Pittsburgh tops Big East basketball poll

[TyBull]

The Washington Times

www.washingtontimes.com

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Pittsburgh tops Big East basketball poll

Published October 25, 2006

11:50 a.m.

   NEW YORK (AP) -- Pittsburgh, which returns eight of its top 10 players from last year's team that reached the Big East championship game, was picked No. 1 in the pre-season poll by the league's coaches.

   Seven-foot senior center Aaron Gray of Pittsburgh was chosen the pre-season player of the year in balloting announced this morning.

   The Panthers, who went 25-8 and lost in the second round of the NCAA tournament, received 10 of the 16 first-place votes, while Georgetown, which was No. 1 on four ballots, was second.

   Syracuse, last season's conference tournament champion, and Marquette, each of which received one first-place vote, were third and fourth, respectively.

   Gray averaged 13.9 points and 10.5 rebounds last season and was voted the conference's most improved player.

   Besides Gray, three other players -- juniors Jeff Green and Roy Hibbert of Georgetown and sophomore Dominic James of Marquette -- were unanimous selections to the 11-man all-conference team.

   The others on the team were: Jeff Adrien of Connecticut, Wilson Chandler and Sammy Mejia of DePaul, Juan Palacios of Louisville, Lamont Hamilton of St. John's, Terrence Roberts of Syracuse and Curtis Sumpter of Villanova.

   Paul Harris, a 6-5 forward for Syracuse, was selected pre-season rookie of the year.

[TyBull]

 

Big East writers weigh in on hoops

Aaron Gray and Dominic James are top players; SU's Paul Harris is top rookie.

Wednesday, October 25, 2006

By Mike Waters

Staff writer

Pittsburgh's Aaron Gray and Georgetown's Jeff Green have been receiving the most hype in the college basketball preview magazines.

But Marquette sophomore Dominic James might be the best player in the Big East Conference, according to The Post-Standard's annual Big East media poll.

James, a 6-foot-1 point guard, earned co-Player of the Year honors along with Gray in the poll, which surveyed 16 members of the media from around the Big East. James and Gray received six votes apiece, with the remaining votes going to Green (three) and his Georgetown teammate Roy Hibbert (one).

Gray, a 7-foot center, dallied with entering the NBA Draft last

June after averaging 13.9 points and a league-best 10.5 rebounds as a junior.

James tops the Big East's returning players in both scoring (15.3 points) and assists (5.3 per game).

"James has the chance to be another in the long line of Big East point guards," South Bend (Ind.) Tribune writer Tom Noie said in casting his Player of the Year ballot for James. "He's a dynamic and charismatic leader who doesn't shy away from the league's bright lights."

The Big East Conference will release its preseason coaches' poll today at the league's media day event in New York City.

James and Gray were the only unanimous picks on the writers' all-league team. Green and Hibbert joined Gray and James on the first team. The fifth all-league player was Villanova's Curtis Sumpter, who missed the entire 2005-06 season with a knee injury.

The second team included Louisville's Juan Palicios, St. John's Daryll Hill, Connecticut's Jeff Adrien and A.J. Price and Syracuse's Eric Devendorf and Paul Harris.

Harris was a runaway winner in the Rookie of the Year vote. The 6-5 guard received 13 of a possible 16 votes. The other votes went to Louisville's Derrick Caracter, St. John's Derwin Kitchen and UConn's Hasheem Thabeet.

While James and Gray received the bulk of the Player of the Year votes, the tandem of Green and Hibbert makes Georgetown the Big East's preseason favorite in the eyes of the writers.

The Hoyas picked up 10 first-place votes, four second-place votes and two third-place votes to out-distance Pittsburgh at the top of the predicted standings. Georgetown and Pittsburgh accounted for all 16 first-place votes.

Connecticut came in third in the writers' poll, while Marquette was fourth and Syracuse fifth.

However, not every writer was sold on the Hoyas.

"It's surprising how many people are jacked up about Georgetown," Kevin McNamara of the Providence Journal said. "The Hoyas have the best 1-2 post pair in the country in Hibbert and Green, but do Jonathan Wallace and Jesse Sapp at guard make your heart skip a beat? Not me."

While Georgetown and Pittsburgh were solidly atop most writers' polls, the rest of the standings were fluid. Syracuse received two second-place votes and two eighth-place votes. DePaul was picked to finish as high as seventh and as low as 15th. The Blue Demons finally settled at No. 8 in the poll behind No. 6 Villanova and No. 7 Louisville.

The bottom half of the standings were like this: No. 9 St. John's, No. 10 Providence, No. 11 Cincinnati, No. 12 Notre Dame, No. 13 Seton Hall, No. 14 West Virginia, No. 15 Rut- gers and No. 16 South Florida. Coming off its 1-15 inaugural Big East campaign, South Florida was picked to finish last this season on 15 of the 16 ballots.

Notre Dame received the lone remaining last-place vote. Writers who contributed to the poll:

John Akers, Basketball Times; Brian Bennett, Louisville Courier-Journal; Phil Chardis, Manchester Journal-Inquirer; Barker Davis, Washington Times; Lew Freedman, Chicago Tribune; John Grupp, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review; Bill Koch, Cincinnati Enquirer; Tom Luicci, Newark Star-Ledger; Brett McMurphy, Tampa Tribune; Kevin McNamara, Providence Journal; Tom Noie, South Bend Tribune; Dana Pennett O'Neil, Philadelphia Daily News; J.P. Pelzman, Bergen Record; Lenn Robbins, New York Post; Todd Rosiak, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel; Mitch Vingle, Charleston Gazette.

© 2006 The Post-Standard. Used with permission.

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