The Academic Progress Rate, the measure by which the NCAA tracks eligibility and retention rates of student-athletes, isn’t as straightforward a system as some would believe. It’s like most things in life: Money might be the root of all evil, but it sure does benefit those with the fattest wallets.
There was about a minute remaining in UNLV’s basketball game against San Diego State on Friday evening when Aztecs fans began a popular chant for teams about to win on another’s court.
Randall Cunningham is humbled. When he thinks back, he sees only a big deficit on the scoreboard, 80,000 lunatics screaming at him and Bruce Smith on a mission to rip his head off.
Deville Smith took full advantage of just his fourth start on Wednesday. He will get a fifth at first-place San Diego State on Saturday. He is sure to remain in the lineup for the foreseeable future.
It was to college basketball cheering sections what the Great Pyramid of Giza and the Colossus of Rhodes were to classic antiquity; what Big Bertha was to metal drivers; what Superman’s bare hands were to steel and the course of mighty rivers.
I’m not so sure it’s this simple, but for all the weirdness of this college basketball season, it just might be: My esteemed colleague, fellow Review-Journal columnist Ron Kantowski, viewed Katin Reinhardt’s recent shooting slump in the most basic of terms.
It was two years ago, and San Diego State’s basketball team was in the midst of its best season in school history, a campaign that would end in the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament and with a record of 34-3.
You need heart to win NCAA Tournament games. You need leadership on the basketball court. You need to play together. You need, above all, mental and physical toughness.
The season’s first 10 games suggest this was the exception and not the rule, that UNLV’s basketball team on Wednesday simply had one of those nights.
