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Adam Zagoria covers basketball at all levels. He is the author of two books and an award-winning journalist whose articles have appeared in ESPN The Magazine, SLAM, Sheridan Hoops, Sports Illustrated, Basketball Times and in newspapers nationwide.
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Saturday / November 23.

Remi Dibo, a 6-foot-9 Frenchman and forward from Casper (WY) College, signed with West Virginia on Wednesday, marking the second straight junior college player to sign with Bob Huggins.

Jonathan Holton, a 6-9 forward from Palm Beach State, signed earlier this week.

“Remi gives us outstanding size and perimeter shooting from the wing position,” said Huggins. “His size and length should also help us at the defensive end and obviously on the backboards where we struggled mightily last year.”

The Big Ten / ACC matchups were released today.

One of the most interesting and compelling matchups features Indiana at Syracuse on Dec. 3 in a rematch of their Sweet 16 matchup from Washington, D.C. won convincingly by the Orange. Victor Oladipo and Cody Zeller will be gone from Indiana, and Michael Carter-Williams, Brandon Triche and James Southerland will be departed from the Orange. Syracuse returns C.J. Fair, an SNY Preseason All-America Third-Team pick, and both teams bring in strong recruiting classes.

Michigan at Duke on Dec. 3 features two of the top coaches in the land in John Beilein and Coach K, and two perennial powers who both lost to national champion Louisville in this year’s NCAA Tournament. Michigan has big men Mitch McGary, an SNY Preseason All-America First-Team pick and fourth-teamer Glenn Robinson III. Duke has third-teamer Rodney Hood and fourth-teamer Jabari Parker.

And North Carolina at Michigan State Dec. 4 features two of the top coaches in the country as well in Roy Williams and Tom Izzo. Carolina features fourth-teamer P.J. Hairston and is still in the mix for Andrew Wiggins, while Michigan State has All-America Second-Teamers Gary Harris and Adreian Payne.

Other compelling games include Florida State at Minnesota (especially if Wiggins picks the Seminoles); Illinois at Georgia Tech; Maryland at Ohio State; and Northwestern at N.C. State in new coach Chris Collins’s return to ACC country.

Creighton’s hiring of Patrick Sellers as an assistant coach should definitely help the new Big East school recruit in the Northeast.

Sellers is a former UConn and Hofstra assistant who is well known in the New York/ New Jersey area, from which Creighton will need to draw players.

“I think it plays a part of a familiar face the kids can put a name on,” Expressions Elite coach Tyron Boswell told SNY.tv. “He’s from UConn and Northeast kids have watched UConn throughout their adolescent year. So it helps, along with coach being a great guy and a great evaluator of talent.”

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uirM5sljfO8&w=560&h=315]

NEW YORK — While the basketball world waits to see if Derrick Rose will suit up for Game 3 against the Miami Heat, much of the talk across NBA circles today revolves around Iman Shumpert’s vicious one-handed putback dunk that made No. 1 on SportsCenter’s Top 10 plays.

Rose and Shumpert tore their ACLs on the same day a year ago, April 28, 2012, yet while Rose has yet to play this season, Shumpert made a jaw-dropping play with a one-handed putback jam of Chris Copeland’s missed 3-pointer in the first half of the Knicks’ 105-79 rout of the Indiana Pacers in Game 2.

“I think I was trying to make a statement,” said Shumpert, who finished with 15 points and six rebounds in the win. “That was the most perfect miss. It came off so perfect. It was beautiful. I wanted to win this game so bad. I know we need this game.”

Denver’s George Karl is the recipient of the Red Auerbach Trophy as the 2012-13 NBA Coach of the Year, the NBA announced today.

Under Karl’s stewardship, the Nuggets finished with a league-best 38-3 (.927) mark at home and the No. 3 seed in the Western Conference Playoffs.

In earning his first NBA Coach of the Year, Karl totaled 404 points, including 62 first-place votes, from a panel of 121 sportswriters and broadcasters throughout the United States and Canada.

Miami’s Erik Spoelstra finished second with 190 total votes, including 24 first-place votes.

The Knicks’ Mike Woodson finished third with 127 votes, including six first-place ballots.

http://web.sny.tv/media/video.jsp?content_id=26934499

 

NEW YORK — The Knicks’ Game 2 rout, combined with a much-needed three-day rest, should give them the momentum heading into Game 3 in Indiana.

Many Major League Baseball teams will play three, or even four, games between the end of Game 2 Tuesday night and the beginning of Game 3 Saturday night.

And for a banged-up team like the Knicks, the rest could not come at a better time.

Consider that Carmelo Anthony (shoulder), Tyson Chandler (neck), Raymond Felton (ankle), Steve Novak (back) and Amar’e Stoudemire (knee) are all hurt and will now have nearly four full days off before the start of Game 3.

“The more rest the better,” Anthony said in his on-court interview after he scored 22 of his game-high 32 points in the second half as the Knicks routed the Pacers, 105-79, in Game 2 to even the series at 1-1. 

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