Returning to college basketball a bit faster than I thought we would...

The Big 5 just announced its 2010 Hall of Fame class, and it's a big one: John Chaney, Rollie Massimino and Speedy Morris.

You knew they'd all be inducted at some point, but to have it happen in the same year is quite something.

The date and location of the ceremony have not yet been announced. Villanova plays La Salle on Nov. 18 at the Pavilion and Temple on Dec. 13 at the Liacouras Center. As far as I know, the dates of the Temple-La Salle games have not been announced yet.

I wonder if they'll do it when Temple plays at Penn, which will be in mid-January from what I've heard. Massimino has at least a marginal connection to Penn, having served as an assistant to Chuck Daly for one season, and Fran Dunphy was an assistant to Morris at La Salle for three seasons.

I also wonder if people will complain about Massimino's induction. I think he deserves it because of the national championship. Or, to put it another way, I don't see how you can't induct him - especially when Harold Jensen, Dwayne McClain and Ed Pinckney are already in. If you're going to have a place to honor the best players and coaches in Big 5 history, then Massimino should be there, even with everything that came afterwards.

What do you think?

Here are the bios for each coach that the Big 5 sent along:

Chaney, 77, spent 10 seasons building Philadelphia's Cheyney State (now Cheyney University) into a Division II power before taking the helm at Temple for the 1982-83 season. In his 24 years with the Owls, Chaney led Temple to 17 NCAA Tournament appearances and five regional finals.

Known as a great educator and a fiery, inspirational leader, Chaney and his teams became regarded for their discipline, teamwork and defense. He finished his college coaching career with 741 wins, including a record of 516-253 at Temple. Chaney twice was national coach of the year and was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2001.

Massimino, 74, was an assistant to Chuck Daly at Penn in the 1972-73 season before commencing a remarkable 19-season career as Villanova's head coach from 1973-92. As the leader of the Wildcats, Massimino led the program into the new Big East Conference in 1980 and oversaw Villanova's subsequent transformation to a national power.

Villanova made the NCAA Tournament 11 times under Massimino, including the famed 1985 national championship upset of Georgetown as well as four other trips to the elite eight. Overall, Massimino compiled a record of 357-241 (.596) at Villanova.

Morris, 67, was the head coach at La Salle for 15 seasons from 1986-2001. In his first year at La Salle he led the Explorers to a 20-13 record and the NIT final. From there it was more success with MAAC titles and NCAA appearances in each of the next three seasons, culminating with a 30-2 campaign in 1989-90 that produced the national player of the year, Lionel Simmons.

La Salle made the NIT the following season before claiming another MAAC title and NCAA bid in the 1991-92 season, completing a run of six straight postseason berths. In all, Morris would go on to finish with 238 wins at La Salle, the most in school history.

An alert reader sent along a note that Morris began his coaching career with a two-year stint as the Explorers' women's coach, from 1984-86. I asked Mel Greenberg about this and he noted that Morris was one of the first Division I coaches to make the jump from the women's game to the men's game.

One of the nice things about the summer lull in college sports news is that I get to catch up on all the magazines I didn’t have time to read during the spring.

That includes the April issue of Basketball Times, in which Hoop Scoop’s Clark Francis ranked the 50 best head coaches in college basketball. Lists like these are always great for starting conversations, so let’s have at it.

Francis doesn’t say much about his criteria, except that Rick Pitino tops the list “based on the way the Cardinals played this season.” The column was also written before the NCAA Tournament, which might be why Roy Williams came in second.

Mike Krzyzewski is third, Jim Calhoun is fourth and John Calipari is fifth. The top-ranked local coach is Villanova’s Jay Wright, who comes in 22nd. That seems a bit low to me, and I suspect it might to some of you as well.

Coaches also ranked ahead of Wright include Wisconsin’s Bo Ryan, a Chester native, at No. 12, Minnesota’s Tubby Smith at No. 13 and UNLV’s Lon Kruger at No. 18.

