ESPN Men's Basketball

1. The NCAA offered up an explanation as to why there can be a difference between the Memphis-Derrick Rose and Duke-Lance Thomas case when the person in question chooses not to cooperate and talk to the NCAA. According to NCAA spokesperson Stacey Osburn, if there is more information to allow the enforcement staff to allege a major violation through information gathered then it can go forward. Osburn said if there is a case in which there is no other information to suggest a violation without cooperation then the case cannot go forward. "You can't tell someone you violated a rule if they're not a member of the NCAA or if there is no other evidence to suggest a rule was broken. If there was a major violation there has to be evidence. It can't just be he said/she said. If you have folks who have information and they haven't said anything like an agent or a jeweler they don't fall under NCAA rules. So they don't have to talk to you. If they're no longer a student athlete they don't have to, either unless the school says it will disassociate you from the school. We don't have the subpoena power so we can only do so much." Translate: The NCAA claims it had other evidence in the Rose-Memphis standardized test case (it ultimately forced Memphis to vacate the 2008 Final Four) without talking to Rose but didn't have anything else in the Thomas case and never got Thomas to talk.

2. Harvard made my early-season Top 25 and with good reason. The Crimson beat New Mexico in the round of 64. The assumption was the two best players -- who were suspended for the year with a number of other students from the general student body over an academic scandal -- would be returning next season. Harvard coach Tommy Amaker said Wednesday that Brandyn Curry and Kyle Casey will be back as expected. That was always the plan but there could have been a hiccup with neither player being on campus during the past year. Harvard has a few high-profile games next season with the series continuing against UConn and a return games against UMass and Boston College. The Crimson are in the Great Alaska Shootout, a tournament that has waned in importance recently. But the 2013 field is decent with a few teams that could end up in the NCAAs in 2014 like Iowa, Denver, Indiana State and Tulsa. TCU, Pepperdine and host Alaska-Anchorage are the other three in the field.

3. Miami coach Jim Larranaga said he'll know in a few weeks who might be his replacement for Shane Larkin at the point. But he now knows who will be the lead guard in the fall of 2014 with the arrival of Kansas State transfer guard Angel Rodriguez. There's always a chance Rodriguez will appeal to play immediately since he wanted to be closer to his family in Puerto Rico. Meanwhile, Georgia coach Mark Fox said he has the player ready to take over for his early-entrant sophomore and leading scorer Kentavious Caldwell-Pope. Fox said freshman Kenny Gaines, who averaged 3.7 points or almost 15 fewer than Caldwell-Pope, would take over. "He had many solid nights as his backup (last year)," said Fox. "He's a good player."

I know, I know.

More Kentucky hype. Enough is enough already, right?

Well ... no.

John Calipari has signed five of the top-9 prospects in America (Julius Randle, Aaron Harrison, Andrew Harrison, Dakari Johnson and James Young), according to RecruitingNation. And Marcus Lee is one of six McDonald’s All-Americans in that class. Plus, Alex Poythress, Kyle Wiltjer and Willie Cauley-Stein will return.

That’s just ridiculous. And consensus No. 1 prep talent Andrew Wiggins ... gulp ... might choose the Wildcats, too.

Yes, Kentucky will be the No. 1 team in America once preseason rankings are released in the coming months. I don’t understand any arguments against that.

But, we won’t have to wait too long to see if these Wildcats will justify the preseason buzz.

On Wednesday afternoon, the school released its nonconference schedule through its Twitter feed.

John Calipari teased the slate with this tweet: “It's once again an elite schedule, but that's the standard here. It looks like we'll play several top teams.”

That’s no overstatement.

Here are the highlights (Yes, we knew about some of these games months ago):

Kentucky vs. Michigan State (Chicago), Nov. 12: Whoa. So, we might see the top two squads in the country compete against one another in the State Farm Champions Classic in Chicago, huh? We know what Kentucky has. But the Spartans are going to be a force, too. With Adreian Payne and Gary Harris returning, Tom Izzo has a team with Final Four potential. How will the Big Ten contenders handle this young Kentucky crew that’s packed with NBA talent? We’ll see.

