Now it makes sense why the Lamplighter was a basketball team hangout… I did not start going there until the Frieder days. Not sure if Orr still owned it then. My best memory of the Lamplighter was following the 1987 season finale at Crisler when we blew out Purdue. Purdue was ranked #3 and Michigan, at 16-11 and on a two game losing streak, was a huge underdog. After the game, my friend and I were having a pizza at the Lamplighter and in walked Bill Frieder, who probably had a beer or two following the game (who could blame him, we were celebrating too). He walked right up to our table and yelled “Hey Garde!” with a huge smile on his face. My friend, who did have a passing resemblance to Garde Thompson, had to tell Bill to head a few tables further back in the restaurant. My friend and I still have an occasional chuckle about that encounter. I always think fondly about Bill Frieder when I think about that one too. It gave a personality to a guy we only saw on the sidelines.
A great place, no question. At it was on Liberty. Great Pizza… The owner was a Greek guy when I was there. His name was Thanos, I guess… He ran the place with his wife… Across from his shop towards west, there was another pizza place owned by Greeks. I forgot the excact name. I think it had pizza, or something like that. A bit classier than the Lamplighter, but it was not a good hangout.
The thing I remember vividly was that there was always a pitcher of coca cola on their table that Thanos kept filling all the time. Not sure it was an NCAA violation :). Rice was a newcomer when I was about to graduate.
Griffin off to Syracuse.
Bucknell PG Jimmy Soto just committed to OSU. He isn’t a grad transfer so unless he gets a waiver (unlikely as of now according to 11Warriors), he’ll sit out next year. In his 3 years at Bucknell he never cracked an ORTG of 100.8 and last year had a 98 ORTG on 22% USG.
Holtman loves transfers, seems like osu is in on pretty much every transfer.
Bryce Aiken is announcing tomorrow at 1PM.
I’m going to interpret this as DDJ leaving being the impetus he needed to announce his decision to go to Michigan.
I didn’t see this yesterday…
Put this in another thread, but it probably belongs here. Grad transfers, sit-outs, mid-years, guys who sat out last year and are eligible this year. Four categories and plenty of movement between them given waivers and whatnot. It’s dizzying.
That brief Haarms article is interesting in a few ways. Painter apparently had no idea that Haarms was even considering leaving, which makes me wonder how often a coach is completely caught off guard by a transfer decision. Will kids typically discuss their situations with a coach prior to deciding whether to transfer? I’m guessing that most kids would not do that.
Purdue had scheduled a game in the Netherlands on their upcoming August trip (since cancelled) so that Haarms could play a game in his home country.
Haarms sees himself as having a “NBA skillset”. What am I missing?
If Christopher comes, I think it would help Eli’s case to be the starting PG. Christopher would be the primary ball handler while Eli would be the off-guard, but still assuming the starting PG role as a defender.
Another random thought: it is really impressive to me that Mike Smith is close to 50% on two point FGs, considering the difficulty of the shots he takes, judging from highlights. His 3pt% isn’t too bad either for a guy taking a lot of contested, off the bounce shots. From what some people were saying, I was thinking he had Geo Baker like percentages. With all of that said, I still wouldn’t be surprised if Zeb plays more than him next year (given they’re both on the team of course), due to his athletic advantage and what that would mean on defense.
As been stated many times before its usually determined by who you defend not who handles the ball most.
If Michigan ends up losing Livers or Todd and an additional scholarship opens up, I’d love for Michigan to go and get a sit out transfer. Bienemy would be an awesome sit out addition. Highly doubt he’d leave the Texas region but still.
Beilein recruited him out of high school right?
Very hard.
From a player perspective, I figure next season would be a great one to sit out with so much that’s uncertain.
UNCG sticks out there, wonder why they’re the lone non-power conference team in the list. His length would be interesting in TTUs defensive scheme.