By Franz Beard
A few thoughts to jump start your Tuesday morning:
TRINITY THOMAS WINS HONDA AWARD
Trinity Thomas took the next step toward the Honda Cup, issued annually to the Collegiate Woman Athlete of the Year, when she was named the 2022 recipient of the Honda Sports Award for gymnastics. Thomas is the sixth Florida gymnast in the last 11 years to win the Honda award for gymnastics (Bridget Sloan 2013, 2016; Kytra Hunter 2012, 2015; Alex McMurtry 2017).
Thomas just completed the most dominant season in Florida gymnastics history when she won the NCAA all-around, uneven bars and floor exercise titles. Along the way, Thomas won the all-around title at every stop – Southeastern Conference, NCAA first and second rounds, NCAA semifinal and championship final.
Thomas posted 12 perfect 10s this season, the second highest single season total in NCAA history. Thomas posted a 10 on floor in both the NCAA semifinals and championship final. She has 20 perfect scores for her career. She had a career Gym Slam (10 on each event) and a Sean Slam (at least one 10 on each event during the season). Thomas finished with the five highest all-around scores in the country including a 39.90, the fifth highest score in NCAA history; a 39.8125 equaling the NCAA semifinal record; and 39.8625, the second highest all-around in NCAA championship final history.
UF BASEBALL: GATORS HOST SOUTH FLORIDA
It’s getting down to crunch time for the Gators (25-18), who have only three SEC series remaining on the schedule. That makes non-conference games like tonight’s encounter with South Florida (23-20) at the Condron Family Ballpark critical for NCAA Tournament and seeding purposes. Counting tonight’s game, the Gators have 12 regular season games remaining before the SEC Tournament. To be comfortable heading into Hoover, the Gators need to have at least 33 wins under their belt.
D1Baseball top 25: 1. Tennessee 40-4; 2. Oregon State 34-9; 3. Oklahoma State 31-13; 4. Arkansas 34-10; 5. Virginia Tech 31-10; 6. Miami 32-12; 7. Southern Miss 34-10; 8. UCLA 30-13; 9. Texas Tech 31-16; 10. Louisville 31-12; 11. Stanford 25-14; 12. Gonzaga 28-13; 13. Texas A&M 27-15; 14. Virginia 33-12; 15. UConn 37-8; 16. Notre Dame 28-10; 17. Texas State 34-11; 18. Maryland 35-9; 19. Auburn 31-14; 20. LSU 29-14; 21. Georgia Tech 27-18; 22. Georgia 30-14; 23. Florida State 26-15; 24. TCU 27-16; 25. UC-Santa Barbara 30-10
UF SOFTBALL: GATORS DROP TO NO. 13
Florida (38-13) dropped down to No. 13 in the latest D1Softball poll after taking two out of three on the road from LSU over the weekend. With the SEC portion of their schedule complete, the Gators will finish out their regular season this week, first with 3rd-ranked Florida State in Tallahassee on Wednesday and then a pair of doubleheaders with Mercer and Florida Gulf Coast Friday and Saturday. The Gators need to be at 41-42 wins prior to the SEC Tournament if they are to host an NCAA Regional. The Gators probably will have to make the SEC Tournament championship game to host a Super Regional as well.