Kentucky vs. Robert Morris (Lexington), Nov. 17: The Wildcats clearly want payback for last year’s embarrassing NIT loss. The Wildcats commenced last season with a national ranking. They ended last season with a first-round NIT loss against Robert Morris. It was a fitting conclusion for last year’s disaster. But this is not last year’s team. Pay attention to the pregame buzz. Calipari and Co. will say that this is “just another game.” And then they’ll go out there and try to beat the Colonials by 50.

Kentucky vs. Baylor (Arlington), Dec. 6: I’ve been pumped about this one since it was announced last year. It will be held at Cowboys Stadium. That helps. Projections for Baylor changed recently when both Cory Jefferson and Isaiah Austin announced that they will return for another season. That makes this matchup more intriguing. The venue has fueled most of the hype. But Kentucky should be on upset alert entering this matchup.

Kentucky at North Carolina (Chapel Hill), Dec. 14: Wiggins could be a factor in this matchup. The Canadian standout could choose either school. But even if he doesn’t, this is still a high-profile battle. Last season, the Tar Heels failed to achieve the results that the program has historically produced under Roy Williams. They had matchup problems throughout the season because they didn’t have the inside-outside balance they’ll possess in 2013-14. But incoming freshmen Isaiah Hicks and Kennedy Meeks should give Williams such much-needed size and enhance their chances of defeating the Wildcats. And Chapel Hill will be on fire with anticipation for this game.

Kentucky vs. Louisville (Lexington), Dec. 28: You don’t really need an introduction for this one. We all know about the rivalry. But right now, the Cardinals are kings. They’re the national champs. And they’re returning some of the key players who fueled that title run. But the game returns to Lexington in 2013-14. The Wildcats just weren’t on Louisville’s level last season. This, however, should be a more competitive matchup than last season’s meeting. And again, we’re talking about a pair of squads that might be ranked first and second in the preseason rankings. Get your popcorn ready.

There is a small part of your humble author that wishes that headline was about basketball programs finally fighting back against German apparel company adidas for foisting horrific uniforms in an attempt to troll college basketball fans for "buzz" every March and early April. It is not. The good news, however, is that some schools are standing up to adidas for something far more serious -- an ongoing dispute about worker compensation in one of its factories in Indonesia.

ESPN.com sports business reporter Kristi Dosh reported this week that 17 schools have suspended their contracts with adidas after a report by the Workers' Rights Consortium alleging that 2,800 workers at PT Kizone -- an Indonesian factory where adidas, Nike and the Dallas Cowboys all had manufacturing contracts -- were not compensated when the factory faced work suspensions, surprise closings, its owner's sudden flight from Indonesia, repurchase and eventual bankruptcy. WRC and other workers' advocacy groups are claiming that while Nike and the Cowboys have made partial payments, adidas has steadfastly refused it owes workers any money.

As Dosh reported, beginning last fall, Cornell, Rutgers, Washington, Georgetown, University of Montana, Santa Clara University, College of William and Mary, Northeastern University, Temple University and Washington State terminated their contracts with the company. Others have told adidas they would not renew when their contracts expired, Wisconsin has sued with the assistance of the state attorney general, and Penn State has given adidas a 60-day timeline to rectify the situation. From Kristi (my emphasis in bold):

Not all of these schools have their athletics apparel contract with adidas. Some only have licensing agreements for merchandise sold in campus bookstores and through other retailers. However, a growing number of universities who have exclusive all-sport contracts with adidas, such as Wisconsin and Michigan, began to give ultimatums and threaten contract termination over the past month.

Not coincidentally, that’s when things took a turn for the better for the former PT Kizone workers. Last week, just days after adidas participated in a conference call with Michigan and neared the end of Michigan’s 45-day cure period, adidas announced a settlement. The agreement is confidential, but a press release from the former PT Kizone workers states, “the former workers will receive a substantial sum from adidas.”

