Headed out to spring football for a feature in a bit. In the meantime, here are a few notes from around Big Blue Nation:
– Kentucky men’s basketball signee Michael Gilchrist won ESPN’s Mr. Basketball USA on Thursday. Gilchrist beat out Duke signee Austin Rivers and Florida signee Bradley Beal. ESPN Rise has a short video interview with Gilchrist on winning the award.
– ESPN Insider ranked the best rookies in the 2010-11 NBA class, and, of course, a few Kentucky guys were honored for their efforst this year. John Wall (Washington Wizards) was named to the all-rookie first team while DeMarcus Cousins (Sacramento Kings) and Patrick Patterson (Houston Rockets) were tabbed to the second team. ESPN lists all three among its five players with the most upside with Wall topping the list. Here’s a link to the full story. Since it’s a subscription service, here’s a small nugget on what ESPN had to say about Patterson:
When Patterson put his name in the draft in 2010, I considered him an upgraded version of Udonis Haslem, but he’s been better than that. I’m impressed with how much his game has grown in just a few months, and Houston fans can recognize some of Luis Scola‘s signature moves being done by a much taller and quicker Patterson.
As it stands now, he’ll be a very good sixth man for a talented Houston team, or the Rockets will move him for more assets and he can start somewhere else for years to come.
– The story out of spring football of late has been the emergence of quarterback Morgan Newton. He’s carrying himself differently and throwing the ball a lot better. It appears that the light has finally turned on in the head of the junior quarterback. ESPN has picked up on the story and has a feature on him on its Southeastern Conference blog.
– Pretty interesting story from Chip Cosby in the Lexington Herald-Leader a couple of days ago on linebacker Danny Trevathan. Apparently Trevathan was a lot closer to leaving for the NFL than people thought. As Trevathan explains, “I was gone, man. I was out of here.” Check out the full story here.
