Friday's WAC pre-holiday weekend wrapup

Dayton Morinaga has the details about Bill Amis' choice to forsake professional basketball and get on with his life -- Amis has returned to Hawaii. PTW always liked him and his game and wishes him well.

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ESPN's Fran Fraschilla tabs Texas Arlington's Scott Cross as one to watch in the college coaching ranks.

Friday's WAC roundup

Brad Winton posted: "Raphael Carter, a 6-9 forward/center out of Diablo Valley CC in California, is waiting on his final summer grades to be posted before he makes a decision. Carter will know early next week whether he graduates and qualifies for the NCAA D1 level. Carter originally signed with Nevada, but was released from his NLI. He now has offers from Rhode Island, Bowling Green and Oakland."

Thought some WAC teams might jump in but apparently not.

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A 2013 homegrown point has Texas San Antonio in his top four.

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Speaking of the Roadrunners, junior backcourter Ryan Whitehead has announced his departure. He played but 37 minutes last season.

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Dayton Morinaga has a post up on 6-foot-7 CA power forward Kaiako Kaluna who appears a very strong Hawaii lean but Utah State is also mentioned.

Rainbow Warriors nab a 2012 wing

For the PTW Hawaii faithful -- per Alex Kline/The Recruit Scoop, Hawaii just landed Aaron Valdes, a 6-foot-5 SoCal prep wing. He possesses an 83-inch wing span and is way above the typical athletic level of the Big West Conference.

Idaho was interested at one time.

Here's Josh Gershon from April of this year

Here's some 2011 video:  

Sunday's sermon WAC style

Wendell McKines has a summer home: "Its official I will be playing on the ‪#Warriors‬ ‪#NBA‬ summer league team #510 lol. The irony is crazy"

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Brian McInnis has been tweetin' away so start clicking for news on Isaac Fotu, Caleb Dressler, Keith Shamburger and Michael Harper.

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Probably missing something as PTW is heading out early to catch a club team practice. We bid adieu to Nevada, Fresno State and Hawaii (which means off-season coverage from here on is going to be even more scantier) but Parsing The MWC will be in operation a year from today.

Friday's post NBA draft digest

It was waiting in vain for the names Big Wen, Dario Hunt and Olek Czyz to be called last night but none will need a collection taken up for them.

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USU athletics provides an update on Mr. Tai.


The USU Stats folks infiltrated the summer ball being played by the Aggies and offers up numbers and analysis.

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Wes Nakama profiles erstwhile UH walk-on Dyrbe Enos, who is exciting some folks in the islands.

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Texas State athletics profiles the hoops accomplishments of the Bobcats while a Southland Conference member.

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Coach Doug Davalos has signed a junior college point -- Phil Hawkins -- for his Texas State program.

Armstead apparently not heading to the islands

Credit Sportsbow (as usual) at the Sports Hawaii MB for unearthing the current status of the Aaric Armstead-to-Hawaii scenario (it's entry #12 in the post).

Orel Lev's arrival to be delayed

Dayton Morinaga offers the very latest status of UH signee Orel Lev.

Shooting to the point

Credit warriorbow for posting this link at the Warrior Sports Network MB  on UH signee Manroop Clair. A point with distance shooting ability will be a nice asset for Gib Arnold.

Tuesday's WAC hoops digest

Jimmy Durkin reports that former Fresno State assistant coach Senque Carey will be pacing the sidelines of a certain high school next season.

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Yet another sign of the apocalypse: Anthony Davis Trademarks His Brow 

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Joey Natale reports: "Nevada just offered 2013 ICP Portland forward Jordan Bell. Memphis, Hawaii and Wyoming all recently offered"

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Dayton Morinaga has the details on Hauns Brereton's summer activities.

Sunday morning WAC hoops edition

Tony Jones posts about the summer edition of Kyisean Reed.