The situation is not entirely settled; adidas is still claiming a different version of the events from the WRC, which argues that adidas goods were made in the factory as late as November 2010, two months after the first compensation violations occurred. And there is much more context and information included in Kristi's report. Go read it.

It really is a fascinating story.

For one, like suicides at Apple-producing Foxconn factories in China and the deaths of dozens in a Bangladeshi garment factory collapse last week, it's a reminder of the way globalization allows us to ignore how the things we wear are made and distributed. (We didn't like to see how the sausage was made -- literally -- at the turn of the last century, either.)

That is more general, but there's a specific collegiate sports lesson here, too: Maybe the universities that take huge sums of money for all-sport contracts from Nike and adidas don't have to be totally beholden to their corporate overlords after all.

It's one thing to recognize that your profoundly ugly replica uniforms are made in steamy conditions in Indonesia, and maybe that's an acknowledged fact of the modern global economy. (It might be unfathomable to Americans, but in many countries sweatshops are a godsend). It's another to see something so basic -- allegations by a respected academic non-profit that your corporate partner was nickle-and-diming Indonesian workers -- and decide to build real pressure around the cause of getting those people the pay they probably deserve. Why, it's enough to make even the grumpiest college sports skeptic momentarily optimistic.

It also, by the way, reaffirms my belief that we need to organize a Fans' Rights Consortium, a group devoted to stopping the spread of hideous trolling uniforms each and every spring. Rise up, people! Rise up!

Rick Pitino loves horses. Last season he started a new custom in his hobby of naming horses for his own Louisville players. The honor was first bestowed last summer to Peyton Siva ("Siva") and Gorgui Dieng ("Dieng"), which was followed by "Russdiculous," a colt named after Louisville leading scorer and national player of the year candidate Russ Smith back before Smith was known less for those qualities and more for his quirky, endearing personality.

Now Pitino has apparently added another Cardinal-themed horse to the stable, this one named after the hero of Louisville's two 2013 Final Four wins: Luke Hancock.

As Pitino explained in a pre-Derby news conference this week, the horse's name is "Three-Point Luke." (My editors would quibble with the spelling, as they prefer "3-point." But we'll relitigate that argument another day.) Pitino didn't actually name the horse this time around. The name came from trainer Dennis O'Neill. You can watch the Pitino video here, and it's actually kind of interesting -- he draws parallels between the confidence required to succeed in basketball and in riding horses.

Which brings us, of course, to this weekend, when a horse Pitino partially owns -- Goldencents, won the Santa Anita Derby the same weekend he led his Louisville Cardinals to the national title -- will attempt to capture the most prestigious win in all of horse racing. His jockey, Kevin Krigger, is extremely confident about Goldencents:

"We're not just looking at the Kentucky Derby winner, but a Triple Crown winner," Krigger said. "I've looked at all the Triple Crown threats, and I haven't seen a horse that I'm worried about. I'll tell you what's going to happen. We're going to win the Kentucky Derby, and we'll find out the fractions at the end of the race."

"It's almost like [Brandon] Jennings, who said [the Milwaukee Bucks] were going to beat the Miami Heat in five," Pitino told reporters. "You want your people thinking that way. You want your people thinking as winners."

Pitino also told reporters he'll be watching the Derby while "on his 17th mint julep." As a former attendee of the Derby, let me just say: That's thinking like a winner.

Dave Telep and Paul Biancardi recap some of the top classes in 2013 college basketball recruiting.

Yesterday, former Wisconsin-Green Bay player Ryan Bross went public with a complaint his parents sent to UWGB accusing coach Brian Wardle of abuse, including the use of a homophobic slur and an instance in which Wardle and his staff allegedly forced Bross to vacate his bowels from extensive preseason "boot camp" training. Another former player, Brennan Cougill, and his mother submitted a similar complaint to university president Thomas Harden in early April, and the school has long since opened an internal investigation with no current timetable for completion.

