SB Nation - Alex Ruoff

Heytvelt, Downs Workout for NBA Teams Today

Zach B — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 16:43:06 -0000

Micah Downs blocks North Carolina's Deon Thompson in the Sweet Sixteen. Today, Downs will be hoping to impress the Blazers. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)

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Like our loyal reader GUnit pointed out yesterday, Micah Downs will be working out with the Portland Trailblazers today. A late addition, Downs is replacing Tasmin Mitchell, the forward out of LSU. He will be working out with Chris Johnson also from LSU, Omri Casspi from Israel, Jerel McNeal from Marquette, Greivis Vasquez from Maryland, and Chinemelu Elonu from Texas A&M. Aside from Casspi, all the players working out for Portland today are probably guys that will be projected in the second round or undrafted. The good thing for the six working out today is that Portland has a lot of picks to throw around. While Portland will probably be looking for a point guard in the first round, Casspi could be worth selecting with the Blazers 24th pick. You'll be hearing Portland's name a lot in the second round as they have four picks (#33, #38, #55, #56). It'd be great to see Micah remain in the Pacific Northwest and get drafted by the Blazers. Hopefully his work out goes very well and make sure to check BlazersEdge throughout the day as their writers will be at the workout today.

Also working out today is Gonzaga center Josh Heytvelt. JH has been projected as a mid-to-late second round pick and the Milwaukee Bucks will be testing him out today along with five other prospects. Josh has, much like Austin Daye, had some very mixed reviews throughout the pre-draft process. He got some raves during the combine and people were enamored with his size since graduating. The most recent review of Josh, however, was not so glowing:

Speaking of Gonzaga, several GMs were ranting about big man Heytvelt. "He looked completely disinterested," one GM said. "He was awful. He had his teammates urging him to compete harder. It was weird."

That was from ESPN's Chad Ford who has been covering the workouts. This makes you wonder about Josh's passion for the game, especially since he no longer has the option to come back another year. These three weeks could become very crucial for Josh because he is a guy that some think could be an end of the first round type guy but could also drop out of the draft. Milwaukee has two picks in this year's draft. With the tenth overall pick, Josh will not be the pick but if he impresses them enough, he could fit in as the 41st selection. Joining Josh in today's workout is UCLA's Josh Shipp, Miami of Ohio's Michael Bramos, Alabama's Alonzo Gee, West Virginia's Alex Ruoff, and North Carolina State junior Brandon Costner.

We're Dancing: West Virginia Mountaineers

SFBE.MP — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 02:00:34 -0000

Location: Morgantown, WV

Enrollment: 28,113

Record: 23-11 (10-8)

Leading Scorers: Da'Sean Butler (17.3 ppg), Alex Ruoff (15.9 ppg), Devin Ebanks (10.4 ppg)

What to know:

West Virginia is carrying an RPI rating of 21 and the #10 strength of schedule, but hwo did they really do? The Mountaineers went 4-9 when battling the top 25 in the nation.
West Virginia did get the wins when they needed them most, making it to the Big East Semifinals with a major victory and confidence builder over the mighty Pittsburgh Panthers.
Rouff and Butler can play with anyone in the nation. Having swingmen like these keep the Mountaineers in every game.

Projected Performance: West Virginia gets a tough draw as a six seed with the spuratic Dayton Flyers. We think the Big East will prevail in this one and beyond that the bottom half of their bracket seems managable, with Kansas and Michigan State. We could see the Mountaineers go as deep as the Elite Eight.

Quick weekend thoughts

Mike Rutherford — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 14:31:26 -0000

We're too far removed from Saturday and too near the start of the Big East Tournament to do a full wrap on the West Virginia game, so let's just brush up on the main details.

1. My favorite part of Saturday was Jerry Smith jumping on T-Will's back as they headed into the locker room. Williams was pissed, Jerry knew he was pissed, and he still couldn't help himself.

The man was also a bit clutch down the stretch

2. Edgar Sosa made a handful of poor decisions with the ball, but his three to make it 51-48 and his three-point play to put us up four were two of the biggest plays of the game.

