I’m not surprised---are you?
Australian Dante Exum made the well-kept view official; he will enter the 2014 NBA Draft. Every mock draft site I’ve come across has the 6-6 188 pound combo guard as a second to seven pick. The prospect of earning millions of dollars was the key consideration over college. School is always there, the possibility of a college injury might also be a factor. Did you really believe he was headed to college---did you?

Missouri Valley Conference--maybe
You must crawl before you walk is an old adage. Simply states it takes time to learn adjust or sometimes make a move. This is not intended as criticism but the Summit Conference was not a good fit for University of Missouri-Kansas City. It’s far too early to determine if the Western Athletic Conference will be any better. There is a best fit conference (geographically at least) in my view, I’m referring to the Missouri Valley Conference. UMKC might be in the center of all the conferences schools.

UMKC would continue to fly charter to matches everybody flies these days.  Consider this, Missouri State and UMKC are both located inside the state. We know the historical significance of the border war with the State of Kansas where Wichita State is located. If we look east toward the State of Illinois Bradley, Southern Illinois, Loyola (Chi) and Illinois State are all located there. On the north Missouri shares a border with Iowa where Northern Iowa and Drake are located. The only Missouri Valley State without a geographical connection to Missouri is Indiana. Evansville and Indiana State are located in the state. In any event adding UMKC makes sense to me.

The new Hugo
Shortly after the NBA season began it was make known the Bobcats would become the Hornets next season. As a reminder Hornets was the name of the original Charlotte franchise which left town for New Orleans. The Hornet name remained in New Orleans till this season when the franchise became the Pelicans. For a number of reasons Charlotte fans seem to pine for the Hornet name and the change was requested by Michael Jordan. Recently the Charlotte Hornet logo was released, Hugo the Hornet is still part of the logo but his design has been changed. Check NBA.com for a photo of the new logo.

“Haters will hate”
I overheard this conversation between two acquaintances; I wasn’t part of the discussion. One said; “Wichita State hasn’t played anybody.” The two went on and on questioning the teams’ undefeated record. I will never ever question a team without a loss as we approach February. I believe a portion of their objection is the belief the Missouri Valley Conference isn’t very strong. I have no desire to trash the MVC I’m sure as with most conferences there are strong, average and weak teams. I believe my two conversationalists failed to take into account Wichita State was a Final Four team last season. They are the first team to 20 wins; why not just wait until the season concludes prior to deciding how good they are.

“Talkin’ out of the hole in his neck”
I’m not even sure the term above is still in usage. For those unsure of its meaning it simply says a person has little or no knowledge of the subject.  Normally I attempt to refrain from calling somebody out, this is an exception. I’m viewing local sports special and the discussion on college basketball. The station had Tom Keegan as a guest. Keegan has covered sports for the Lawrence Journal World newspaper a number of years. Naturally the discussion centered on Kansas which was okay. The hosts then steered the conversation to Mizzou. One of the hosts mentioned “how talented he believes the Tigers were.”

This is Keegan; “they (Mizzou) are not really a good team and Frank Haith is not a good coach.” He goes to state he believes former Coach Mike Anderson was better.  I take issue with several of his comments; first this guy covers Kansas and the Big XII. Has he journeyed to Columbia at least once to see Mizzou play?  I truly doubt it, his basis for trashing Mizzou was their home loss to Georgia. I agree they should have beaten Georgia but losing a game makes you a bad team? In addition he's one of that group still upset with Mizzou for leaving the Big XII Conference.  I might ask him about Kansas team losing to Villanova when they were unranked? As for Anderson being a better coach than Haith please explain, Keegan makes this statement without providing us a single shred of evidence.  .