The coaches immediately ahead of Wright are Michigan’s John Beilein at No. 19, Gonzaga’s Mark Few at No. 20 and George Mason’s Jim Larranaga at 21. Davidson’s Bob McKillop follows Wright at No. 23, Tennessee’s Bruce Pearl is No. 24 and Georgetown’s John Thompson III at No. 25.

I personally think Kruger, Smith and Larranaga are too high. Kruger has got UNLV back on the winning track, but not anywhere close to where it was under Jerry Tarkanian, and Smith’s greatest successes came when he was at Kentucky. And I like what Larranaga has done a lot, but VCU has been the better team in the CAA since Mason’s Final Four run.

Wright, on the other hand, is ushering Villanova through a sustained period of success, and it looks like that will continue with the incoming recruiting class. I’m sure the rankings would have been different had they been conducted after the NCAA Tournament, but even without that I think Wright deserves more credit than Francis gave him.

Two other local coaches made Francis’ ranking: Temple’s Fran Dunphy at No. 48 and Phil Martelli of St. Joseph’s at No. 50. I think those ratings are fair.

Some other notable names on the list: Maryland’s Gary Williams at No. 26, Notre Dame’s Mike Brey (formerly of Delaware) at No. 36 and Siena’s Fran McCaffery at 46.

I also can’t help noting that now-former USC coach Tim Floyd was ranked No. 29. I think we can safely say that Floyd wouldn’t deserve to be in this list if it was assembled today. We don’t deal with the Pac-10 that much on here, but I think we can agree that we won’t miss him or his recruiting methods all that much.

After ranking the Top 50 coaches, Francis ranked what he called the “Next 50.” He ranked 30 “Coaches in Mid-Career” and 20 “Up-and-Coming Coaches.”

La Salle’s John Giannini made it to No. 25 on the Mid-Career list, and Penn State’s Ed DeChellis was No. 28.

Notable names included Dayton’s Bryan Gregory at No. 5; Rhode Island’s Jim Baron at No. 8; Northwestern’s Bill Carmody (formerly of Princeton) at No. 10; Cincinnati’s Mick Cronin at No. 16; American’s Jeff Jones at No. 19 and Cornell’s Steve Donahue at No. 23.

I’m not sure about Mick Cronin. Maybe he can turn Cincinnati around, but the Bearcats’ 8-10 record in the Big East this season was underwhelming. They also haven’t beaten local rival Xavier since the 2004-05 season.

Anthony Grant, who moved from VCU to Alabama in March, is the at the top of the Up-and-Coming list. Notable names include Marquette’s Buzz Williams at No. 3, Providene’s Keno Davis at No. 5, Oregon State’s Craig Robinson (Barack Obama’s brother-in-law) at No. 11.

Two former St. Joe’s assistants are on that list as well: Mike Rice (now at Robert Morris) at No. 12 and Matt Brady (James Madison) at No. 20.

One name not listed: Drexel's Bruiser Flint. Surprising? I think you can make a case for him to be somewhere in the "Next 50."

But wait, there’s more. Francis also ranked the Top 100 assistant coaches and the Top 50 “Low-to-Mid-Major” assistant coaches.

Notable names on the first list include West Virginia’s Billy Hahn, the former La Salle head coach, at No. 3; now-former Villanova assistant Pat Chambers at No. 31; Rutgers’ Jim Carr at No. 50; Temple’s Dave Duke at No. 60; Penn State’s Kurt Kanaskie at No. 81; Villanova’s Jason Donnelly at No. 83; Geoff Arnold of St. Joe’s at No. 92 and La Salle’s Walt Fuller at No. 96.

Notable names on the second list include Drexel’s Tony Chiles at No. 21; Penn’s John Gallagher at No. 32; Robert Morris’ Andy Toole (who played at Penn) at No. 36; and Delaware’s R.C. Kehoe at No. 37.

Yes, there are a lot of local names on those lists, and we know some better than others.

What do you think of all this, especially the head coach rankings?

Though it may be hard to believe given the miserable weather we've had lately, the Penn Relays start a week from today. The formal countdown to the start of the 115th running started yesterday in a conference room adjacent to Franklin Field, where the first of two media sessions with a range of Relays personalities took place.

