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Saturday / November 23.
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Cincinnati, Lance Stephenson

The Big East improved to 51-4 on the young season after Cincinnati downed No. 24 Vanderbilt 67-58 in the Maui Invitational.

Seven Big East teams are ranked in the latest AP poll, including Syracuse, which was unranked a week ago but vaulted to No. 10 — with one first-place vote — in the latest poll after routing defending NCAA champ North Carolina last Friday at MSG.

Cincinnati, which next plays the Maryland-Chaminade winner, could move into the polls with a strong week in Maui.

On a night when senior point guard Deonta Vaughn managed just 8 points on 1-for-3 shooting, sophomore big man Yancy Gates was a monster with 16 points and 10 boards.

West Virginia

West Virginia sophomore forward Devin Ebanks has yet to play this season for what are being called “personal” reasons and head coach Bob Huggins says he isn’t sure when Ebanks might return.

“I don’t know,” Huggins told The Dominion Post.

No. 8 West Virginia meets The Citadel Tuesday night in Charleston, West Va., before traveling to Anaheim to face Long Beach State Thursday in the 76 Classic.

The 6-foot-9 Ebanks, a Long Island City, N.Y. native, is one of the keys to West Virginia’s chances to make a deep run this year. The Mounties were picked second behind Villanova in the Big East preseason coaches’ poll.

Washington

The Enes Kanter Sweepstakes is over.

Kanter, a 6-foot-10 Turkish citizen born in Zurich, Switzerland who now plays for Stoneridge (Calif.) Prep, has verbally committed to the University of Washington. He chose UW over Indiana, UNLV, USC and UCLA without having seen the campus.

“Yes, [Sunday] night,” Stoneridge coach Tank Thornton said.

“They’ve been on him. They’ve seen all the practices and the kid wanted to sign. He wanted to go somewhere.”

Kanter has a strong relationship with UW assistant Raphael Chillious, who coached him two years ago in the Jordan Brand International Game at Madison Square Garden.

Cincinnati, Lance Stephenson

Lance Stephenson will play his first nationally televised game as a college freshman today when Cincinnati meets Vanderbilt in the Maui Invitational at 5:30 on ESPN2.

The 6-foot-6 Stephenson is averaging 11.5 points and 3.5 rebounds for the Bearcats (2-0). After a rough first game in which he scored just 7 points and was called a “nervous wreck” by Bearcats coach Mick Cronin, Stephenson scored 16 points on 6-for-13 shooting in last week’s 92-68 win over Toledo.

Speaking of Stephenson, the Daily News had a good feature on Sunday on Lincoln coach Dwayne “Tiny” Morton and addresses several Stephenson-related issues.

First, NBA agent Andy Miller, who serves as former Lincoln star Sebastian Telfair’s agent, denies any involvement with Stephenson.

Iona


 

David Laury, a 6-foot-8, 230-pound power forward from West Orange, N.J., has verbally committed to Iona beginning in 2010.

Iona beat out Houston and TCU for Laury, who had initially signed a National of Letter  to Western Kentucky. Because he already signed one NLI, Laury just made a verbal commitment to Iona.

“Yes, I did [Sunday],” Laury said by phone. “I liked the coaching staff. They’ve been recruiting me for a long time and I got a good relationship with all the coaches there, especially [assistant] Coach Shaheen [Holloway].”

Laury is currently playing for Ocean Academy out of Deal, N.J., where he is taking an SAT Prep class. Ocean coach Mike Rodgers said St. John’s and Providence were among the other schools interested in Laury because of his skill-set.

“He’s a legit four who can play the three and the two,” Rodgers said. “He’s very skilled. He’s a strong reobunder, great passer. He shoots it very, very well from deep. He has a tremendous basketball IQ.

LeBron James, Old Knicks

NEW YORK — Doc Rivers says he can relate to Mike D’Antoni trying to win while also awaiting the heralded 2010 free agent class.

While Rivers coached in Orlando, the Magic added Grant Hill and Tracy McGrady through sign-and-trade deals in 2000 after going 41-41 the year before.

“It’s funny. I thought the reason we got McGrady and Grant Hill was because we went 41-41 that year and they said, ‘You know what, they’re not that far off,’ so I thought the winning actually was as important as anything,” Rivers said before the Celtics beat the Knicks 107-105 in OT on a last-second jumper by Kevin Garnett Sunday at MSG. “Obviously, the money was very important as well. But I thought us winning allowed those guys to even look at our franchise.”

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