From the desk of Jim Snyder
Revised dates for Nike combine
The nearest Nike combine will now take place in Cleveland, Ohio on March 25th at the Cleveland Browns practice facility in Berea, Ohio. This originally had been scheduled for this weekend. I am not sure why Student Sports moved it back.
Rivals.com will also hold a Rivals Day on the same date at the University of Akron. Obviously these two organizations were not doing a good job of communicating.
Please see the posts at the top of the Between Fifth & Forbes message board for further details. There is contact information for both events.
Changes in message boards
Historically the Pantherlair had the message boards set to a Thread View. Rivals.com has been talking to us about switching to Topic View for sometime but we were reluctant to make the change as long as the West Virginia and Penn State sites were set up for thread views. The West Virginia site also made the conversion this week. The Penn State site is also scheduled to make the change in the near future. Despite being hesitant to make these changes once Rivals.com convinced us they thought West Virginia and Penn State grads were smart enough to handle the new concept we felt confident Pitt alums would be too.
If you wish to continue to look at the messages boards on a thread view you may continue to do so. Simply change your settings in User Options. See Chris Peak’s post at the top of this board for details.
When I have time I often move between these two viewing options on the same day. Just keep this in mind. It is your choice on how you view the site. We give you the option.
One of my colleagues told me that he was a creature of habit. He is a senior. He would try the new format but that if he could not adjust he would change his setting so he could go back to the thread view. Fair enough.
My Fan Pages
The last time I looked over 142,000 college football (and basketball) fans had set up their My Fan Page with Rivals.com. The number keeps growing without let up. See my post at the top of the football message board if you need help getting started.
Congratulation to Rivals.com’s CEO
Terry Shannon of Rivals.com was named as one of the 20 most influence people on the on-line sports business this week. Many of the others on the list were from ESPN, CBS, Major League baseball, NASCAR, the PGA, Turner or Sports Illustrated although Mark Cuban is also on the list. Here is what they had to day about Terry Shannon.
The simplest barometer of Terry’s influence and position is the array of top-tier sports sites that have chosen to align with Rivals.com on some type of content sharing or syndication deal rather than seek to develop their own competing outlet for college and recruiting news. The company now partners with such top names as Yahoo!, AOL, Sporting News, MSNBC, NBCSports.com, SI.com, and USA Today. With mainstream outlets now recognizing the growing popularity of college and prep sports, Rivals.com’s foothold in the space appears destined to grow further.
Getting to know you
Our “Getting to Know You” series continued this week. We now know the coaching staff hired has recruited a tennis player and a lifeguard from Florida and that one is a hero having saved a life from a burning building at a young age.
We also discovered one was an extra in a movie. We hope this series helps you to know these players a little more as people.
It is showdown time in hoops but
The Pitt basketball team heads to Washington, D.C. this weekend for a game with Georgetown. In all likelihood the winner will be the regular season champion and get the No. 1 seed in the Big East tournament. With Aaron Gray and Levon Kendal having sprained ankles and senior guard Antonio Graves in a shooting slump it will not be easy for Pitt.
Hopefully you caught Chris Peak’s article yesterday which indicates Pitt will probably have to play without Aaron Gray. This much we know for sure. Gray has not practiced this week. Even if he does manage to play he will not be a full strength.
A year ago Florida lost twice to South Carolina (a team Pitt beat on the road). They almost lost a third time to the Gamecocks when South Carolina took them to the buzzer in the SEC championship game in Nashville. The Gators went on to win the national championship.
This game of Saturday is very important but there are other games to be played this year. Sometimes it gets down to who is healthy at the end. Last year Pitt was not. Hopefully the Pitt trainers will be able to help Gray return to form.
Congratulations to Coach Jamie Dixon on reaching 100 wins. Let’s hope the second hundred comes just as fast.
Last fall when Pitt released the names of players that had signed Letters of Intent Coach Dixon assured the media that the players he recruits tend to be higher rated after their senior year in high school than after their junior year. Maybe he is right. Rivals.com recently released their new Top 150 and all four of the Pitt seniors are now included. Schenley’s DeJuan Blair now has a four-star ranking.
Hopefully you saw the video on Darnell Dodson this week.
Football recruiting summary
Recently some high school players are reporting to us that Brian Angelichio is recruiting them. We have reported earlier that we believe Coach Angelichio will be promoted this year from graduate assistant to a fulltime assistant coach. We have not seen a public release from Pitt but coach Angelichio seems to be already operating in that capacity.
We hope you caught the video interview with Gateway’s Cameron Saddler. He talks about Coach Curtis Bray leaving the Pitt staff but seems to have made the transition to Coach Gattuso. The video interview was done before Pitt’s Junior Day. I think he is even more comfortable with Pitt now.