D1Softball top 25: 1. Oklahoma 45-1; 2. Virginia Tech 39-6; 3. Florida State 45-5; 4. Arkansas 39-8; 5. UCLA 39-6; 6. Oklahoma State 38-9; 7. Northwestern 38-7; 8. Alabama 39-9; 9. Washington 32-11; 10. Duke 36-7; 11. Arizona State 35-7; 12. FLORIDA 38-13; 13. Tennessee 35-14; 14. Texas 35-15-1; 16. Clemson 37-14; 17. Auburn 39-11; 18. Georgia 39-13; 20. Notre Dame 36-9; 21. Michigan 31-15; 22. San Diego State 33-12; 23. Louisiana 39-11; 24. Wichita State 31-13; 25. LSU 32-19
UF TRACK AND FIELD: MEN, WOMEN BOTH NO. 3USTFCCA men’s top 25: 1. Texas; 2. Alabama; 3. FLORIDA; 4. LSU; 5. Texas A&M; 6. Georgia; 7. Oregon; 8. Texas Tech; 9. Southern Cal; 10. Stanford; 11. Baylor; 12. Tennessee; 13. BYU; 14. North Carolina A&T; 15. Kentucky; 16. Florida State; 17. Arkansas; 18. Washington; 19. Iowa; 20. Ohio State; 21. Arizona State; 22. Princeton; 23. Virginia; 24. California; 25. Oklahoma
USTFCCA women’s top 25: 1. Texas; 2. Texas A&M; 3. FLORIDA; 4. LSU; 5. Texas Tech; 6. Arkansas; 7. Kentucky; 8. BYU; 9. Oregon; 10. Ohio State; 11. Baylor; 12. New Mexico; 13. North Carolina A&T; 14. Washington; 15. Arizona State; 16. Stanford; 17. South Carolina; 18. Oklahoma; 19. North Carolina State; 20. Ole Miss; 21. Southern Cal; 22. Auburn; 23. Duke; 24. California; 25. Colorado
UF TENNIS: NO. 2 MEN; NO. 16 WOMEN HOST NCAA REGIONALS
Florida’s 2nd-ranked men’s tennis team and 16th-ranked women’s tennis team will host NCAA regionals this weekend. The men (23-2), last year’s NCAA champs and 2022 SEC champions, will play host to Miami, South Florida and New Orleans. The Gators will face New Orleans at 5 p.m. Friday. The 16th-seeded women’s team (19-6) will host Florida State, Florida International and South Alabama. The Gators will face South Alabama (22-4) Saturday at 2 p.m.
KELLY RAE SIGNS THREE TRANSFERS
Florida women’s basketball coach Kelly Rae Finley signed three high profile recruits in the transfer portal – Leilani Correa (6-0, from St. John’s); KK Deans (5-8, from West Virginia); and Ra Shaya Kyle (6-6, from Purdue).
Correa is a two-time All-Big East selection who averaged 17.3 points, 5.3 rebounds and 2.5 assists per game. She was a 4-star recruit out of high school.
Deans averaged 14.5 points, 2.8 rebounds and 3.7 assists per game at West Virginia. She was a 5-star recruit out of high school.
Kyle only played in nine games for Purdue before suffering a season-ending injury. She averaged 11 points and 4.7 rebounds per game. She was a 5-star recruit out of high school.
SEC FOOTBALL/BASKETBALL
Alabama: Eli Ricks, the stud corner who transferred in from LSU, was arrested Sunday in Mississippi for speeding, no car insurance and possession of marijuana.
Arkansas: Connor Vanover (7-3, 230) is transferring to Oral Roberts.
Auburn: Bruce Pearl will take the basketball team to Israel for three games over a 10-day stretch in late July and August.
Kentucky: Guard Zan Payne, who played in nine games last season, is transferring out. He’s the son of former UK assistant, now Louisville head coach Kenny Payne, so we can all but pencil in his final destination.
Mississippi State: Redshirt freshman safety Eldric Griffin is in the transfer portal. He played in one game last year. Griffin has four seasons of eligibility remaining.
Missouri: Former Baylor quarterback Gerry Bohannon, who threw for 2,200 yards and 18 touchdowns in 2021, has visited Mizzou and has the Tigers on his transfer short list.
Ole Miss: Theo Akwuba, who averaged 9.1 points, 7.9 rebounds and 2.0 blocks per game at Louisiana last year, is transferring to Ole Miss.
Tennessee: Former Ohio State defensive back Andre Turrentine is transferring to Tennessee. A former 4-star recruit, Turrentine has four seasons of eligbility remaining.
Texas A&M: Power forward Justus Marble (6-9, 245), who has two years of eligibility remaining, is transferring in from Michigan State where he averaged 6.4 points and 3.3 rebounds per game last year. Also transferring in is former Mississippi State small forward Andersson Garcia (6-7, 210). He averaged 4.3 points and 4.2 rebounds last season.