In attendance were Penn Relays executive director Dave Johnson, Secondary Schools Committee chair Tim Hickey and Penn women's track coach Gwen Harris, who is always one of the event's more effusive personalities.

Three other college coaches participated by phone: Florida men's coach Mike Holloway, Texas men's coach Bubba Thornton and Tennessee women's coach J.J. Clark.

You can listen to what all of them had to say in the audio player below. The event lasted over an hour, but each person has his or her own track.

I don't have time to go into too much depth about what was said, but it won't surprise you to hear that the Jamaican high school teams are ridiculously stacked once again. Among the best is Calabar's boys 4x100-meter team, which won the Jamaican high school championship in 39.90 seconds.

Some other notes:

- This year's television broadcast window will be Saturday from 4 to 6 p.m. on ESPN2.

- Penn Relays Secondary Schools Committee chair Tim Hickey said that despite the troubled economy, "we've got more entries this year than there have ever been, and the quality is as good as it's ever been."

- Two familiar names on UCLA's women's squad will be running the 400-meter hurdles: West Catholic grad Nicole Leach and Methacton grad Ryann Krais. Krais, a freshman, was the high school girls Athlete of the Meet at last year's Relays. Leach is now a senior in Westwood and won Athlete of the Meet honors twice.

- In their respective audio clips, you'll hear Florida coach Mike Holloway and Texas coach Bubba Thornton talk about having sprinters on their teams who also play football. It's a subject that intrigues me in part because of the enormous workload on the students and in part because I wanted to know from the coaches how those athletes get recruited. The most famous recent example was Longhorns running back Jamaal Charles, who now plays for the Kansas City Chiefs.

- Former Penn Relays public address announcer Bob Hersh is this year's Honorary Carnival referee. You might recall that I interviewed Hersh at the end of last year's relays, and you might wonder why I put the word "former" before his title.

Hersh has stepped down from the microphone both at the Relays and internationally to focus on his work as vice president of the IAAF, the governing body of international track and field. Hersh was the voice of seven Olympic Games and nine World Championships in his announcing career.

- The other honorary referees are St. Joseph's Prep coach Curtis Cockenberg (High School Boys), Council Rock North coach Cliff Robbins (High School Girls), Michigan associate men's head coach Ron Warhust (College Men) and LSU women's head coach Dennis Shaver (College Women). You can get their bios here. The list of this year's Wall of Fame inductees is here.

- Because of the ongoing construction at Franklin Field, things are going to look quite different inside and outside the stadium. The shops and other Carnival activities will move from the north side by the tennis courts to the south side, and one lane of South Street will be closed off to vehicle traffic. The main spectator entrance will also move to the south side.

The paddock is also moving from the north side of the track to the south side, which will affect a few other things along the way. You usually see a range of teams camped out along the brick exterior of Weightman Hall at the east end of Franklin Field, but this year the paddock will stretch across that area. As a result, from what I understand, the team rest area will be in that little parking lot at the corner of 33rd and South.

The location of the finish line remains the same, however, as does the location of the press seating area.

And while I know I've said this a number of times already, the South Street bridge quite literally does not exist right now. So if you are planning to come to the Relays, you'll have to get off the Expressway or cross the river elsewhere, or take SEPTA. More information is available here.

I never met Les Keiter, but I would be remiss if I did not note his passing here on the blog in some form. The Inquirer and Daily News both posted obituaries yesterday afternoon, and the Inquirer also pulled a Frank Dolson column out of the archives.

As of the time that I wrote this blog post, the print edition stories were not yet on the website. They should be in the headlines list in the blog rail by the time you see this, though.

Those of you who watched Keiter call games or got to meet him at some point are welcome to leave your memories in the comments.

We finally have the answer to the season's last big question: Ahmad Nivins of St. Joe's has won the Robert V. Geasey Trophy as the Big 5's Most Outstanding Player.

You could argue for Dionte Christmas, and I would have if asked to vote at the end of the regular season. You could argue for Dante Cunningham, and if ballots were cast this week he'd probably have won it.

But regardless of timing, if you take either of them off their respective teams would it have anywhere near the kind of impact as St. Joe's without Nivins? No.