In a somewhat unusual twist Tuesday afternoon -- unusual because players don't typically address situations like these to the public, let alone on open radio -- two of Wardle's current team leaders, Alec Brown and Keifer Sykes, talked to local Green Bay radio hosts Maino and Nick. Both players refuted claims made by Bross and Cougill. Sykes said the "context" of the incidents was "skewed"; Brown went so far as to argue Bross and Cougill were lying.

Another day has brought another set of public accusations: On Wednesday, Cougill told Green Bay Press-Gazette writer Rob Demovsky -- to whom Bross initially went public -- that both players were wrong, that they couldn't have seen what Bross was accusing Wardle of:

Cougill, however, said neither Brown nor Sykes were in the same running group as Bross during the October training session that took place on the hills near campus. Cougill said the group included Bross, freshman Nick Arenz and himself. When Bross dropped out because he defecated himself, the rest of the group continued to run, and the other groups were not nearby, said Cougill, whose mother also filed a complaint against Wardle.

It was at that point Bross said Wardle ridiculed him ... Cougill said when Bross dropped out, the rest of the players kept running, leaving Bross alone with Wardle.

“Ryan went back in the woods to take care of his business, and I can vouch no one else ever went back there with Ryan except for Wardle,” Cougill said.

This is pretty weird, right? As I wrote yesterday, the independent investigator will have to sort all of this out for himself, and Green Bay's institutional staff is already on high alert, well aware, in our post-Mike Rice world, of how carefully and thoroughly allegations of coach mistreatment should be treated. It's no use to speculate, but let's say this: At least one person is wrong. I have no idea why players and their parents would falsify accounts against a former coach, as Brown alleged, and an attempt to tarnish a program out of some sort of strange vendetta doesn't strike me as a very good reason. Why not just move on? Or, conversely, if these things are false or even exaggerated, why? What's the motivation?

This is college basketball; you honestly never know. It seems UWGB's independent investigator is in an immensely unenviable position.

All week long, we're taking an in-depth look at the 2013-14 season. On Wednesday, my colleague Myron Medcalf and I met at our proverbial Watercooler to discuss the incoming freshmen we're most looking forward to watching on something other than YouTube next fall:

Myron: A few years ago, I attended a Junior Olympic team tryout in Colorado Springs. I watched (Jabari) Parker for four or five days and couldn't believe how fluid and disciplined he was at that age. He's obviously evolved since that time. No player in this class has had a bigger target on their back. He has played in Chicago. Now, he's going to Duke. And the expectations for his first (and only) year on the collegiate scene are sky high.

I really believe he's equipped to meet them. Parker can create his shot. He's smart. He just gets buckets. And you know Coach K is going to mold him into a better defender.

You live in Chicago, man. Should I really be this excited about Parker?

Eamonn: Let me dive right in and answer your question: I think so.

Parker has lost a little bit of the luster he had as a sophomore and junior at Simeon for a couple of plain reasons: He suffered an injury that took him a little longer to recover from than he anticipated this past season. It also kept him from playing against Andrew Wiggins on the AAU circuit last summer, when Wiggins, who was still a class below Parker, basically shut the whole thing down. Wiggins later reclassified to the current class, rapidly took Parker's No. 1 spot in 2013, and everyone's attention span sort of shifted -- one "next" LeBron James rapidly replaced by another.

Don't get me wrong: Wiggins is that dude. But as we'll discuss, this class isn't really the kind where you should worry about the No. 1 or No. 2 player -- or where they're ranked and what that means for their future -- because by all accounts the class of 2013 includes a wide swath of NBA talents. Parker is obviously one of them.

Read our entire Watercooler here.

Dave Telep and Paul Biancardi recap the final 2013 rankings for college basketball recruiting.