ONE FINAL PITHY THOUGHT: It was the late, great Jerry Tarkanian who coined the phrase, “The NCAA is so mad at Kentucky it will probably slap another two years probation on Cleveland State.” Some might say Tark was a prophet, but not really. He simply understood that the NCAA plays its favorites whether it’s basketball or football. Certain programs are untouchable.
Take Duke basketball for instance. In a 2018 basketball story in Golf Digest (of all publications) entitled “The new Zion Williamson scandal is the NCAA’s nightmare,” Shane Ryan wrote: “If there's a “too big to fail” school in college basketball, it's Duke University, and if there's a personality the NCAA desperately doesn't want to see tied to any kind of "corruption," it's Coach K.” In case you’re unaware or simply choose to ignore the reality, Zion Williamson went to Duke, which is a Nike school even though Nike officials openly texted that they paid him $35,000 to play on the EYBL summer AAU circuit. Zion’s stepfather asked Adidas representatives for jobs, money and housing in order to sway Zion to Kansas. His mama took money from both Nike and Adidas sources.
Of course, Coach K didn’t know anything about it. Sure. Duke conducted its own investigation and found nothing. The NCAA, in its infinite wisdom said that was good enough for them to consider it case closed.
I’m sure Roy Williams didn’t know anything about the academic scandal at North Carolina where stud basketball players got A in classes they didn’t even attend. The NCAA was so mad at Roy and Carolina hoops that it slapped women’s basketball with probation.
I bring this up because Monday the NCAA gave Nebraska coach Scott Frost a show cause and a 5-day suspension from football DURING the 2022 season. Why? Because a special teams analyst got too involved in practice, film sessions and even offered advice during games. The NCAA says Nebraska exceeded the number of permissible coaches.
Perish the thought!
These penalties are for two Level II violations, which are minor violations. To give a coach a show cause for what amounts to parking tickets is a bit unprecedented even for the NCAA. More likely, the NCAA is getting back at Frost because the coach allegedly held off-campus workouts during the COVID-19 pandemic. That the workouts aren’t mentioned in the punishment against Frost basically means the NCAA may have known something went on but couldn’t prove it so they went after something that goes on at EVERY school that hires analysts or former coaches who need to go through the recycling bin before being allowed to hold down a real football job again.
This is kind of like the way the NCAA was with players selling their football tickets for more than face value back in the 1970s and 1980s. When the NCAA wanted to nail someone (see Charley Pell), football tickets were the fall back when they either couldn’t find anything else or wanted to force someone to confess to heinous crimes. Florida had some major violations in 1984, but most of the 109 that made their way into the NCAA report were similar to when Dale Dorminey got gym shorts and a couple of T-shirts that he slept in because Eastern Airlines lost his luggage. He never gave the shorts or T-shirts back. Dorminey was also mentioned when UF assistant Hoss Adams bought him a Sprite and a pack of Juicy Fruit when the plane to take Dorminey back to Pensacola was late.
Florida got some of the harshest penalties ever handed out by the NCAA, which considered giving UF the death penalty. In reality, what went on at Florida paled in comparison to what was going on at other schools in the SEC, which went by the motto “Sure, Everybody Cheats” back in those days. Now we have NIL, which stands for “Now It’s Legal.” Charley Pell rolls over in his grave on a daily basis.
Friends of mine who write large checks to Southern Cal swear that if there had been cell phones back in 1980 Herschel Walker would have never gone to Georgia. They allege that John Robinson was on the tee at Bel Aire when Georgia gave Herschel’s dad a take-it-or-leave it offer, otherwise USC would have outbid UGa. Georgia did get caught by the NCAA for illegal recruiting of Herschel, but lost only two scholarships.
Duke basketball and Coach K, Carolina basketball and Roy Williams, Scott Frost and Nebraska football, Charley Pell and UF, Georgia football and Vince Dooley – all examples of selective enforcement of the rules by the NCAA. The sacred cows of the college sports world have nothing to worry about. Everybody else beware.
What happened today with Scott Frost is just one more example of why the revolution to ditch the NCAA can’t happen soon enough.