Pitt held a Junior Day this past weekend as did several other schools. The recruits got a tour of the UPMC complex on the Southside and then went to breakout sessions with their position coach. Saddler is being recruited as an “athlete” and wandered around not knowing what room to go to. He said he went with Coach Ball because he seemed to have the fewest guys. They all then went up to the Pete to watch the basketball game with Washington. There were no commitments although we still think Pitt will pick up a couple of more commits early in the process.
Here are a few with offers from Pitt that did not go:
Jonathan Baldwin (basketball practice)
Mike Cruz (death in family)
A.J. Alexander (transportation issue)
Nic DiLillio (Michigan Junior Day)
Andrew Sweat (Michigan Junior Day)
Hubie Graham (Syracuse Junior Day)
Pitt will hold a Blue Chip Day on March 25th. A couple of the players who could not come last Saturday have already told us they plan on making the one on March 31st. Since there is no basketball game that day the football recruits will be probably be given a longer tour of the campus.
Spring is in the air
Coach Wannstedt will take the Panthers to spring camp in about three weeks. Several schools will start this week. Tennessee (2/22), Texas (2/23), Mississippi Sate (2/26 ) and Auburn (2/23) will get things started.
The position which we will have to watch very closely is linebacker. Tommie Campbell is no longer with the team. We are skeptical if he will be back. Pitt started last season with H.B. Blades, Clint Session, Derron Thomas, Brian Bennett and Tommie Campbell on the two-deep chart at linebacker. They are all gone. This means only Scott McKillop returns from the two-deep chart Pitt started with last fall.
Dave Wannstedt moved Coach Paul Rhoads so he could handle the linebackers this fall. He has his work cut out for him to fill the two-deep chart. It appears a few players will be moved to linebacker and given a look in the spring.
The Pantherlair will be there keeping you up to date. The ability for the Panthers to move ahead this fall may depend on Coach Rhoads finding a few good men willing to step forward at linebacker.
Coming attractions
It has been a busy week. The last we counted there were approximately 45 articles on the Ticker since Monday. I have had trouble keeping up with them all.
Chris Peak will have a good article on Lucas Nix today. We will also have a “Getting to Know You” article on LeSean McCoy. In addition we report on a tight end from Scranton and a pair of players from Roman Catholic High School in Philly.
The War Room is targeted towards our premium customers. We ask that all information reported in the War Room MUST stay right here! That’s the way this deal works. When this information is repeated outside of the Between Fifth and Forbes forum it only cheapens the price of yours and every other die-hard who have purchased premium services. The War Room is one of our more popular features...thank you all for keeping the information on this board.
Revised dates for Nike combine
The nearest Nike combine will now take place in Cleveland, Ohio on March 25th at the Cleveland Browns practice facility in Berea, Ohio. This originally had been scheduled for this weekend. I am not sure why Student Sports moved it back.
Rivals.com will also hold a Rivals Day on the same date at the University of Akron. Obviously these two organizations were not doing a good job of communicating.
Please see the posts at the top of the Between Fifth & Forbes message board for further details. There is contact information for both events.
Changes in message boards
Historically the Pantherlair had the message boards set to a Thread View. Rivals.com has been talking to us about switching to Topic View for sometime but we were reluctant to make the change as long as the West Virginia and Penn State sites were set up for thread views. The West Virginia site also made the conversion this week. The Penn State site is also scheduled to make the change in the near future. Despite being hesitant to make these changes once Rivals.com convinced us they thought West Virginia and Penn State grads were smart enough to handle the new concept we felt confident Pitt alums would be too.
If you wish to continue to look at the messages boards on a thread view you may continue to do so. Simply change your settings in User Options. See Chris Peak’s post at the top of this board for details.
When I have time I often move between these two viewing options on the same day. Just keep this in mind. It is your choice on how you view the site. We give you the option.
One of my colleagues told me that he was a creature of habit. He is a senior. He would try the new format but that if he could not adjust he would change his setting so he could go back to the thread view. Fair enough.
My Fan Pages
The last time I looked over 142,000 college football (and basketball) fans had set up their My Fan Page with Rivals.com. The number keeps growing without let up. See my post at the top of the football message board if you need help getting started.
Congratulation to Rivals.com’s CEO
Terry Shannon of Rivals.com was named as one of the 20 most influence people on the on-line sports business this week. Many of the others on the list were from ESPN, CBS, Major League baseball, NASCAR, the PGA, Turner or Sports Illustrated although Mark Cuban is also on the list. Here is what they had to day about Terry Shannon.
The simplest barometer of Terry’s influence and position is the array of top-tier sports sites that have chosen to align with Rivals.com on some type of content sharing or syndication deal rather than seek to develop their own competing outlet for college and recruiting news. The company now partners with such top names as Yahoo!, AOL, Sporting News, MSNBC, NBCSports.com, SI.com, and USA Today. With mainstream outlets now recognizing the growing popularity of college and prep sports, Rivals.com’s foothold in the space appears destined to grow further.