Having said that, the award is for Most Outstanding Player, not Most Valuable. But Nivins' numbers make one heck of a case: 19.2 points and 11.8 rebounds a game and 61.2% field goal shooting in an average of 39.3 minutes per game.

That last number is really something for a big man.

Cunningham averaged 16.1 points and 7.4 rebounds a game and shot 52.5 percent from the field, by comparison. Christmas averaged a City Series-best 19.5 points per game, but as a guard it's not as easy to make a straight statistical comparison to Nivins.

Who would you have chosen?

All-Big 5 First Team

C Ahmad Nivins (St. Joseph's)
F Dante Cunningham (Villanova)
G Scottie Reynolds (Villanova)
G Dionte Christmas (Temple)
G Rodney Green (La Salle)

All-Big 5 Second Team

F Lavoy Allen (Temple)
F Dwayne Anderson (Villanova)
G/F Reggie Redding (Villanova)
G Corey Fisher (Villanova)
G Tasheed Carr (St. Joseph's)

A press release from the Big 5 just landed in my inbox announcing this season's winners of a bunch of awards given out by the Herb Good Basketball Club. The highest-profile of them was Villanova coach Jay Wright, who won the Harry Litwack Award for Eastern College Coach of the Year.

Wildcats forward Dante Cunningham won the George Paull Award for the Big 5's Most Improved Player, and Penn's Zack Rosen, who won the Dave Zinkoff Award for Big 5 Rookie of the Year.

That Rosen won the Zinkoff award surprises me somewhat, as I thought it would go to Juan Fernandez. Then again, Fernandez didn't play the full season.

The only other freshmen in the Big 5 who got significant minutes were Bryant Irwin and Chris Prescott of St. Joe's. While both contributed, I think we can fairly say that Rosen and Fernandez were at the top of this year's rookie class.

This is the second straight year that a Penn player has won the Zinkoff Award. Tyler Bernardini won it last season.

The Big 5 Player of the Year award has not been announced. I don't know when it will come but my guess is tomorrow.

Other award winners include:

- Cy Kaselman Award (Big 5's most accurate foul shooter): Scottie Reynolds, Villanova

- Palumbo Award (Big 5's top scorer): Dionte Christmas, Temple (19.5 points per game/662 total)

- Harry Merrill Sportsmanship Award: Kevin Egee, Penn

- Eddie Gottlieb Award (Outstanding 76er): Andre Iguodala

- High School Standouts: Cameron Ayers (Germantown Academy), Maalik Wayns (Roman Catholic), Denzel Yard (Franklin Learning Center), Dalton Pepper (Pennsbury High)

- All-Philadelphia Area Player of the Year (non-Division I): Malcolm Ingram, Philadelphia University

- All-Philadelphia Area Squad (non-Division I): Malcolm Ingram (Philadelphia University), Dominique Curry  (Cheyney), Russell Frederick (Philadelphia University), Ralph Hegamin (West Chester), Charles Jones (Widener), Kevin Misevicius (Cabrini), John Noonan (Ursinus) Dave Smith (Gwynedd-Mercy).

By the way, I'm going to be liveblogging the Phillies game tomorrow afternoon here on Philly.com, starting at around 2:45. I hope you'll join me (though we'll have to keep the talk to baseball, at least for most of the game).

The undercurrent started flowing Monday morning, and it has grown stronger amid all the hoopla enveloping Villanova's trip to the Final Four.

Given the many ways in which Jay Wright embraces his program's participation in the Big 5, is it time to embrace the Wildcats as a Philadelphia team?

In other words, is it time for Big 5 fans whose dislike of the Main Liners literally predates the birth of an entire generation of fans to get over it?

I will offer my opinion in a bit. But first, I'd like to take a moment (okay, maybe a few moments) to aggregate the commentary we've seen this week about how the region has warmed to the Main Liners.

It started Monday morning with Phil Sheridan's front-page column in the Inquirer.

"During his tenure, Villanova has returned to full and proud participation in the Big Five," Sheridan wrote of Jay Wright. "This may not be popular on Hawk Hill, or at Broad and Montgomery, but that makes this Villanova team a Philadelphia team."

