SAME FEDORA-NEW CROWN?

[Wayne23]

Thanks. I usually spend between 30 and 35 thousand unless I go after a few international recruits. I try to keep about 40 grand just in case.

[PointGuard]

1st Assistant Coach C.J. Costa

Our roster wasn’t strong but then 4 players decided to transfer including 2 who were starters last season (C Reggie Riley and SF Chad Johnson) and our expected backup C Marcel Robinson. So now we have 6 walkons and to put it bluntly…we pretty much suck, particularly up front. Looks like we have to get our team’s players working hard in camps this summer and really focused when fall practice begins.

[Wayne23]

Ouch!!!

[PointGuard]

Jack Stevens

We just got some new neighbors. It turns out the guy is the new basketball coach at Cal Poly. I met him while walking my dog. He was out washing his car. Most people here get their cars cleaned at car washes. In fact he and I are probably the only guys in our neighborhood who wash our own. I think his name is Fred, although to be honest I’m not sure…I mighta got it wrong. He’s a black guy…another rarity in San Luis Obispo. In fact I don’t know of any other blacks living in our immediate neighborhood. He and his family moved here from Boston. He said his wife does something in the medical field. I gotta remember to tell my wife since she’s a techie at our local hospital.

[PointGuard]

Fred Aura

I was sorry to hear that 4 players transferred away from Boston College. Even though one or two may have transferred had I remained with the Eagles, it's unlikely all 4 would have decided to jump ship.

PG Rashon Thorn transferred to Cincinnati
SF Maynard Gardner transferred to Illinois
SF James Pratt transferred to Yale
C Tim Cotton transferred to Louisville

The Eagles picked up 4 transfer players who look like minimal-minutes guys.

With the restrictions on adding scholarship players, we here at Cal Poly were blocked from going after any transfer players....as much as we really need them.

[PointGuard]

Janeka Aura

The NBA held their pro draft today. We all were surprised but thrilled when Omari was selected by Memphis as the 41st pick (11th in round 2). Omari said he had been contacted by the Grizzlies but felt they had another player in mind and therefore had pretty much figured there was no chance for him to be drafted. But the guy that Memphis had targeted was selected a few spots earlier. Omari therefore became the Grizzlies fall-back. Omari is of course ecstatic and has decided to give the pro game a try and forego graduate school for now. Omari was one of four Providence players drafted.

[PointGuard]

Rob Benchley, Athletic Director for Cal Poly

Coach Aura asked me to set up an easy pre-conference schedule since our team won’t be strong and needs to gain some confidence. I pretty much did that but had to schedule 6 of our 9 pre-conference games on the road. I’m hopeful our team can pull off some victories in pre-conference play since there’s no reason to expect they will do any better in the conference than they did last season.

[PointGuard]

Eugene Wallace, 2nd Assistant Coach (Player Development)

Our best player is PF Denny Grove. He scores well from both the inside and outside. Overall we’re stronger on the perimeter than inside. We’re definitely weakest at C.

At the beginning of the season we’re starting the following players:

PG: John Gibbs. He’s a sophomore but freshman Aki Mosely is giving him a run for his money to be the starter.

SG: Victor Carson. Vic is a junior. It’s possible that sophomore Dean Plowman or freshman Terrell Alexander may become the starter. Freshman Cederic Gregory will also get playing time at SG.

SF: Freshman Jason Fleming. Plowman, Carson, and Alexander will also get minutes at SF.

PF: Denny Grove. As a senior Grove is our team leader and likely will be our top scorer. Fleming will fill in at PF when we have to rest Denny.

C: Senior Roland Holland. He’s a walk-on. Freshman Donald Blackmon will sub at C, but needs to gain experience to become effective.

There’s also 5 other walk-ons who are not likely to get much playing time unless there are injuries.

We’re likely to put a short lineup on the court fairly often with one of our SG’s playing at SF and Fleming filling in at PF.

[PointGuard]

Cal Poly Mustangs (0-0) @ Alabama A&M Bulldogs (0-0)

PF Denny Grove picked up 2 quick fouls. A slow start put us down 14-2 with 13 minutes remaining in the half. Led by Aki Mosely and Dean Plowman, we cut the lead to 2 points with 7 minutes left. The Bulldogs then went on an 8-0 run. The half ended with us trailing 35-26. Too many turnovers and poor shooting contributed to the hole we had dug.

We opened the 2nd half by cutting the lead to just 3 points but then quickly fell behind by 13 as our shooting went ice cold. We continued to flail ineffectively the rest of the game, hitting just 33% of our shots and making 18 turnovers.

Final Score: Alabama A&M—62, Cal Poly—51.

Top Players: Dean Plowman-13 pts, 7 reb; Aki Mosely-12 pts.

[PointGuard]

Janeka Aura

Malik started at PG in Georgetown’s first game…a 55-45 win over George Mason. He played 30 minutes and scored 8 points. In their 2nd game which they won 65-48, Malik scored 11 and had 5 assists while playing 31 minutes.

Omari has begun the season playing for the Memphis Grizzlies’ d-league team. They’ve played 3 games this season with Omari scoring a total of 20 points and grabbing 17 rebounds. Until he gains more experience, Fred thinks it will take an injury on the Grizzlies for Omari to get called up to play for the NBA team.

Devany is on a club basketball team. She’s got some good basketball sense, even though this is the first year she’s played for a team. But she’s watched and learned from her brothers and has some pretty good innate moves. She’s 13 and that’s brought about a new attitude which includes often not wanting to talk to her parents or if she does, answering in the briefest way possible or with a simply facial expression including frequent eye rolls…or more often just nodding or shaking her head. We know she can still talk though, since she does incessantly with her friends. But I’m missing how talkative and bubbly she was as a young kid. My Mom warned me this might happen.