PTW would be more than happy to be incorrect in this case (won't be the first time, nor the last) but how many players 'get it' in their final season? Reed has been a tease throughout his basketball playing (not a judgment, just an observation) so why would every-second full-game focus come into play now?

Again, Reed on the All-WAC ream at season's end would be great. Here's hoping he achieves that honor by moving from contributor to featured in the Aggie system.

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Sportsbow @ the Sports Hawaii forum (scroll to the bottom), has dug up some interesting details on Rainbow Warrior recruiting target Aaric Armstead -- very, very good work.

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At the Warrior Insider site, there is news about former UH backcourter Shaq Stokes.

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* 6-foot-6 Anthony Dixon, a talent out of Chicago who played one season )2009-10) at San Jose State University, has signed with Fresno Pacific but he will sit out the 2012-13 season. Dixon played at West Valley College in 2010-11 but didn't participate last season.

Friday's a.m. WAC tidbits

Matt Norlander performed his usual magic with numbers and it turns out that Nevada has more NBA draftees than Louisville and others over the past decade -- credit to Dan Hinxman. Ya think Coach Carter uses that in his recruiting pitches?

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Wes Nakama checks out the Rainbow Warrior participation in the Hawaii Summer League.

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Frank Woodford writes (a Rivals sub is required) about 2013 Nevada prepster Hunter Myers, a 6-foot-7 forward who is aces in the classroom and has offers from Nevada, Idaho and many others but it's looking like it's between Harvard and Cal for the young man.

Wednesday's WAC hoops digest

Jason Groves saves the day with a post about the Aggie team leaders come the 2012-13 season. That's a fascinating topic as Big Wen leaves behind an oversized role to fill -- let's see who comes to the fore.

Found a few more items...

Matt Sonnenberg is rolling ... Morgan Grim has joined the play-for-pay ranks.

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The Fresno Bee reports a 6-foot-9 Kansas community college player has given a 2013 verbal to Coach Rodney Terry. Give the man a raise!

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Check out Bill Amis' interview here.

Sunday morning's WAC connections

Joey Natale tweeted: "'14 Utah Pump N Run F Dalton Nixon heard from Stanford, Creighton, BYU, Utah, San Francisco, Utah St, Portland & Harvard since last night"

Here's Bill Oram and Kyle Goon on Utah State and Nixon back in April.  

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Eric Hampford writes about 2013 Land of Enchantment prospect John Dawson who has been offered by New Mexico State and Denver among others. He's a 6-foot-4 backcourter. 

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Dayton Morinaga has the latest on play in the Hawaii Summer league as the Rainbow Warriors have Jace Tavita and Charles Standhardinger participating.

Wednesday's roundup

Dan Hinxman offers his take on the top Wolf Pack sports happenings during Nevada's tenure in the WAC -- three are basketball related.

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Stephen Trembley and Jennifer Jory of FSU athletics interviewed former Bulldog Paul George who seems to have stayed connected with Fresno State basketball despite the coaching change.

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Dayton Morinaga reports in multi-media that Jace Tavita is taking his final college court go-around very seriously.

Sunday's WAC basketball coverage

Joe Davidson tweetin' on D'Erryl Williams: "Sac Bee Player of Year D'Erryl Williams resting ham and hand. Hoop offers from Fresno St, UC Davis, UOP, Irvine, Santa Barbara. Smart, tough, skilled"

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Dayton Morinaga reports that UH's Christian Standhardinger is taking next season very seriously right now. 

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A tweet from the Grand Rapids Storm: "CONGRATS to 2010 Storm Alum Chris Anderson (6'5 SF Reeths Puffer/Weatherford CC) & his family on his commitment to Louisana Tech! Go Storm!"

The uber-athletic Anderson averaged 14 points, five rebounds, three assists and two steals per game last season, shooting 43% overall, 30% from three and 58% from the foul line.

Earlier reports indicated Central Michigan and St. Bonaventure were interested. 

