential, but we know how well Don Seals, Curtis Pearson and Derrick LaLane have done for us in the past. We’ll do some experimenting as we begin pre-conference play to see who ultimately wins out as starters up front. We pretty much can mix and match amongst those 4 guys…plus Richard Lawson is really a PF so he can fill in up front as well as on the wing.

[PointGuard]

Cal Poly Mustangs (0-0) @ Oregon State Beavers (0-0)

Coach Fred Aura

There’s been a light drizzle the entire time we’ve been in Corvalis. We’re going to be playing a deep bench tonight to see how various guys do and if there are certain lineups that click well together. We’re starting Aki Mosley at PG, Terrell Alexander at SG, Donald Brown at SF, Curtis Pearson at PF, and Victor Collier at C. Collier played for UC Santa Barbara last season and we want to see how he does for us.

Collier grabbed an offensive rebound and put the ball back in on our first possession to score his first points for us. Nice start. Donald Brown picked up two quick fouls guarding Julius Acani and we replaced him with Richard Lawson at SF. Acani went on to score 11 of the Beavers first 13 points. Lawson hit 3 quick baskets, including 2 from beyond the arc, to put us on top 16-11 with 14 minutes left in the half. We shot extremely well but so did Oregon State so we couldn’t pull away. The refs were really calling the game close against both teams. We finished the half with a slim 43-41 lead. We hit 62% of our shots and the Beavers hit 57% of theirs. The two teams went the the line a combined 37 times in the first half. We got good scoring from throughout our lineup with 9 players scoring. SF Julius Acani scored 16 points for Oregon State.

The lead continually shifted throughout the entire 2nd half. With 2-1/2 minutes remaining we trailed 77-76. Then we tied the game at 80-80 with 58 seconds to play. Richard Lawson was fouled with 19 seconds on the clock. He sunk both free throws to put us up by 2. Oregon State hit a jumper from the foul line and was fouled on the shot. They hit the foul shot to make it 83-82 with 12 seconds to go. We called a time out and then worked the pick and roll perfectly with Terrell Alexander hitting a 12 foot jumper to put us ahead 84-83 with just 4 seconds left. The Beavers were unable to get off a shot and we escaped with the one point victory.

There were 26 lead changes and 12 ties, almost all of those in the 2nd half. We outshot the Beavers 57% to 53% and we knocked down 8 of 16 of our 3’s.

SG Terrell Alexander had 16 points, 6 rebounds, 4 assists and 2 steals. PF Curtis Pearson and SF Richard Lawson both scored 12 points, PG Aki Mosley had 10 points and 7 assists, and C Victor Collier had 10 points and 6 boards in his first game for us. Eleven of our players scored. Oregon State’s Julius Acani finished with 19 points.

UC Santa Barbara put us all on notice by travelling to Tennessee and blowing the Volunteers out in the 2nd half to win 81-66.

[PointGuard]

Cal Poly Mustangs (1-0) @ Siena Saints (1-0)

PG Aki Mosley

In Siena’s opening game this season, most of their offense came from the perimeter, so T-Man (SG Terrell Alexander), Donnie (SF Donald Brown) and I need to shut them down outside.

We had a tough time getting the ball in the basket early in the game, but our shots began to fall midway through the first half and we were able to slip ahead of the Saints. But our shooting fell off again and Siena hit a couple shots in the final minute to give them a 27-22 lead at the break. We did well keeping their guards in control, but SF Brendan West dropped in 10 points. We only hit 24% of our shots, but Siena wasn’t much better (29%).

Our poor shooting continued into the 2nd half, but we compounded our problem by making a bunch of turnovers. Siena took advantage to go ahead 50-36 with 10 minutes to play. We never recovered and lost a game we probably should have won. The final score was 66-53. We hit just 30% of our FG’s and 19% of our 3’s. We were out-rebounded 41-33 and made 17 turnovers compared to 15 by Siena.

PF Curtis Pearson scored 15. I had 4 rebounds and 3 assists but missed all shots I took.

After the game, C Victor Collier complained about having a sore knee. I heard the athletic trainer tell him and the coaches that he stay off it and skip practice the next few days and that his availability for our next game will depend on how it improves.

[PointGuard]

San Francisco Dons (0-1) @ Cal Poly Mustangs (1-1)

Father Peter Morville

Probably most would be expecting me to root for San Francisco, since I’m a Catholic priest. But my parish is in San Luis Obispo and Coach Aura’s family attends my church, so I’m a Mustangs fan. I just hope Cal Poly plays better than they did last week against Siena, another Catholic university.

PF Curtis Pearson scored the Mavericks’ first 7 points. The Mustangs held a small lead nearly the entire half but San Francisco crept ahead in the final minutes to post a 29-27 halftime lead.

C Don Seals began the 2nd half hot and led the Mustangs to a 6 point lead after 6 minutes of play in the half. Cal Poly then stetched the lead, going up 58-39 when Seals knocked down a 3 with 4 minutes remaining in the game. The Mustangs went on to win convincingly 70-48.

C Don Seals dropped in 24 points plus had 6 rebounds, 2 assists, a steal and 3 blocks. PG Aki Mosley scored 12 points and had 3 rebounds, 3 assists, and 2 steals.