A few thoughts to jump start your Tuesday morning:
TRINITY THOMAS WINS HONDA AWARD
Trinity Thomas took the next step toward the Honda Cup, issued annually to the Collegiate Woman Athlete of the Year, when she was named the 2022 recipient of the Honda Sports Award for gymnastics. Thomas is the sixth Florida gymnast in the last 11 years to win the Honda award for gymnastics (Bridget Sloan 2013, 2016; Kytra Hunter 2012, 2015; Alex McMurtry 2017).
Thomas just completed the most dominant season in Florida gymnastics history when she won the NCAA all-around, uneven bars and floor exercise titles. Along the way, Thomas won the all-around title at every stop – Southeastern Conference, NCAA first and second rounds, NCAA semifinal and championship final.
Thomas posted 12 perfect 10s this season, the second highest single season total in NCAA history. Thomas posted a 10 on floor in both the NCAA semifinals and championship final. She has 20 perfect scores for her career. She had a career Gym Slam (10 on each event) and a Sean Slam (at least one 10 on each event during the season). Thomas finished with the five highest all-around scores in the country including a 39.90, the fifth highest score in NCAA history; a 39.8125 equaling the NCAA semifinal record; and 39.8625, the second highest all-around in NCAA championship final history.
UF BASEBALL: GATORS HOST SOUTH FLORIDA
It’s getting down to crunch time for the Gators (25-18), who have only three SEC series remaining on the schedule. That makes non-conference games like tonight’s encounter with South Florida (23-20) at the Condron Family Ballpark critical for NCAA Tournament and seeding purposes. Counting tonight’s game, the Gators have 12 regular season games remaining before the SEC Tournament. To be comfortable heading into Hoover, the Gators need to have at least 33 wins under their belt.
D1Baseball top 25: 1. Tennessee 40-4; 2. Oregon State 34-9; 3. Oklahoma State 31-13; 4. Arkansas 34-10; 5. Virginia Tech 31-10; 6. Miami 32-12; 7. Southern Miss 34-10; 8. UCLA 30-13; 9. Texas Tech 31-16; 10. Louisville 31-12; 11. Stanford 25-14; 12. Gonzaga 28-13; 13. Texas A&M 27-15; 14. Virginia 33-12; 15. UConn 37-8; 16. Notre Dame 28-10; 17. Texas State 34-11; 18. Maryland 35-9; 19. Auburn 31-14; 20. LSU 29-14; 21. Georgia Tech 27-18; 22. Georgia 30-14; 23. Florida State 26-15; 24. TCU 27-16; 25. UC-Santa Barbara 30-10
UF SOFTBALL: GATORS DROP TO NO. 13
Florida (38-13) dropped down to No. 13 in the latest D1Softball poll after taking two out of three on the road from LSU over the weekend. With the SEC portion of their schedule complete, the Gators will finish out their regular season this week, first with 3rd-ranked Florida State in Tallahassee on Wednesday and then a pair of doubleheaders with Mercer and Florida Gulf Coast Friday and Saturday. The Gators need to be at 41-42 wins prior to the SEC Tournament if they are to host an NCAA Regional. The Gators probably will have to make the SEC Tournament championship game to host a Super Regional as well.
