The basketball team is changing!

Tim Miles is allowing incoming recruits Keith Coleman and Jerran Young out of their letters of intent and he is granting freshman Josiah Moore his request for a scholarship release.

Freshman Corey Hilliardwill likely have surgery in May for a sports hernia.

Miles will attend the Final Four and interview up to ten people to fill the other two assistant coaches' position.

Danny Manning is the new coach at Tulsa. He is a great developer of big men and should be a great coach. This will hurt the Kansas team.

Doc Sadler was at the Nebraska football practice today.

Tim Miles

I received an e-mail this morning from Tom Gdowski of Grand Island. Tom was a defensive tackle for the Huskers in the late 70's, early 80's. Tom's son Jake Gdowski graduated from Grand Island High School and started at Colorado St. He had a very good career as an offensive lineman. He may get a chance to play in the pros. He is 6' 3" and 303 lbs.

Tom made a lot of trips to the Colorado St. campus and met Tim Miles. Here's what Tom had to say about the new NU basketball coach.

" Met the guy several times. He is ALWAYS upbeat and enthusiastic. Doesn’t take
himself too seriously but commands respect from players and peers. Should do
well!"

The positive comments continue to come in and it will be exciting to see how he puts his staff together and who he will put on the floor next year as NU lost a lot of seniors this year. Miles is bringing in"Chin" Coleman who has AAU ties and knows the Chicago area as one of his assistants. He is known as an ace recruiter. Coleman has been on Miles' CSU staff and was a very successful high school coach in the Chicago area. Coleman is presently traveling to talk to the present recruits for Nebraska.

Jayden Olson has also been added to the staff. Olson spent two seasons at CSU as the basketball operations director and video coordinator. Miles plans to add three more to his basketball staff.

John Groce, who led Ohio to the final eight in the NCAA basketball tournament, is headed to Illinois.

Baseball attendance in the Big 10 was led by Nebraska with over 5000 average attendance this weekend. It was by far the leader in attendance. In contrast, Minnesota averaged 242 fans per game, Iowa 676 per game, and Michigan only 706 per game. It will be culture shock when we go to play some of these teams.

Andrew Rodriquez is getting noticed this spring on the NU football team due to his work ethic. Rodriquez is working some at tackle this spring but is presently working with the second unit.

On defense, Daimond Stafford is light years ahead of last year according to Pelini. Pelini says that cornerback Mohammed Seisay continues to impress this spring. Seisay is a juco transfer.

Ryne Reeves has moved to guard. That leaves Cole Pensick, Justin Jackson, and Mark Pelini at center. Pensick seems to be the leader right now.

Sport Shorts!

Butler Coach Brad Stevens turned down the Illinois basketball job. He was reportedly offered an annual salary of $2.6 million.

Malik Zaire, a quarterback that Nebraska was after, has commited to Notre Dame.

Tim Miles, the new NU basketball coach, pleads for patience from the fans.

The Atlanta Hawks beat the Jazz tonight 139-133 in the first quadruple overtime game in the NBA since 1997. This was the first for the Jazz ever.

Nebraska baseball beat Illinois 13-3 today to win two of three from Illinois. Illinois was expected to finish fourth in the Big 10 while Nebraska was predicted to finish third. Nebraska blew out Illinois on Saturday and Sunday but was beaten 11-3 on Friday night.

Nebraska played 16 games in March at home and not one was altered by weather.

Today Zach Hirsch helped hold Illinois to a season low in hits and pitched real well over seven innings.

Royals' closer Joakim Soria will miss the season due to reconstructive elbow surgery.

Alex Gordon is hitting .422 this spring.

Next weekend's matchups of Ohio State/Kansas and Kentucky/Louisville look very attractive to watch.

Andrew Luck and Robert Griffin III look to be the first two picks of the draft for Indianapolis and Washington. Texas A & M's QB Ryan Tannehill could go third or fourth in the draft. Minnesota picks third and Cleveland goes fourth.