Sheridan, who was a senior at Temple when the Wildcats won the title in 1985, admitted to celebrating the Wildcats' triumph over Georgetown.

"I believe John Chaney would have understood why I cheered at my TV," Sheridan wrote. "Reaching the Final Four - especially with wins over storied programs like UCLA and Duke, plus Big East power Pittsburgh - should transcend all local grudges and resentments."

Wright himself was quoted in Rich Hofmann's column in Monday's Daily News.

"I love it for Philly basketball," Wright said. "It’s done so much for all of us. That’s what I’m into right now... I'm proud that now we get to be a part of that lore, of Villanova at the Final Four, and the La Salle teams [in the early 1950s], and the other Villanova teams. I’m really proud of that, of that maybe more than anything.”

Now you can choose to believe, as Hofmann wrote, that Wright really does enjoy being able "to participate in something that is bigger than him," or you can choose to believe that it's just talk.

But I would think you have to listen in some form to the many people quoted in Mike Jensen's story from Tuesday's Inquirer, from Speedy Morris' son to the late Jim Boyle's wife.

"Those guys just get it," Tess Boyle said of Jay Wright's program.

The big thing Wednesday was John Gonzalez's column, of course, in which the La Salle grad went to Hawk Hill to see whether St. Joe's students have warmed up to their eternal rivals. The poll of 50 students ended 37-13 against the Wildcats, but if you ask me, a roughly 3-1 ratio isn't all that big.
       
If you read the comments both in and on the story, you can tell that there's at least a decent amount of respect in the rivalry. There's jealousy too, especially among fans of the Atlantic 10 schools that have been stuck at the Elite 8 for a long time. But it's way more tame than much of what I see from Eagles fans on a regular basis.

Thursday's addition was a story by The Inquirer's Frank Fitzpatrick about the differences between new and old Villanova alumni. I will return to that shortly, because once you read the story you'll know right away there's a point in there that needs to be discussed.

Finally, today's Inquirer includes an interview John Gonzalez did with Villanova radio color analyst Whitey Rigsby. The former Wildcats player embraced Villanova's role in the region and voiced his belief that the region is capable of embracing his alma mater.

When St. Joe's made that great run with Jameer Nelson and Delonte West, I was the leader of the pack. They have to realize 'Nova is representing them whether they like it or not. They don't want to cheer for 'Nova when we're playing St. Joe's. I get that. But we're representing Philly and the Big Five and the area right now. Why would you root for Carolina? What positive vibes do you get out of rooting for a team from 500 miles away?

This change in mood at both ends of Lancaster Avenue didn't just happen because of Scottie Reynolds' picket-fence dash to glory on Saturday. The roots of this thing were planted much earlier, and now the time has finally come for the blossoms to flower.

I think there might be a generational aspect to this too. And by generation, I don't mean 20 years, I mean maybe half that at most. Take La Salle: the Rasual Butler generation of fans isn't the same as the Steven Smith generation, and won't be the same as the Aaric Murray generation if he turns out to be as advertised.

At Penn - and we'll get to the Quakers' situation after the season ends, but keep in mind what I'm about to say - there have been separate generations of fans centered around Jerome Allen, Michael Jordan, Ugonna Onyekwe and Ibrahim Jaaber. That's four in 15 years. I've come to know people from each one covering the team and they all see things differently.

At St. Joe's, you can argue that there are different generations for Marvin O'Connor, Jameer Nelson and Ahmad Nivins. You get the idea.

Regardless of when you came to the Big 5, I'm not saying you have to go out and buy a Villanova t-shirt because of this. And of course you shouldn't be any less throaty in yelling at the Wildcats when your team is playing them.

I'm just saying that it's okay for you to think about whether the Main Line is really as far away as you think it is, and to acknowledge that Wright has done a lot of work to get Villanova to embrace the culture of Philadelphia basketball. If nothing else, take a moment to think about why you feel the way you do about the Wildcats.

The reason why I say all this is that I worry sometimes about the future of the Big 5 round-robin. Not because of any information I have or rumors I hear, but because of how difficult it is to get the thing scheduled every season.