D1Softball top 25: 1. Oklahoma 45-1; 2. Virginia Tech 39-6; 3. Florida State 45-5; 4. Arkansas 39-8; 5. UCLA 39-6; 6. Oklahoma State 38-9; 7. Northwestern 38-7; 8. Alabama 39-9; 9. Washington 32-11; 10. Duke 36-7; 11. Arizona State 35-7; 12. FLORIDA 38-13; 13. Tennessee 35-14; 14. Texas 35-15-1; 16. Clemson 37-14; 17. Auburn 39-11; 18. Georgia 39-13; 20. Notre Dame 36-9; 21. Michigan 31-15; 22. San Diego State 33-12; 23. Louisiana 39-11; 24. Wichita State 31-13; 25. LSU 32-19
UF TRACK AND FIELD: MEN, WOMEN BOTH NO. 3USTFCCA men’s top 25: 1. Texas; 2. Alabama; 3. FLORIDA; 4. LSU; 5. Texas A&M; 6. Georgia; 7. Oregon; 8. Texas Tech; 9. Southern Cal; 10. Stanford; 11. Baylor; 12. Tennessee; 13. BYU; 14. North Carolina A&T; 15. Kentucky; 16. Florida State; 17. Arkansas; 18. Washington; 19. Iowa; 20. Ohio State; 21. Arizona State; 22. Princeton; 23. Virginia; 24. California; 25. Oklahoma
USTFCCA women’s top 25: 1. Texas; 2. Texas A&M; 3. FLORIDA; 4. LSU; 5. Texas Tech; 6. Arkansas; 7. Kentucky; 8. BYU; 9. Oregon; 10. Ohio State; 11. Baylor; 12. New Mexico; 13. North Carolina A&T; 14. Washington; 15. Arizona State; 16. Stanford; 17. South Carolina; 18. Oklahoma; 19. North Carolina State; 20. Ole Miss; 21. Southern Cal; 22. Auburn; 23. Duke; 24. California; 25. Colorado
UF TENNIS: NO. 2 MEN; NO. 16 WOMEN HOST NCAA REGIONALS
Florida’s 2nd-ranked men’s tennis team and 16th-ranked women’s tennis team will host NCAA regionals this weekend. The men (23-2), last year’s NCAA champs and 2022 SEC champions, will play host to Miami, South Florida and New Orleans. The Gators will face New Orleans at 5 p.m. Friday. The 16th-seeded women’s team (19-6) will host Florida State, Florida International and South Alabama. The Gators will face South Alabama (22-4) Saturday at 2 p.m.
KELLY RAE SIGNS THREE TRANSFERS
Florida women’s basketball coach Kelly Rae Finley signed three high profile recruits in the transfer portal – Leilani Correa (6-0, from St. John’s); KK Deans (5-8, from West Virginia); and Ra Shaya Kyle (6-6, from Purdue).
Correa is a two-time All-Big East selection who averaged 17.3 points, 5.3 rebounds and 2.5 assists per game. She was a 4-star recruit out of high school.
Deans averaged 14.5 points, 2.8 rebounds and 3.7 assists per game at West Virginia. She was a 5-star recruit out of high school.
Kyle only played in nine games for Purdue before suffering a season-ending injury. She averaged 11 points and 4.7 rebounds per game. She was a 5-star recruit out of high school.
SEC FOOTBALL/BASKETBALL
Alabama: Eli Ricks, the stud corner who transferred in from LSU, was arrested Sunday in Mississippi for speeding, no car insurance and possession of marijuana.
Arkansas: Connor Vanover (7-3, 230) is transferring to Oral Roberts.
Auburn: Bruce Pearl will take the basketball team to Israel for three games over a 10-day stretch in late July and August.
Kentucky: Guard Zan Payne, who played in nine games last season, is transferring out. He’s the son of former UK assistant, now Louisville head coach Kenny Payne, so we can all but pencil in his final destination.
Mississippi State: Redshirt freshman safety Eldric Griffin is in the transfer portal. He played in one game last year. Griffin has four seasons of eligibility remaining.
Missouri: Former Baylor quarterback Gerry Bohannon, who threw for 2,200 yards and 18 touchdowns in 2021, has visited Mizzou and has the Tigers on his transfer short list.
Ole Miss: Theo Akwuba, who averaged 9.1 points, 7.9 rebounds and 2.0 blocks per game at Louisiana last year, is transferring to Ole Miss.
Tennessee: Former Ohio State defensive back Andre Turrentine is transferring to Tennessee. A former 4-star recruit, Turrentine has four seasons of eligbility remaining.
Texas A&M: Power forward Justus Marble (6-9, 245), who has two years of eligibility remaining, is transferring in from Michigan State where he averaged 6.4 points and 3.3 rebounds per game last year. Also transferring in is former Mississippi State small forward Andersson Garcia (6-7, 210). He averaged 4.3 points and 4.2 rebounds last season.