The odds are pretty good that Nebraska won't have anybody taken in the first round.

NU will announce Tim Miles as NU's new coach!

Tim Miles will be named Nebraska's new head basketball coach on Saturday!!

The full contract, according to ESPN, would be an estimated $8.7 million over
six years.

Miles, 45, replaces former head coach Doc Sadler, who was fired after
six seasons in Lincoln earlier this month. Miles had just received a three-year
contract extension in May to stay at CSU, which would have increased his salary
to $750,000 annually through 2016.

Tim Miles is 45 years old and took Colorado State to the NCAA tournament this year. Tim Miles is from Doland, South Dakota.

Before taking over at CSU, Miles coached at North Dakota State (2001-07),
Southwest Minnesota State (1997-2001) and Mayville State (1995-97). His career
record as a head coach is 285-227, and he was 71-88 in five seasons at Colorado
State.

One factor that obviously made Miles attractive is that he built his team around Nebraska players this year. Four of his players wer Jesse Carr of Ainsworth, Wes Eikmeier of Fremont, and Dwight Smith and Greg Smith of Ralston.

He also had a couple of regional players such as Colton Iverson of Yankton and Dorian Green of Lawrence, Kansas.

Eikmeier (15.5 points per game), Green (13.1 ppg) and Greg Smith (9.4 ppg)
were Colorado State's top three leading scorers this past season.

Miles' Colorado St. roster this year consisted of four players from Colorado and Nebraska and one each from Arizona, Minnesota, Kansas, South Dakota and Florida.

He definitely likes Midwest kids. Will there be enough local kids to take Nebraska to the next level. One plus for Nebraska is that he obviously knows a lot about our State. The Nebraska high school coaches seem to like him.

His assistant coaches are Niko Medved, who also serves a key role in recruiting, Craig Smith, who was named NAIA Coach of the Year in 2007, and Ron Coleman, who was a star basketball player for Lamar and played some NBA ball and served as CSU's recruiting coordinator this past year. Coleman has experience in the AAU ranks also. It is unknown how many of these coaches will come with him to Nebraska but they all look like great assets to the new coach.

Colorado State's top recruit coming in this fall is Jermaine Morgan, who was recruited by Coleman due to his ties to Chicago. He is a 6'7" power forward.

It will be interesting to see what Nebraska ends up with this fall. Don't expect too much from Miles and the Huskers the first year.

Florida and Kansas, who were both in Omaha last weekend look like they BOTH will make it to the Elite Eight. Pretty cool.

Sutton interviews with Nebraska

Oral Roberts coach Scott Sutton has interviewed for the Nebraska vacancy for basketball. Scott Sutton is 250-181 in 13 years at Oral Roberts. Scott Sutton is the son of Eddie Sutton who coached at Creighton, Arkansas, Kentucky, and Oklahoma St.

Eddie said" He brings a lot to the table. He's a good speaker, a good recruiter, and he always runs a clean program. He's everything a university would look for in a coach. And he has a desire to get to that next level."

Other coaches connected to the Nebraska job are Wisconsin-Milwaukee's Rob Jeter and Colorado St.'s Tim Miles.

Alex Gordon is hitting .378 this spring.

Last weekend, at the NCAA tournament in Omaha, I really enjoyed watching and being a part of the NCAA tournament. The Florida-Virginia game never turned out to be a good game. Florida looked real good and Virginia was very cold. Florida won easily.

The upcoming game of Missouri-Norfolk St. That looked to be a pretty boring game and more on that later.

The evening games started with Purdue and St. Mary's. St. Mary's had beaten Gonzaga in the conference standings and conference tournament this year. Purdue had finished in the mid-pack of the Big 10. But the Big 10 has shown they are really good in this tournament. The Big 10 is tough. St. Mary's had a chance to win the game but traveled late in the game and Purdue got the win by three points.

Now back to the Norfolk St/Missouri game. Missouri was a #2 seat and Norfolk State was a #15 seat. The game started close and was close the whole game. I am not sure anybody got ahead more than four points the whole game. Missouri had a lot of trouble containing Kevin Durant or I mean Kyle O 'Quinn. O'Quinn looked ready for the NBA.