With a 16-team Big East and a 14-team Atlantic 10, the number of open dates for non-conference games isn't as big as it used to be before the conference realignments of recent years. But it gets done, and it gets done because all of the parties involved want to get it done.

I also wonder whether we might not be where we are now if Wright wasn't the coach at Villanova. Maybe we would be, and I'm not saying this to disparage the other schools and the many administrators whose work isn't as public as the coaches'. But it's not so hard to imagine things being different, because things haven't been as they are for all that long.

That brings me to my last point, which is to refute Fitzpatrick's assertion that the Palestra and Big 5 "don't mean what they once did."

Of course we aren't in the 1970's anymore, but I think that line overstates things.

The current generation and the one before it have only ever known a full round-robin. I've talked to students of recent vintage from all of the schools, and they all really enjoy the special atmosphere and culture of City Series games. That includes Villanova students, who've told me without prompting how much they love the Palestra. Some even wish they could have more games there.

As someone who first got exposed to the Big 5 in this decade, I fall into that category too. To me, the best way to ensure that we keep getting new generations of fans is to keep the full round-robin intact every year. It's a lot harder to learn about a tradition if you don't get to experience it yourself firsthand, from trips to the Palestra to throwing streamers.

(The latter of which could get an interesting twist when the soccer team comes to town next year, but that's a whole other discussion.)

So as Jay Wright prepares to step on to college basketball's biggest stage, we should be thankful for his belief in the value of the Big 5, and for his willingness to be part of a whole that truly is made richer by the sum of its parts.

Join me tomorrow night for live coverage of the Villanova-North Carolina game, starting at around 8:30. I don't expect the game to actually start at the listed time of 8:47, but we should have plenty to talk about before tipoff.

And if you're looking for a way to pass some time during the day tomorrow, the Penn Relays enthusiassts among you might want to swing by Franklin Field. Penn is hosting a track meet that will include 40 other schools, including Temple, Villanova and La Salle. More information on the meet, including the event schedule and a list of all participating teams, can be found here.

I'll be there to do some advance work for the blog's Relays coverage, which believe it or not starts in only 20 days. Yes, the time is going by that quickly.

Temple coach Fran Dunphy (left) and Villanova coach Jay Wright (right) were the centers of attention at the Palestra this morning. (Alejandro A. Alvarez/Staff Photographer)

The morning after Selection Sunday is always one of my favorite times of the college basketball season.

Even though it usually follows a night with far too little sleep, the reward for getting up before sunrise is a trip to the Palestra for the Coaches vs. Cancer March Madness Tip-Off Breakfast.

We talk all the time about the sense of community that exists among the City Six schools, but this day more than any other is when it is made clear to the region and the nation.

The breakfast brings together coaches, administrators and hundreds of fans, and as you walk down the ramp to the arena floor it seems like everyone in the building knows each other by first name.

In addition to a range of fundraising activites for Coaches vs. Cancer, the highlight of the morning is hearing Final Four picks from all six of the region's coaches and a panel of local media members.

This year's media panel included Howard Eskin, Joe Juliano, Dick Jerardi, Mike Kern, Dei Lynam and Harry Donahue.

As happens every year, I tried to record it, and as happens in more years than I would like, my audio recorder bombed during the recording. So I give you some transcribed highlights from what I could recover.

Eskin started by complimenting Fran Dunphy's mother for cheering La salle when the Explorers beat Temple, then picked Alabama State to win the play-in game and Memphis to make the Final Four "because I'm always a John Calipari guy because all the coaches here can't stand him except Bruiser."

"The one thing that I can go against here," Eskin continued, "because Phil [Martelli] thinks North Carolina's going to win the national championship, they're out. Phil never wins these things. Never."

"Why don't you save it 'til this afternoon," Martelli retorted. "Go on this afternoon - you don't know what you're talking about. Do that for four hours. Don't waste these people's times."

Eskin got the last word in, noting that the St. Joe's coach "did it this morning with Angelo, so I'm just following your lead."

The feud between Martelli and Eskin is well known. Yet Eskin said that Martelli's endorsement of Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim was enough to pick the Orange to make the Final Four.

