People I was just joking!!
I'm acquainted with several Kansas basketball fans.   A husband and wife I met recently probably wish they hadn't said anything to me.  They invited me to attend Midnight Madness at Allen Fieldhouse next month.  I said; "you've seen those vampire movies, they walk into the sunlight and burst into flames------that might happen to a Mizzou fan."  I followed it up with the following; "is it okay if I wear my Mizzou garb inside?"  Naturally they found my attempt at humor only slighlty funny. 

Addendum to the Roger Brown narrative
I wanted to clarify a portion of the Roger Brown story. It was titled “Most of us had no opportunity to see him play.” Basketball was on television at the time, the trouble it was NBA and college only. Despite it attempts to compete with the more established NBA they were never able to secure a national television contract. Games were only available to those in league cities or local television. The ABA-NBA merger wasn’t a merger in a true sense, most ABA teams were dissolved.

The Nets, Pacers, Spurs and Nuggets moved into the NBA. Players from those dissolved teams were placed in a pool and NBA teams conducted a draft in order of their previous season record. NOTE: This is worth mentioning again, the Kansas City Kings (with the second pick) had an opportunity to draft 21-year old Moses Malone. *“In two seasons in the ABA, Malone had averaged 17.2 points and 12.9 rebounds per game.” In a cost saving effort move the Kings choose 6-2 shooting guard Ron Boone, a sound player but no Malone. *Wikipedia.

The focus is Andrew Wiggins
I'm interested in Joel Embiid’s progress more than highly touted Andrew Wiggins. The 7-foot Embiid landed at the Lawrence campus with far less fan fare than his highly touted teammate. Unlike Wiggins and several of his more celebrated teammates Embiid most likely will not head off to the NBA immediately. Although he has the body of a man (230 pounds) this native of Cameroon in West Central Africa is raw. He arrives at Kansas with little competitive basketball behind him.  I can appreciate Kansas players can't I?  It's a number of the school's fans who sometimes irrate me. 

He played his high school ball at The Rock, a college-prep school in Gainesville Florida. YouTube video is available however it could be somewhat misleading. Consider the fact the 7 foot Embiid might have been matched against centers with less height and weight than him. The college will be a better-quality check of his ability. Coach Bill Self will assign a coach to work with Embiid; its too bad Danny Manning is no longer on the scene. This young man certainly fit’s the student-athlete model arriving with a 3.0 G.P.A. from high school.

　
Names of note
I realize it’s early, in fact so early you might forget the names. There are two sleepers to keep in mind for the 2014 draft. The first name of note is Jerrelle Benimon; he’s a 6-8 245 pound forward. Benimon plays for Towson University which competes in the Colonial Athletic Association. Benimon will be returning for his junior year at Towson, his sophomore numbers 17.1 ppg, 11.2 rebounds and 2.5 assists a game. The second is playing professional basketball currently, his name is Ondrej Balvin. Balvin stands 7-2 and weighs in at 280 pounds. He’s from Usti Nad Labem, Czech Republic and plays for Cajasol Banca Civica Sevilla.

The Shark
Jerry Tarkanian will be enshrined in the Hall of Fame on September 8. Tark nicknamed the “The Shark” had a number of coaching stops during his brilliant career; his greatest success was at UNLV. His Runnin Rebel team won the 1990 NCAA Championship. A number of purest disliked Tarkanian and the style of basketball of his teams. Tark’s won-lost record during the course of his coaching career was a sparkling 729-201. The only coaching stop we might state he failed was at San Antonio. Tark was hired in 1992 to coach the Spurs but didn’t last for a lengthy period, he was fired after 20 games.

Tark and then owner Red McCombs fell into a disagreement over player personnel. He would return to coach at the collegiate level with Fresno State, Tark remained at the school until he retired in 2002. The NCAA always seem to be lurking over him throughout his career. *“After being fired from the Spurs, Tarkanian sued the NCAA, claiming it had harassed him for over two decades. The harassment, Tarkanian claimed, started when he wrote a newspaper column alleging that the NCAA was more willing to punish less-prominent schools than big-name schools. Although the NCAA did not admit harassing Tarkanian, it settled out of court in 1998, paying him $2.5 million.” *Wikpedia