When the game started there were about 80 Norfolk St fans and about 3500 Missouri fans. The rest of the 16,000 were just watching. Then the Norfolk St pep band started to heat up, the cheerleaders put on a show I can't even explain, and the rest of the 16,000 became instant Norfolk St. Spartan fans. Spartan, their mascot, was one of the funniest and best mascots I have ever seen in college sports. The crowd was shouting NSU, NSU!!!! The fans for Norfolk St now counted to around 12,500 fans. Even Missouri fans gave the NSU pep band and cheerleaders standing ovations. What a game. Norfolk St. wins 86-84. For a while it seemed neither team could miss. Missouri didn't play bad but my did Norfolk St play well. A memory I will never forget.

On Sunday the anticipated game between Florida and Norfolk St never materialized. At one point the Florida gators outscored the Spartans 25-0. Florida went on to win by about 35 points but I still enjoyed the NSU pep band and cheerleaders.

The second best game of the tournament was Purdue and Kansas with Kansas winning at the end in a hard fought battle.

Omaha put on a good show. I would love to go again. It was fun and relaxing.

nsu cheerleaders 2011

norfolk state university a-squad cheerleaders 2010-2011

Norfolk State Cheerleaders 11/30/11

Norfolk St. Pep Band at NCAA Tourney

Scott Spinelli should be our pick!

Scott Spinelli was an assistant under Barry Collier. He was a great recruiter and showed lots of promise. Nebraska seemed to be getting better and then he left for Wichita State. He had been an assistant at Nebraska for three years. It was a sad day when he left.

Spinelli is very personable and a very kind person. He believes in realationships. He is familiar with Nebraska. He knows how tough it will be to build a program. He is a great recruiter.

He is never been a head coach but he has to be ready. He may have been ready ten years ago.

Spinelli has followed former KU star, now Maryland coach since he left Nebraska. He spent time as an assistant at Wichita State, Texas A & M, and now Maryland.

Spinelli is the only potential coach that I have read so far that has interest that I feel can do the job at Nebraska. Nebraska basketball will be tough to change but Spinelli can do it.

Let's hope he has interest and that we take a serious look at him.

We will miss Doc!

Doc Sadler was an emotional guy. The first time I heard him speak, he told the crowd that one of his father's last wishes was to see a Nebraska football game. His dad lived in Arkansas but he always loved Nebraska football. So Doc and his dad went to Lincoln to watch Nebraska football. When Doc told the story he broke down. He loved him reight away.

Yesterday Doc Sadler was let go by Nebraska. Again you had to love Doc Sadler and feel for him when he spoke at the press conference. He is a genuine person with lots of integrity. He cared about academics. He just didn't win enough.

Doc Sadler, after five seasons, was the winniest coach in Nebraska basketball history for their first five years. Then year six hit and the Huskers went 12-16. Injuries to Brian Diaz and Eric Almeida was costly to Nebraska as they had no answer to the big men in the Big 10. Who knows how good they would have been if only they would have been playing. Instead Doc had to give walkons a lot of minutes.

Doc ended up 101-89 compared to Danny Nee's 105-81 after his first six seasons.

Ray Gallegos took a redshirt and had improved enough that he may have taken over as point guard next year. It was still unknown as the availability of Diaz and Almeida for the 2012-13 season. Doc had five recruits coming in next year. He had a point guard, two shooting guards, and two power forwards coming to Nebraska. Also he had a really good point guard signed for 2013 by the name of Imara Ready.

Doc was never ever able to recruit the big star or two to take Nebraska to a new level. Roburt Sallie was good but never was allowed to play because of a mess-up in the paper work. Injuries were always a problem.

Doc was always funny. At one of the early compliance meetings with the athletic departments Doc wore a Hawaiian shirt. Steve Pedersen told him to at least dress business casual and come looking more professional. The next meeting Doc came in his best suit. He winked at one of the other staff and said "Do you think he will think this is professional enough?" Funny guy. Always joking.