1. Wisconsin-Green Bay spokesperson Christopher Sampson said Tuesday that the lesson the school learned from the Rutgers case when there are allegations of mistreatment against a coach is that the story goes national. But UWGB has already done something Rutgers didn't and should have immediately -- take the investigation out of the school's hands. When the results are in from the independent investigation, led by a local attorney, then it will be much harder to refute the results if everyone involved has cooperated in talking to the investigator and all evidence has been examined. Rutgers made the major mistake of only examining the charges within Rutgers last fall. The penalties -- if there are any -- should be decided by the president and athletic director. But to put the parents at ease of a fair investigation by using a third party, the issue has a chance to be treated appropriately. This will also help coach Brian Wardle if he is exonerated since it would come from a third party without any agenda to either save or hurt his job status.

2. The Lance Thomas case involving how the former Duke player received a loan to purchase jewelry while a senior in 2009-10 had no chance with the NCAA when the key people involved -- Thomas and a jeweler -- decided not to talk to the NCAA. This has always been the issue with the NCAA. The only people who are "forced" to talk to them are those who still are employed by an NCAA institution and players who still have eligibility remaining. In this case, having a third party of an experienced attorney or professional investigator may not have mattered, either, since Thomas and the jeweler wouldn't have been under any legal obligation to talk. Still, it would have helped perception for the NCAA if the attempt was made by an independent body. If the NCAA is going to regain its credibility, then using a third party, out of NCAA headquarters, to conduct investigations might make more sense. There is a larger extra benefit issue here at stake that may need to be addressed of whether or not it's OK for players to be treated differently in securing loans or product because of who they are as long as everything is done legally. This is an ongoing fluid topic about whether or not an athlete can be treated differently for what they do for the university.

3. The new American Athletic Conference is close to securing the Mohegan Sun Casino arena, home to the WNBA's Connecticut Sun, for the women's basketball tournament in 2014. But the American Athletic Conference isn't interested apparently in making it a home for the men's tournament. Instead, sites like the XL Center in Hartford, FedEx Forum in Memphis and facilities in Cincinnati, Tampa and the Palestra in Philadelphia are being considered. Bids are being accepted and a decision is forthcoming in the coming weeks. UConn athletic director Warde Manuel said the 9,000 seats would probably be too small for the men's event in the hope that it could grow beyond that at a place like the XL Center. But the new conference needs a destination site and the Mohegan Sun could offer that for fans, akin to those who go to Las Vegas sites at the MGM for the Pac-12 and the Orleans Arena for the WCC. The American Athletic Conference needs to make the right call here in the hope that this tournament can grow. It will have the advantage of Louisville fans flooding the site for 2014, but then won't have the Cardinal faithful in 2015 and beyond. So making a long-term choice that will be a destination for fans is critical.

ESPN.com has learned efforts are underway to tip off the upcoming basketball season with a multigame event featuring some of the nation's top teams at the American Airlines Center in Dallas -- just 20 minutes from the site of the 2014 Final Four.

The one-day event -- which could feature as many as four games -- would be run by bd Global, the same group that put on last season's Texas-UCLA game in Houston. Details are still being finalized, so bd Global president Brooks Downing declined to name potential participants.

"We're still tying up some loose ends," Downing told ESPN.com, "but hopefully we'll be able to announce something soon."

Downing did acknowledge that as many as half the participants could be from Big 12 schools (such as Baylor, Texas or Oklahoma State, for example), which have large fan bases in or near the Dallas area. The rest of the teams would be nationally known programs from outside the region.

"We want this to serve as the tipoff to the season," Downing said. "The plan is to generate a lot of excitement and hype about college basketball in the city that's hosting the Final Four."

The 2014 Final Four will be played at Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Texas, just 18 miles from Dallas.

If the November event is a success, Downing said bd Global likely will stage something similar each fall in the city slated to host the Final Four. The 2015 Final Four will be in Indianapolis before shifting to Houston in 2016.

This is what happens when the NCAA can't force anyone to talk about an enforcement case: The case withers on the vine until its slow, quiet death. And so ends the saga of Lance Thomas.

