We Talkin' Bout Practice

So each team gets to their NCAA first round site a day early to shoot around and get used to the gym. In other words: Practice.

Wake Forest was still on the court when I got to "AAA" so I decided to do some scouting and took a little video too:

Let's hope they shoot like that tomorrow night. 

Before each team practices the media gets to inundate the players with questions. So I strolled into the Cleveland State locker room and...I was the only one asking questions. 

A big theme during today's general media session was Wake Forest's size and how much bigger they are than the Vikings. Most of the mainstream media members look way too much at height and not at toughness. I asked J'Nathan Bullock about all the talk, his message was pretty clear:

When I asked J'Nathan about Miami and he called it a business trip, or bid'ness trip, it set off a series of comments about these games being a business trip for the Vikings. Got me a little depressed actually.

The key matchup in tomorrow night's game is going to be Cedric Jackson vs. Wake Forest's Jeff Teague. I asked Jackson about guarding one of the best players in the country. 

Once practice started up coach Gee and coach Desimplare worked the bigs at one end and the guards at the other. I was a little surprised by the tone of the practice although I shouldn't have been. It was all bid'ness. They brought out the pads to simulate what could be a very physical game down low. Cedric Jackson was keeping everybody's spirits up with some positive chatter. One player who didn't need any positive chatter was Norris Cole. That dude is a deadeye shooter. I mean he rarely misses. RARELY. I've seen some of his better games this year in person and you can't convince me that he isn't one of the best five players returning next year in the HL.

Here's a little bit from the end of practice when they started hurting the rim. I won't identify the bigs who "layed it in" or missed their dunk entirely. Could be worse I suppose.

I'll be posting an update on D'Aundray Brown and a quick conversation I had with Coach Waters before practice in a bit. Thanks for checking out the blog!