We'll miss him.

The next coach will need to work on Akoy Agau of Omaha Central. He may be Nebraska high school's best big man in quite a few years. He had a triple double in the championship game against Omaha South Saturday.

The championship D-2 game last night will be talked about for a long time. Gilter was behind by four points to Howells with 1.9 seconds left. Gilter guard Dustin Hastings was fouled on a three point attempt. He missed the first free throw and then made the second. Gilter then set up a play where Hastings was to miss the free throw and then Drew Ott was to tip it out to Jake Findley for a three pointer and it worked as designed. It then became a question whether Findley got the shot off before the clock expired. The television replay showed that maybe he didn't but it was close and the officials gave it to him. Overtime.

Gilter ended up winning in two overtimes 52-41 as they outscored Howells 11-0 in the final OT.

In football, secondary coach Terry Joseph will be a plus for the Huskers.

The Husker women find out tomorrow night who they will play in the NCAA tournament. What a year they have had. Well beyond what many expected before the season began.

Even though the Nebraska baseball team lost today, there is enthusiasm from the fans. The Huskers are executing the small ball approach when needed. It seems in the past when we needed to move over a runner into scoring position we had a hard time of getting the bunt down. The pitching is starting to take shape and improving.

Husker women are in the finals of the Big 10!

The Husker women will face Purdue at 3 on Sunday on ESPNU!! They are playing great and it should be a great game tomorrow!! Jordon Hooper had 21 points to lead the Huskers over Ohio State today.

The Husker men lost again today and will play in the Big 10 tournament this week.

The NCAA women's tournament starts this week. Should be a fun time and we hope the Huskers go far. They have the team to do so.

Then there is the men's tournament starting in less than two week. Who's the best? Kentucky, North Carolina, Duke, Ohio State, Kansas, Missouri, Syracuse, and you can go on and on. Should be a tough bracket to fill out.

But this week is the women's tournament and I am filling out a bracket to have some fun!!

Should be a great race in Phoenix tomorrow. I have been there and there is tons of action!!

Nebraska faces tough Michigan St.

Don't see anything but a 20-30 point loss tonight for the Husker men. Michigan St is the hottest team in the Big 10, hardly ever gets beat at home, and well Nebraska isn't playing well.

Nascar starts tomorrow. Seems like we just finished last season a couple of weeks ago. The Daytona 500 is an exciting race but there always seems to be a big wreck known as the "Big One." Many times a driver, not considered a favorite, ends up on top. Who knows who it will be this year. In 2010 it was Jamie McMurray and last year it was Trevor Bayne. This year I look to go with Paul Menard as the surprise!!

Even though this race is just goofy, the fact is in the last 129 races, 55% of the winners have came from qualifying in the top five.

Terrell Owens takes the field for the first time since 2010 when he makes his debut for the Indoor Football League's Allen Wranglers tonight. The game will be shown on ESPN3 tonight at 7.

Kansas knocked off Missouri this afternoon 87-86 in overtime.

Nebraska adjusts for victory!

Doc Sadler said before the Penn State game that they needed to implement some changes to their offense due to Diaz not playing in the middle. The trouble was they hadn't had much time to work on the changes so they couldn't use them yet. Well this week they had the time and it showed.

Nebraska dominated Illinois and won by 23 points. They shot well. Bo Spencer had his best day as a Husker with 27 points.

There is no doubt in mind mind that if Diaz and Almeida would have been healthy this year that Nebraska would have made it to the NCAA tournament. Without them Nebraska had nobody that could play center.

Nebraska drops to a ranking of 155 in Pomeroy!

I've been following Nebraska men's basketball for 50 years. I am not sure if I have ever felt that Nebraska has no chance to win a game but the feeling is there. Without Jorge Brian Diaz Nebraska is 0-8 and probably won't win another game this year. Two injuries have put Nebraska in a helpless situation. Injuries to Eric Almeida and Diaz, the big boys leaves us with nobody underneath that can score.