Villanova coach Jay Wright was asked to weigh in on the matter.

"I like when he and Phil go at it - I think that's what everybody comes for," Wright said. What did [Eskin] say about Boeheim? I don't listen to him."

Penn coach Glen Miller admitted that he fell asleep during the six-overtime Syracuse-Connecticut game, but added that he'll be paying plenty of attention to the Huskies for the rest of the month.

"Bruiser's rooting for Memphis for his ticket upgrades, and I'm rooting for Connecticut," said the former assistant to Jim Calhoun, who said he has UConn facing North Carolina in the national championship game.

"No bias there?" emcee Neil Hartman of Comcast SportsNet asked Miller.

"Excuse me?" Miller replied. After a dramatic pause, he admitted to "a little bias."

Donahue, who calls Temple basketball games on the radio, told a story about one difference between working with John Chaney and Fran Dunphy. Apparently Chaney let Donahue and color man John Baum travel on the plane, but after landing they were responsible for their own transportation.

Dunphy allows the radio guys on the team bus, but Donahue said the price of admission is being regularly told "how little I know about the game."

La Salle coach John Giannini picked quite a few upsets: North Dakota State over Kansas, Cornell over Missouri "if they can beat the press" (good luck with that), and Western Kentucky over Illinois.

He also said that American will "go right at Jay's guys" against Villanova, and "make it more difficult on them than some people may realize."

Giannini would know at least something of what he speaks, as the Explorers played the Eagles last season before AU threw a scare into Tennessee in March.

Inquirer college basketball writer Joe Juliano joined the chorus picking a Villanova-Pittsburgh East Regional final, but went for the Panthers over the Wildcats on the theory that DeJuan Blair will have learned his lesson after losing at the Spectrum.

His upset pick was Missouri out of the West region, taking down Memphis and Connecticut on the way.

Then came Bruiser Flint's turn. As Hartman said, the stage was his to explain why Memphis will win the national championship.

"Why should I?" Flint retorted. "I did it last year - I sat behind the bench and watched the game. The guy's won 30 games four years in a row, he's got two guys that aer the all-time winningest seniors in the history of college basketball, they're good. They're good."

He continued, and even without the audio I'm sure you'll be able to hear this part in your minds.

I know Cal gets on you guys' nerves, he thinks all this stuff up, he runs it by me before he gets it... everybody gets upset. But the guy wins basketball games. But the greatest thing - and Glen knows about this - if they play UConn in the final eight, that will be one of the all-time handshakes before a game that you will ever see in history.

Please, people, tell me you're going to show it on camera. Calhoun and Calipari hate each other. No, no, no, I don't think you all understand. These two guys HATE each other. First thing Cal said to me last night: "Ooh, I can't wait until the final eight." I was like, "You're crazy - why don't you get there first?"

Pay attention to it if they make it. That's going to be the greatest handshake of all time when those two guys stand next to each other.

As for his Final Four picks, Flint couldn't quite send Villanova all the way.

"I'm not going to say they're going to go to the Final Four, because you know, those Villanova guys get a little crazy," he said, picking them to lose the regional final to Pittsburgh. "I'm a St. Joe guy - if Villanova goes to the Final Four again, Phil, we might have to go up there and break some windows."

Mike Kern had some of the best - and most honest - quotes of the morning.

"All I do, I root for the local teams to go as far as they can because to me, that's what it's all about," he said. "I root for Dunph to win, Jay to win, Drexel's women, whoever's playing basketball games."

In particular, he'd like to see Villanova play Duke in the Sweet 16.

"I just think it will be one of the great matchups in the tournament," Kern said.

Kern closed his remarks with a paragraph or so about the region's coaches that I thought was especialy profound, and summed up really well why our local college basketball scene is such a special thing.

"We get to deal with these guys all year, and you just have to understand how lucky you are in Philadephia to have a group of guys who not only can coach - because they can do that - but they get it," he said. "We bump heads with them every now again, and sometimes they're even right. But don't take these guys for granted, because I think too often we do, both for what they do with their teams and what they do away from their teams. They may not always be here. So don't take this for granted."

I'll second that.

