Short bench once again.

[Cubanbull]

I dont know how in hell we have so many injuries in basketball every fricking year.

Here we go again as we head to play Pitt.

USF’s Infirmary Running Out Of Cots

A season ago, the USF playing roster was reduced for a majority of the campaign to seven healthy scholarship players.  As the Bulls enter the heart of the BIG EAST schedule, head coach Robert McCullum again finds himself with an extremely short bench.

The most recent casualty is sophomore forward Aris Williams, who will miss an undetermined amount of time with a femoral chondral defect in his right knee.  He has already missed five games with tendonitis in his left knee.

Senior point guard Chris Capko has missed the last five games with an ankle injury and he isn’t expected to return anytime soon.

Redshirts Chris Howard and Zaronn Cann, who are both recovering from ACL surgery, have yet to see action for USF in 2006-07.  Howard hopes to make his Bull debut next week, while Cann’s return remains unsure.

The Bulls lost freshman Dante Curry during the preseason because of an achilles injury suffered in conditioning.

Chances are good that the fire RMC now posters will be at full strength later today.

[tampajo]

terrible luck, don't follow mac under any ladders or to vegas.

[CyberBull]

It's not bad luck, but rather lack of proper roster management.

Injuries happen to everyone. Unfortunately, they seem to  strike our Bulls more often than others. With that said, why didn't CRM use all his available scholarships to secure a full roster for the first time in his tenure?

CRM knew that he couldn't count on Cann and Howard b/c of lingering injuries, thus he should have done a beter job in recruiting. I realize that he probably didn't want to "waste" a scholarship on just a body, but there were a lot of serviceable JUCO players that he could have signed to serve as an insurance policy.  Instead he decided to sit on two scholarships, depth be damned!

It's the same excuse every year for the last 4...and from the looks of things we are probably won't use all of our scholarships this year since interest in USF hoops is at an all-time low.

BTW....please don't dump into that darkside crap. This is a legitimate question that anyone who cares about USF basketball should be asking: why are we ALWAYS shorthanded?

[tampajo]

listen, I'm with you regarding roster management.  Do we have scholarships that we haven't given right now?  If so, that's untenable, does anyone know for sure?  Your points are well taken, given all the injuries to Cann and Howard, we should be fully rostered to this point.  

[BigShoop]

Shouldnt the training staff come into question at some point?

How do you "miss" a femoral chondral defect(whatever that is, it sounds interesting) in his right knee if he already has tendonitis in the left knee? Shouldnt these guys be fully evaluated on a regular basis? Am I being unreasonable?

[South_Florida_Flip]

Chances are good that the fire RMC now posters will be at full strength later today.

Even with a full bench I think most of the realists have this game as an L for the Bulls. I'm a pretty optimistic person and I had us losing the first 2 Big East games.

[Greg Auman]

McCullum had two unused scholarships entering the year. At the time late in the process when Collin Dennis decided he was leaving, McCullum said he didn't feel it was a wise use of a scholarship to add someone at that point -- remember that it's a four- or five-year commitment to a player who has been largely unclaimed by lots of programs at lower levels than USF. So he puts Capko on scholarship, and he has a scholarship available to give to Holmes, who is more highly touted than anyone McCullum would have gotten in late summer as the last member of this year's class. I suppose a lot of people would say McCullum shouldn't be thinking long-term in his decisions, and depth continues to be a major issue, but this is how McCullum would explain his decisions regarding the roster.

[bulls96go]

if coach mac keeps his job he will have a nice roster for 2007/8

if not the new coach will have a full cupboard

[Guest Ari_Hinkelberger]

Why was he counting on Howard and Cann...?

Woudn't a guy look at that situation and say "what happens if these guys don't make it back like we need them to."

[On_the_Chip]

Chances are good that the fire RMC now posters will be at full strength later today.

Even with a full bench I think most of the realists have this game as an L for the Bulls. I'm a pretty optimistic person and I had us losing the first 2 Big East games.

I expected them to lose as well......just not in the manner they did.......with all those turnovers, lack of movement under the basket (slow offensive setups), and still pretty bad FT %.  They never had a chance to compete........I just want them to play their best and they are not.  I know they are a better team than that.