Nebraska is now rated 155 and wow just two weeks ago they were working ranks when Diaz showed up and played a few games. He has a painful foot injury and probably won't be back this year or maybe never for Nebraska. Sad case. Nebraska has nobody to take his place.

I wish the Huskers and Doc the best but........

Jeremy Lin has come out of nowhere to be a NBA sensation. He graduated from Harvard. This season Lin was waived by Golden State in December after splitting last season between the Warriors and the NBA Development League. Houston picked him up for a couple of weeks before cutting him and the Knicks decided to give him a look.

Lin scored 38 points Friday night to lead the Knicks over the Lakers. After scoring 28 and 23 points in his first two starts, he outplayed Kobe Bryant in front of a national TV audience. Lin has created a new ambition to watch NBA basketball. I think Lin is the real deal but how did all the other teams not see it before?

Missouri was rated fourth and Baylor rated sixth in the nation. Missouri beat Baylor 72-57 Saturday to go to 23-2. Maybe Missouri's beat team ever.

Michigan St knocked off Ohio State at Columbus 58-48 this weekend. The Buckeye's had not been beat at home in 39 straight games. That's a big victory for the Spartans.

Kasey Kahne has replaced Mark Martin in the No. 5 car for Hendricks. Kahne just had knee surgery but shouldn't miss any time in the car.

Look At Me Now - Chris Brown ft. Lil Wayne, Busta Rhymes (Cover by @Karm...

Nebraska Baseball - Welcome Back to the Ballpark

Nebraska men take a hit today!

Nebraska was 0-4 in games without Brian Diaz. Now they are 0-5. Diaz didn't play today because of sore feet and the Huskers lost at home to Minnesota 69-61. Bo Spencer led Nebraska with 18 points. The Huskers shot well in the first half and then really bad in the second half but again gave the opponent too many shots on offensive rebounds. The Huskers only had seven players that scored points.

Iowa has had the most stable coaching staff in college football. Now they have lost both their coordinators plus they lost Rick Kaczenski to Nebraska as defensive line coach.

Well today is the Super Bowl. Always being the contrarian, I'll take the Giants to win 27-21.

Brandon Jacobs is playing for the Giants today in the Super Bowl. He is also talking about going back to boxing when his football career is over. Jacobs went 35-2 as an amateur heavyweight, twice winning the Louisiana state AAU championship.

The Nebraska men should win today!

Nebraska is home today and in a must win game with Minnesota. Minnesota is 16-7 and 4-6 in conference play. Nebraska is 11-10 overall and 3-7 in the league. Of course Minnesota is still thinking the NCAA tournament so they aren't going to lay down for us.

Minnesota's Tubby Smith is one of the best coaches in the nation. They need a facilities upgrade in Minnesota so you can bet they will be touring the great facilities that Nebraska now has.

Ralph Sampson III plays for Minnesota. remember Ralph Sampson? He is 6'11". Also playing for Minnesota is Elliott Eliason from Chadron. He is averaging two points per game and four rebounds. He is a pretty good spot player.

Minnesota has five of their last seven games at home and have a good chance of making the NCAA tournament. This is a must game for them as previously mentioned.

This will be close to the end.

Nebraska 66 Minnesota 62

Some more about recruiting for the football program.

Paul Thurston is an offensive lineman from Colorado. One of his assistant coaches at Arcade West High School was former NU center Matt Baldwin. 247Sports ranked Thurston as the 92nd ranked offensive lineman in the country. He was rated as the 26th best tackle in the nation and the No. 2 overall player out of Colorado.

Thurston played tackle in high school. He is known for his mean streak. He is a son of a minister and was home schooled. Oregon and Michigan were after him also. He had other offers including Notre Dame.

Thurston could be a redshirt this fall but in years to come he looks like a good one.

Two new links!

I've added Nutritioulocious and Letters of Note to my Link list. Check them out and let me know what you think. Thanks.