He committed to Toledo coming out of high school back in 2009. Here's more.

Saturday's second WAC hoops post

This is our first double-dip in the off-season -- enjoy it as tomorrow may well be barren.

Shaq Stokes has cast his lot with the Flying Dutchmen -- both Adam Zagoria and Raphielle Johnson offer the details.

Dayton Morinaga catches up with Bill Amis.

Brian McInnis has all sorts of Rainbow Warrior hoops goodies in his latest blog entry.

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Jason Groves has the latest on former New Mexico State Aggie Jonathan Gibson.

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USU Stats goes with a pictorial roster of their northern Aggies.

Paging Shaquille Stokes

Just asking: where the heck is Shaquille Stokes?

Shouldn't he have landed somewhere by now?

Monday's WAC hoops post

Here's is an interesting article involving Fresno State's Braeden Anderson, which at least partially accounts for his setting foot in the San Joaquin. Plus, a second one.

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Denver Associate Head Coach Mike McKee is the centerpiece of this very interesting post about scouting reports.

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Don't like doing this but PTW simply must disagree with Tommy Dee on his evaluation of Joston Thomas. JT isn't going to be positioned as a volume shooter or ranked in the top three (more than likely four) in having plays run for him as an NBA team member and, if not getting shots, his motor stops and he fades into the background far too often. Credit username 343 at the Warrior Sports Network MB for digging this up. For Thomas, it's overseas where he can be a #1 or #2 guy.

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Oh yes, a big shout out to our veterans along with a wish that all the politicians and generals would just stay away from any and all Memorial Day ceremonies. The grunts have been used enough.

Saturday's WAC roundup

Dayton Morinaga checks in on Hawaii hoops, covering the question regarding the Rainbow Warriors being Vander-less or not next season.

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Fresno State assist coach Byron Jones is interviewed -- this link thanks to masetheface at the Bark Board Save Mart Center MB.

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Checking in on former Fresno Stater Bracken Funk's season at Hawaii-BYU: 12.4 points (second on the team) and 7.7 rebounds (tops on the team) per game, 50% overall shooting, a team-leading 49 steals and the same with 21 blocked shots.

Friday's WAC basketball notebook

The Mountain West Conference in July 2013 -- PTW thinks this is accurate:

* Air Force
* Colorado State
* Fresno State
* Hawaii (football only)
* Nevada
* New Mexico
* San Jose State University
* UNLV
* Utah State
* Wyoming

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Tony Jones writes that USU and SJSU will have the smallest athletic budgets in the Mountain West Conference.

Some factors in this cannot be magic wand changed, simply indicative of location, demographics, other sports franchises in the area (or not) and so on. There are limits to donations but it's impossible to tell when such has been reached.

Plus think about this: UNLV tops the league in $$$ but where has that gotten Rebel football? Ditto for New Mexico.

As for hoops, the Aggies are the poster program in bang-for-buck basketball.

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Josh Gershon has confirmed that 2012 CA prep backcourter Aaric Armstead will hit Hawaii as part of his recruiting journeys.

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From one of Andy Katz' latest posts: "The National Association of Basketball Coaches board of directors met with NCAA president Mark Emmert on Thursday in Indianapolis and, according to at least one source in the room, there is support to close up a few transfer loopholes. The coaches and Emmert discussed making any player who wants to transfer sit out a year, even if he or she has graduated and is seeking a waiver to play immediately at a school that has a graduate program that isn’t available at the current school. The discussion also turned to the waiver that allows a player to play immediately if a relative is ill. That, too, would be closed. The consensus among the coaches is that if anyone transfers, he should sit out a year, even if that means a sixth year in college. The coaches also wanted some sort of universal language on transfer restrictions, maybe even an NCAA rule that forbids transferring within a conference. Conferences and schools create their own policies on restricting transfer"

Somehow the part about coaches sitting out a season when they change jobs failed to make it to the agenda.