Getting to know you
Our “Getting to Know You” series continued this week. We now know the coaching staff hired has recruited a tennis player and a lifeguard from Florida and that one is a hero having saved a life from a burning building at a young age.
We also discovered one was an extra in a movie. We hope this series helps you to know these players a little more as people.
It is showdown time in hoops but
The Pitt basketball team heads to Washington, D.C. this weekend for a game with Georgetown. In all likelihood the winner will be the regular season champion and get the No. 1 seed in the Big East tournament. With Aaron Gray and Levon Kendal having sprained ankles and senior guard Antonio Graves in a shooting slump it will not be easy for Pitt.
Hopefully you caught Chris Peak’s article yesterday which indicates Pitt will probably have to play without Aaron Gray. This much we know for sure. Gray has not practiced this week. Even if he does manage to play he will not be a full strength.
A year ago Florida lost twice to South Carolina (a team Pitt beat on the road). They almost lost a third time to the Gamecocks when South Carolina took them to the buzzer in the SEC championship game in Nashville. The Gators went on to win the national championship.
This game of Saturday is very important but there are other games to be played this year. Sometimes it gets down to who is healthy at the end. Last year Pitt was not. Hopefully the Pitt trainers will be able to help Gray return to form.
Congratulations to Coach Jamie Dixon on reaching 100 wins. Let’s hope the second hundred comes just as fast.
Last fall when Pitt released the names of players that had signed Letters of Intent Coach Dixon assured the media that the players he recruits tend to be higher rated after their senior year in high school than after their junior year. Maybe he is right. Rivals.com recently released their new Top 150 and all four of the Pitt seniors are now included. Schenley’s DeJuan Blair now has a four-star ranking.
Hopefully you saw the video on Darnell Dodson this week.
Football recruiting summary
Recently some high school players are reporting to us that Brian Angelichio is recruiting them. We have reported earlier that we believe Coach Angelichio will be promoted this year from graduate assistant to a fulltime assistant coach. We have not seen a public release from Pitt but coach Angelichio seems to be already operating in that capacity.
We hope you caught the video interview with Gateway’s Cameron Saddler. He talks about Coach Curtis Bray leaving the Pitt staff but seems to have made the transition to Coach Gattuso. The video interview was done before Pitt’s Junior Day. I think he is even more comfortable with Pitt now.
Pitt held a Junior Day this past weekend as did several other schools. The recruits got a tour of the UPMC complex on the Southside and then went to breakout sessions with their position coach. Saddler is being recruited as an “athlete” and wandered around not knowing what room to go to. He said he went with Coach Ball because he seemed to have the fewest guys. They all then went up to the Pete to watch the basketball game with Washington. There were no commitments although we still think Pitt will pick up a couple of more commits early in the process.
Here are a few with offers from Pitt that did not go:
Jonathan Baldwin (basketball practice)
Mike Cruz (death in family)
A.J. Alexander (transportation issue)
Nic DiLillio (Michigan Junior Day)
Andrew Sweat (Michigan Junior Day)
Hubie Graham (Syracuse Junior Day)
Pitt will hold a Blue Chip Day on March 25th. A couple of the players who could not come last Saturday have already told us they plan on making the one on March 31st. Since there is no basketball game that day the football recruits will be probably be given a longer tour of the campus.
Spring is in the air
Coach Wannstedt will take the Panthers to spring camp in about three weeks. Several schools will start this week. Tennessee (2/22), Texas (2/23), Mississippi Sate (2/26 ) and Auburn (2/23) will get things started.
The position which we will have to watch very closely is linebacker. Tommie Campbell is no longer with the team. We are skeptical if he will be back. Pitt started last season with H.B. Blades, Clint Session, Derron Thomas, Brian Bennett and Tommie Campbell on the two-deep chart at linebacker. They are all gone. This means only Scott McKillop returns from the two-deep chart Pitt started with last fall.
Dave Wannstedt moved Coach Paul Rhoads so he could handle the linebackers this fall. He has his work cut out for him to fill the two-deep chart. It appears a few players will be moved to linebacker and given a look in the spring.
The Pantherlair will be there keeping you up to date. The ability for the Panthers to move ahead this fall may depend on Coach Rhoads finding a few good men willing to step forward at linebacker.
Coming attractions
It has been a busy week. The last we counted there were approximately 45 articles on the Ticker since Monday. I have had trouble keeping up with them all.
Chris Peak will have a good article on Lucas Nix today. We will also have a “Getting to Know You” article on LeSean McCoy. In addition we report on a tight end from Scranton and a pair of players from Roman Catholic High School in Philly.
The War Room is targeted towards our premium customers. We ask that all information reported in the War Room MUST stay right here! That’s the way this deal works. When this information is repeated outside of the Between Fifth and Forbes forum it only cheapens the price of yours and every other die-hard who have purchased premium services. The War Room is one of our more popular features...thank you all for keeping the information on this board.