ONE FINAL PITHY THOUGHT: It was the late, great Jerry Tarkanian who coined the phrase, “The NCAA is so mad at Kentucky it will probably slap another two years probation on Cleveland State.” Some might say Tark was a prophet, but not really. He simply understood that the NCAA plays its favorites whether it’s basketball or football. Certain programs are untouchable.
Take Duke basketball for instance. In a 2018 basketball story in Golf Digest (of all publications) entitled “The new Zion Williamson scandal is the NCAA’s nightmare,” Shane Ryan wrote: “If there's a “too big to fail” school in college basketball, it's Duke University, and if there's a personality the NCAA desperately doesn't want to see tied to any kind of "corruption," it's Coach K.” In case you’re unaware or simply choose to ignore the reality, Zion Williamson went to Duke, which is a Nike school even though Nike officials openly texted that they paid him $35,000 to play on the EYBL summer AAU circuit. Zion’s stepfather asked Adidas representatives for jobs, money and housing in order to sway Zion to Kansas. His mama took money from both Nike and Adidas sources.
Of course, Coach K didn’t know anything about it. Sure. Duke conducted its own investigation and found nothing. The NCAA, in its infinite wisdom said that was good enough for them to consider it case closed.
I’m sure Roy Williams didn’t know anything about the academic scandal at North Carolina where stud basketball players got A in classes they didn’t even attend. The NCAA was so mad at Roy and Carolina hoops that it slapped women’s basketball with probation.
I bring this up because Monday the NCAA gave Nebraska coach Scott Frost a show cause and a 5-day suspension from football DURING the 2022 season. Why? Because a special teams analyst got too involved in practice, film sessions and even offered advice during games. The NCAA says Nebraska exceeded the number of permissible coaches.
Perish the thought!
These penalties are for two Level II violations, which are minor violations. To give a coach a show cause for what amounts to parking tickets is a bit unprecedented even for the NCAA. More likely, the NCAA is getting back at Frost because the coach allegedly held off-campus workouts during the COVID-19 pandemic. That the workouts aren’t mentioned in the punishment against Frost basically means the NCAA may have known something went on but couldn’t prove it so they went after something that goes on at EVERY school that hires analysts or former coaches who need to go through the recycling bin before being allowed to hold down a real football job again.
This is kind of like the way the NCAA was with players selling their football tickets for more than face value back in the 1970s and 1980s. When the NCAA wanted to nail someone (see Charley Pell), football tickets were the fall back when they either couldn’t find anything else or wanted to force someone to confess to heinous crimes. Florida had some major violations in 1984, but most of the 109 that made their way into the NCAA report were similar to when Dale Dorminey got gym shorts and a couple of T-shirts that he slept in because Eastern Airlines lost his luggage. He never gave the shorts or T-shirts back. Dorminey was also mentioned when UF assistant Hoss Adams bought him a Sprite and a pack of Juicy Fruit when the plane to take Dorminey back to Pensacola was late.
Florida got some of the harshest penalties ever handed out by the NCAA, which considered giving UF the death penalty. In reality, what went on at Florida paled in comparison to what was going on at other schools in the SEC, which went by the motto “Sure, Everybody Cheats” back in those days. Now we have NIL, which stands for “Now It’s Legal.” Charley Pell rolls over in his grave on a daily basis.
Friends of mine who write large checks to Southern Cal swear that if there had been cell phones back in 1980 Herschel Walker would have never gone to Georgia. They allege that John Robinson was on the tee at Bel Aire when Georgia gave Herschel’s dad a take-it-or-leave it offer, otherwise USC would have outbid UGa. Georgia did get caught by the NCAA for illegal recruiting of Herschel, but lost only two scholarships.
Duke basketball and Coach K, Carolina basketball and Roy Williams, Scott Frost and Nebraska football, Charley Pell and UF, Georgia football and Vince Dooley – all examples of selective enforcement of the rules by the NCAA. The sacred cows of the college sports world have nothing to worry about. Everybody else beware.
What happened today with Scott Frost is just one more example of why the revolution to ditch the NCAA can’t happen soon enough.