3. Having the benefit of knowing that we ultimately won the game, I'm almost glad that T-Will struggled so mightily from the line down the stretch. The man knows full well that he had a chance to put the Big East title on ice and didn't do it, and he'll bust his ass to make sure something like that never happens again.

4. Poor Alex Ruoff. No one's had a night of celebration turn so sour so quickly since Carrie.

5. If the picture below isn't your computer's background, you, my friend, have some serious issues to address.

6. I know it's a little late in the season to make any drastic strategic changes, but I would rather go small when Earl comes out of the game than bring in Swop (god love him). The man is simply trying to avoid screwing up at this point, and that puts us at a 4-on-5 offensive disadvantage whenever he's on the floor.

7. Preston Knowles.

8. This team played 18 games in one of the deepest conferences in recent memory and won 16 of them. A truly remarkable achievement that will sadly go largely overlooked due to the feverish pace of college basketball in March.

9. I know it's been said many times before, but it's unbelievable how much Terrence Jennings has improved since the beginning of the season. Who would have thunk he'd play this large a role in everything this team has been able to accomplish?

10. With so many Big East teams losing so much next season, it's concievable that West Virginia - with all its young talent - could be where we are 12 months from now.

11. Dick Vitale is annoying and often mistaken.

12. I love this team.

Kentucky 54, West Virgina 43: Post mortem

Truzenzuzex — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 07:42:02 -0000

Congratulations to the West Virginia Mountaineers for a hard fought game that Kentucky was fortunate to win.

I must confess, I did not think UK could pull this off. West Virginia looked like world beaters against an obviously inferior Iowa Hawkeyes team. Yet, that same Iowa team managed to pull out a last-second victory over what seemed to me as a clearly superior Kansas State team. Such is college basketball.

Kentucky came into this game with the clearly tougher road. Barely squeaking by the K-State Wildcats last night, the Kentucky version was obviously tired and energy-depleted, and it really showed in the first half , where the Mountaineers physically dominated Kentucky and took a 10-point lead into the locker room.

The first seven minutes of the second half were more of the same. then, at about the 13:00 mark with the 'Cats down ten, something happened. Kentucky sullenly caught a second wind, and the Mountaineers obviously hit a wall. UK began sending Huggin's charges back onto defense after repeated empty possessions. Not only that, but the Mountaineers began to foul UK over and over again, and it was that foul disparity that would eventually make the difference. WVU kept sending UK's best free-throw shooters to the line, and Kentucky made them.

I can't tell you how exciting it was to sit among so many of the Big Blue Faithful so far away from home. You have all heard that Kentucky travels well, but until you have experienced the camaraderie of a UK tournament on the road, you really have no understanding of the concept. It was life-changing for me, and both me and my wife have vowed to do it again as soon as practicable.

As far as the game went, here are my perceptions:

Evidently, Liggins and Gillispie are back on the same page. Liggins was teriffic tonight, and a big reason why UK won, both offensively and defensively.
Jodie Meeks, despite being obviously leg-weary and less than 100%, never gave up. In fact, at the end of the second half, he really shone through on defense.
Josh Harrellson was, next to Jodie Meeks, probably the MVP of the tournament. Patrick Patterson had a good game tonight, but Harrellson was everywhere, and absolutely played as hard as any player I have seen all year.
Michael Porter once again gave a good effort, but he is nowhere near as talented as Liggins, and that made all the difference.
Perry Stevenson continues to play very passively except on defense. He had a number of emphatic blocks during this tournament, but did very little to help the team on offense.
Ramon Harris played OK. He is definitely capable of better.
Darrius Miller did a great job on Ruoff, particularly in the second half.
UK really needs to learn to get a step or two closer before trying that lob pass into the post.
Free throw shooting was the difference in this game.
At the end of the game, UK looked like the fresher team. I would never have believed that given their trials of last night.
The lack of layoff clearly showed in Meeks' shooting.
Patrick Patterson needs to familiarize himself with the two-handed slam.

That's it for now. Add your comments in.