In September of 2012, New York-based jeweler Rafaello & Co. (not to be confused with Jean Ralphio) sued Thomas, a forward on Duke's 2010 national title team, for failing to repay a 2009 purchase of $67,800 in high-end jewelry, which he was loaned when Thomas made a $30,000 cash down payment at the store, according to the court complaint discovered by the Associated Press.

Much speculation abounded: Did Thomas get a considerable amount of credit from a jeweler-to-the-stars because he played for Duke? And how did drop off $30,000 in cash, exactly? The pitchforks came out immediately. Here was pristine and widely derided Duke with a potential jewelry scandal on its hands. It didn't look good. The only problem: Neither the jeweler nor Thomas had any reason to talk to the NCAA, and the NCAA no legal or institutional mandate to compel such discussions. If everyone kept their mouths shut, the whole thing would probably go away.

On Tuesday, Duke made the NCAA's announcement for it. The whole thing has gone away:

“The NCAA has found no evidence of a rules violation in this situation based on the information available, and both the NCAA and Duke consider the matter closed,” Duke associate athletic director Jon Jackson said in a statement.

"Based on the information available" is the key phrase, because it's pretty obvious that there was no information available. And not necessarily because the whole thing was on the up and up. Merely because no one had to talk, so no one did, and the NCAA presumably had nothing on which to base a detailed investigation. And it's not like the organization is flush with enforcement staff these days anyway. Still, Thomas had indicated at various points that he wanted to clear the air, and was willing speak with the NCAA. At some point, that changed.

It would be tempting to lash out at the infamous perception of unfair NCAA enforcement, the pervasive notion that the organization won't touch its few sacred cows -- Duke being perhaps the most sacred of all. That doesn't seem to apply here. Instead, the discussion should be about an NCAA enforcement group that, for all its supposed power, can't get a jeweler and an NBA player to talk about a blatantly questionable $100,000 jewelry purchase so long as neither of the accused parties is a current student-athlete. And why would they?

WNFL Radio in Green Bay has audio of an interview with forward Alec Brown, who defended Wisconsin-Green Bay coach Brian Wardle against allegations of player abuse leveled at him this month by the parents of former players. UWGB has launched an internal investigation into the matter, which received even more public attention Tuesday afternoon, after former player Ryan Bross outlined his complaints to the Green Bay Press-Gazette.

Brown is one of two players who openly defended Wardle on the radio Tuesday, saying the team wouldn't hesitate to bring its dissatisfactions to the coaching staff. He likewise accused his fellow players of lying:

"Honestly, I don't agree with the things that are being said," Brown told WNFL. "I've been there the longest of any of the guys, and I feel like if I had personally seen any of this happening, I wouldn't still be here. A lot of this stuff is not happening the way it seems that it is."

When asked what has surprised him the most about the situation, Brown said:

"Just the way that some ... I don't ... the way that some players viewed certain situations. And like, the way they can lie about some things is just amazing because of some of these guys were really close to us, teammates, like brothers."

When asked if he ever saw anything that went "over the line," Brown said he didn't "believe so." When asked if he thought his former teammates were lying, he said "Yes, I believe so."

Team captain Keifer Sykes also joined the Maino and Nick Show Tuesday afternoon, and he was just as effusive in his frustration and confusion.

"It was just shocking that all this came about because everyone knows Coach has our best interests in mind, he never did anything to abuse anyone. This is crazy.

"I mean, clearly the guys making these allegations are not in the program anymore. I guess when you leave they wanted to tear it down. But the truth will come out. In every situation it was 20 people there. Some people who are writing letters were never even around when anything or any of those allegations happened. The truth should come out and it should all play itself out."

When asked whether the most graphic situation Bross describes -- when he allegedly vacated his bowels during a preseason "boot camp" running drill -- did in fact happen, Sykes responded:

"It happened, when he voided himself, but the context is definitely skewed. I was there the whole time trying to motivate him to keep going. He was given the option to stop or keep going. He decided to keep going. No one made anyone do anything. He's a grown man.

"He was given the option. He was being a team guy and he didn't want to quit, I was there the whole time trying to motivate him. … That was by far the hardest drill we did all year and the context was definitely skewed. It's just crazy that someone could say that.