After the panel session I got interviews with all six of the coaches. Unfortunately, my interview with Fran Dunphy got totally screwed up by my audio recorder, but the other five made it okay.

Technology screwing over a web guy. Who knew?

There's a little bit of news tonight: the NCAA Women's Tournament field has been released, and La Salle guard Darryl Partin is transferring. Philly Hoops Insider has that news, though there's no word on where Partin is headed.

I'll be back tomorrow, and in my next post I'll give you my picks for the Midwest region. Remember to join Philly.com's Hoops Hysteria contest, and in particular to join me and your fellow blog readers in our pool group.

A Talor-made win. (Carolyn Kaster/AP)

This post was originally going to be about the great display of Fran Dunphy offense that Temple put on against St. Joe's tonight at the Liacouras Center: 16 assists on 21 made field goals, only nine turnovers and 1.03 points per possession.

But at the very end of a big night of local hoops, Penn State's Talor Battle stole the show.

It was on ESPN, so you probably saw it: a missed free throw by Mike Davis led to a rebound by Jamelle Cornley, who only moments before had come back from the trainr's table after suffering what looked like an arm injury.

Cornley handed the ball to Battle, who ran the length of the court, drove the baseline through a batch of Illinois defenders, threw up a prayer of a shot...

... and watched it bounce off the backboard, off the rim twice, off the backboard again, and off the rim once more before dropping through the net with 0.3 seconds left.

Nittany Lions 64, Illini 63.

You have to think that did it for Penn State. Yes, the strength of schedule and RPI aren't the best, but there are too many quality wins on that résumé to ignore - as long as they win at Iowa this weekend, of course.

(Hey, wait a minute. Penn State is on the verge of a big national postseason game and has to travel to Iowa to seal the deal? Haven't we heard this before somewhere?)

Okay, I kid... somewhat. The Nittany Lions are a lot closer to the Big Dance than the football team was to the Rose Bowl when it traveled to Kinnick Stadium last fall. Still, no game can be overlooked at this time of  year.

(Unless you're Villanova, and you can overlook two whole days of the Big East tournament after beating Providence tonight and securing a double-bye.)

Video of Battle's game-winner is below, as is tonight's Line of the Game. It goes to a Villanova senior on the Wildcats' Senior Night, but it might not be who you expect.

Temple 68, Saint Joseph's 59: Inquirer recap | Box score | Enhanced box score | Photo gallery

Penn State 64, Illinois 63: AP recap | Box score | Enhanced box score

Villanova 97, Providence 80: Inquirer recap | Box score | Enhanced box score

Tonight, I'm unveiling something on the blog that I've wanted to do for a long time.

If you take a look at the right rail, you'll see a new widget called The Big Dance. It's based on a combination of the CoverItLive software we use for live blogging and the microblogging platform Twitter.

Anyone who adds the hashtag #bigdance to their tweets will see their writing show up in the widget automatically in real time, or at least after the few seconds it takes for the system to register the new tweet.

There will also be regular contributions from a pair of college basketball blogs I read regularly: BracketDobber, written by Chris Dobbertean, and Storming the Floor, written by Eric Angevine and Marco Anskis.

I'm happy to share the code for the widget with those of you who'd like it on your blog. Email me and I'll send it over.

Also, if you have an account already and tweet exclusively about college basketball, let me know and I'll add your feed into the widget for automatic publishing.

While the interface may look familiar to you, it's different in one major way: you can't submit comments directly from the blog. Everything you see will come from Twitter.

If you don't have a Twitter account, it's very easy to join. Just click here, sign up and get going.

I've written a number of times about how important building a sense of community here on the blog is to me, and I really do mean it. We've done a pretty good job of that so far this season, but the importance of March Madness gives us a chance to do something even bigger.

Those of you readers who are based in Philadelphia know full well what this community looks like in reality, because it's so much of what the Big 5 is about.

My hope with this project is that we are able to bring that atmosphere online, and to enjoy the wild ride that March always gives us in a new way.

It's Tuesday, which means it's Crunchy Numbers time. So off we go with the City Six rankings table and the Schuylkill 16 teamsheets.