Kentucky Wildcats Morning Quickies: John Wall Does "Taken" Edition

This is just too awesome for words. Hat tip: SB Nation:

Tweet of the Morning

Tom Izzo plays Jingle Bells on his accordion. https://t.co/fIowVQjik7

— Kevin Pauga (@KevinPauga) December 16, 2014

Hat tip: John Clay.

Your Quickies:

Kentucky football

• Wildcat Blue Nation writes that big recruits are a real possibility for Mark Stoops. Indeed they are.

Kentucky basketball

• Ira Combs on Kentucky’s unique ride:

  Other than a matchup between UK – UL in the NCAA title game the next best scenario would be meeting in the regular season as unbeatens at # 1 and # 2 . That scenario has come about as close to happening this year as any time in the past but to come true U-Conn has to bump Duke from # 2 on Dec. 21st then UNLV must bump Arizona from # 3 on Dec. 23rd . I doubt either will happen but then again I never thought I’d live long enough to see the day Gardner Webb would be UK in Rupp Arena .

  Don’t say “Gardner Webb” to me, Ira. That’s almost equivalent to profanity. I had almost forgotten about it, and now I have to suffer a memory relapse. I had almost convinced myself that it was a delusion.

• Kentucky is really pushing hard for Stephen Zimmerman. Quite a battle shaping up for him.

  Also, Calipari is searching for his 2016 point guard.

Other Kentucky sports

• Alexis Jennings named SEC Freshman of the Week.

• In case you missed it, Bria Goss has broken a finger and will miss about 6 weeks.

Links posts

• The Leach Report: Tuesday Wildcat Links

• John Clay’s Big Blue Links

• John Clay’s SEC Links

College football

• Heh. Joe Nocera commenting on sports is like me commenting on world economics:

  "Our board is totally committed to athletics and competing at the highest level," said Chris May, the athletic director at Saint Louis University. "We are going to be very aggressive."

  I wonder if it escaped his attention that St. Louis doesn’t have a football team?

  Look, I don’t really care if some mid-majors drop football. If a college thinks that’s the best thing for them, well, who am I to gainsay them? For every one of them, there is likely to be a Division II school that decides it wants to be a mid-major. Circle of life, hakuna matata, all that.

  So I guess, despite the flaws in his article, I actually agree with Nocera’s main point. Football does’t have to define a university, and despite his awkward inclusion of St. Louis, they are a perfectly fine example of just that.

• Heh. Dan Mullen goes off on his defensive staff, so they took a powder for Florida.

• Ohio State leads the nation in fan attendance. For football, of course. There’s lots more in this piece, also.

College basketball

• Duke beats basketball powerhouse Elon, but it wasn’t exactly according to Hoyle. Nonetheless, SI’s descent into Dookie hyperbole is spectacular. Consider this title: “Jahlil Okafor’s big night against Elon hints at historic Duke greatness”

  Really, dude? Historic? Oh, dear. So soon we forget Grant Hill and Christian Laettner.

  Here’s a look at the Duke box from KenPom, with a couple of pithy comments.
  

  

Other sports news

• How the Browns sabotaged Johnny Manziel’s first start. The writer apparently thinks Manziel should have had more designed runs. Tim Tebow, anyone?

Other news

• More reasons why indoor tanning beds are bad for you.

• Asking the important questions: Is it time to change your olive oil?