On April 16, Wisconsin-Green Bay coach Brian Wardle was the subject of a formal complaint sent to the university chancellor by the parent of a basketball player. Gina Cougill, mother of senior forward Brennan Cougill, wrote a scathing letter to chancellor Thomas Harden accusing Wardle of "bullying most of the players," including her son, whom Gina Cougill said suffered from depression. She accused Wardle of dismissing depression as a "distraction."

It was news, bad news -- the school barely had time to open an internal investigation before a copy of the letter was shared with the Green Bay Press-Gazette -- but the Cougills weren't even the first family to accuse Wardle of mistreatment. In fact, the parents of former center Ryan Bross were the first to file a complaint with Harden's office. Their complaint wasn't made public, though, so whatever damage it could wreak on Wardle's reputation, if the allegations are true, for the moment was deferred.

That moment is over. Today, Bross made his own complaints public to the Press-Gazette's Rob Demovsky, and they aren't pretty -- literally or figuratively. They include allegations that Wardle used anti-gay and other derogatory slurs; told Bross to have sex with a girl to improve his performance; and ugliest of all, this story about a preseason workout drill known as "boot camp":

"Coach Wardle told me to stop being a p---- and to go into the woods," Bross told the Press-Gazette. "So I went into the woods and took a crap. I came back and he was like, 'Are you all done? Are you OK? Are you done being a p---- now, Ryan?' because they thought I was faking it, but I wasn't. So I kept running the hills. I finished one hill. I came back down, and I told them I was not feeling well again, and (Wardle) made me run another hill again because he told me that I was being a baby and that I was letting down the team and I was letting down myself, and that I was letting down everyone."

Bross continued: "I got down to the bottom (of the hill), and Wardle told me I was a piece of s--- and that he had never seen such a big p---- in his life and that I was the biggest piece of s--- he had ever seen."

It is important to note that Wardle issued a statement to the Press-Gazette, calling the version of the events in the newspaper "inaccurate":

"I can assure you the well-being of my players is foremost in my mind at all times," he said. "I cannot comment on the specific allegations under federal privacy laws. I can say the version of events [the Press-Gazette is] reporting is inaccurate. I have fully cooperated with the Independent Investigator, as have our players and coaches. I fully expect the eyewitnesses to these allegations you are reporting will contradict the version you are reporting."

It is also worth noting again that these are all merely allegations, and it is now the job of Harden and his independent investigator to get to the bottom of them. We don't know what is true in the complaints filed by Cougill and Bross.

But we do know this: Former Rutgers coach Mike Rice changed the game. For coaches and administrators everywhere, there is now zero room for lapses in oversight, no forgiveness from the public for physical and verbal abuse. There's even a tendency -- if not an outright willingness -- to react on behalf of players being treated poorly by an overzealous coach. Whether any of this new paradigm will apply to Wardle and Wisconsin-Green Bay remains to be seen, but the stakes are high.

There are plenty of "sponsored" arenas in college basketball; it's not like college basketball is immune to the crass commercialization that once gave us Enron Field. Still, the Illinois' athletic department's Monday release -- that the school had signed a 30-year, $60 million deal to rename Assembly Hall the State Farm Center instead -- was a bit surprising. From the school:

A 30-year, $60-million agreement changes the name of the building to State Farm Center as the structure undergoes a major renovation project that is scheduled for completion in the fall of 2016.

"We are extremely proud to announce this relationship with State Farm, one of the most respected corporate brands in the world," Illinois Director of Athletics Mike Thomas said. "State Farm has been an outstanding partner for the University of Illinois for more than two decades, and this agreement will carry that partnership forward for at least three more. The Assembly Hall is one of the most recognizable structures in the nation and, at 50 years of age, has served the UI campus, community and Central Illinois very well. This agreement will ensure State Farm Center will serve those same constituents, and even more, for many years to come."

That statement is total PR-speak, obviously, but it does bring up a valid point: State Farm is a local Illinois company based just an hour northwest of Champaign in Bloomington, Ill., so there is a local tie between the two entities. And as one Illinois fan at the Champaign Room commented, "... Assembly Hall is just a name and a boring one at that." It's also a name the Illini have awkwardly shared with Indiana for decades. This deal changes the branding, or at least makes things slightly less confusing.

My only surprise? Thirty years for $60 million. That doesn't seem like a whole lot of money, does it? I suppose the free market has spoken, but at this point Big Ten teams can find $2 million a year stuffed in the couch cushions of league headquarters. That's not really an exaggeration: In June 2012, commissioner Jim Delany announced the conference would disperse $284 million of network revenue, TV rights money, and NCAA tournament earnings to its 12 teams. Why would any team need to sell its arena name for $2 million a year for 30 years? Will Assembly Hall -- erm, the State Farm Center -- even be there in 30 years?! That building is charming and as loud as any place in the country, but I can answer that question: No. It won't. Pending renovation or not, it's old.

Still, the prevailing response from most Illinois fans seems to be "meh," and besides, those of us in Chicago are already used to defiantly refusing to call our major buildings by new names. (Don't you dare call it the Willis Tower.) So I suppose you might as well make a little money, right?

(Hat tip: Jeff Eisenberg)

1. Baylor coach Scott Drew could have had a myriad problems had he lost Cory Jefferson and Isaiah Austin to the NBA draft. Instead, Drew's primary offseason focus is what to do at the point. He has plenty of time to discuss, dissect and analyze over the summer, but his first inkling is to go with a combination of Gary Franklin and Brady Heslip to offset the departure of Pierre Jackson. Other options for Drew are Kenny Chery, a newcomer, or L.J. Rose, who was on the team last season. This is a critical upcoming year for the Bears. The disappointment last season of not making the NCAA tournament was softened by the NIT championship. Now that Jefferson and Austin have returned, there is no excuse if the Bears don't make the 2014 field. The Big 12 will be down a bit with Oklahoma State and Kansas as the top two teams. Baylor has the personnel to beat out Iowa State, Kansas State and Oklahoma. But the onus will be on consistent play upfront and a stable point guard.

2. The UMass-Lowell job is open after Greg Herenda took the head coaching position at Fairleigh Dickinson. The Riverhawks are joining the America East next season but have a four-year waiting period to become eligible for postseason. North Dakota State is one of the best models for how to make this transition when Tim Miles and Saul Phillips set up the Bison to make the NCAAs in their first eligible year in 2009. Bryant University handled a similar transition, and while the Bulldogs didn't make the NCAAs in their first eligible year, Bryant spent a good portion of the 2012-13 season atop the NEC and ended up earning a berth in the CBI. The Riverhawks now have to follow a similar path and to do so have a shot to look at area schools for coaching talent. Former Boston College coach Al Skinner, his former assistant and current Northeastern assistant Pat Duquette and current Emerson head coach Jim O'Brien, who was the head coach at BC prior to Skinner, all could be in the mix for this position, according to sources. This is hardly a headline position, but everyone jumping up from Division II to I wants to make a splash. The America East grabbed UMass-Lowell to replace Boston University in the hope it can penetrate the Boston market, making it even more imperative to win the new conference with a coach that has local ties.

3. Ray McCallum Jr. announced his decision to declare for the NBA draft last week but it got lost amid other headline names making the tough call to stay or go. But don't dismiss the Detroit guard as an afterthought. McCallum Jr. could have easily gone to UCLA but chose to play for his father Ray at Detroit. McCallum will be an intriguing prospect to monitor throughout the team workouts and in Chicago over the next two months. Each decision is personal and that's why to guess what direction a player would go in this process is extremely difficult. McCallum chose to leave his dad's team and head to the NBA. Doug McDermott decided to stay and play for his dad at Creighton for one more year. McCallum, though, could very well end up being a higher pick in a draft that needs quality ball handlers.