Pull up a chair and sit down at the breakfast buffet, an assortment of all the freshest newsworthy college hoops stories on the net. To make a submission, contact me via email or Twitter.
• Iowa basketball coach Fran McCaffery acknowledged the Ashton Kutcher fiasco wasn't his only secondary violation, though the first one that occurred while he was coaching at UNC Greensboro is even more silly. "We sent recruiting mail out in color on plain white paper," McCaffery told the Des Moines Register. "If it was on letterhead it would have been legal. If it was in black and white on plain white paper it would have been legal. But since it was in color on plain white paper it was a violation ... We called it the ‘Color Paper Caper.'"
• It will be champion against champion Thursday night at Cameron Indoor Arena when Duke and Cal Poly Pomona square off in an exhibition game. Duke, of course, beat Butler in the Division I title game last March and Cal Poly Pomona knocked off Indiana (Pa.) in the Division II championship game, making this the first time the defending Division I and II champs have met.
• Yahoo! Sports' Jason King checks in at Kansas and Kentucky, where very little has changed regarding the status of standout freshmen Josh Selby and Enes Kanter. Both are still awaiting clearance from the NCAA and both have no clue when a decision will be made, leaving their respective teams hamstrung as they prepare for a season that is now less than a week from getting under way.
• A setback in Utah State forward Nate Bendall's recovery from a chronic right foot injury will deprive the Aggies of one of their best big men for at least the next four weeks and possibly much longer. "We were probably fortunate to get him through last year," Utah State coach Stew Morrill told the Herald Journal. "Whether or not he'll be able to play at all is hard to say. He's going to be out at least four weeks or more, and then we will go from there."
• The most surprising aspect of this Los Angeles Times story about USC's recent secret scrimmage with Air Force is that Trojans coach Kevin O'Neil was so open about the results. O'Neil revealed that USC unofficially won 75-46, a victory highlighted by 20 points and 13 rebounds from forward Nikola Vucevic and a solid 10-point, 10-assist performance from freshman point guard Maurice Jones.
• Colorado's Shane Harris-Tunks might not have even been a household name in Boulder after averaging 1.8 points and 1.6 boards last season, but the 6-foot-11, 250-pound big man's season-ending knee injury will hurt Colorado. He was the only player with that kind of size the Buffaloes had on their roster, leaving them severely lacking for any interior depth.
• Brandon Paul and Jereme Richmond will be teammates for Illinois this season, but they were once on opposing sides in one of the more memorable state title games in Illinois history. Paul hit a pair of free throws with 4.7 seconds remaining to give Warren a one-point lead, but Richmond took the ensuing inbound pass, pulled up near mid-court and sank the game-winner to give Waukegan a two-point victory.
• Antonio Burks' playing career ended in tragedy when he nearly died after getting shot in the torso during an attempted robbery, so the ex-Memphis guard has embarked on a new career path. He's now coaching at LeMoyne-Owen, which meant he made his return to his alma mater Wednesday night in a 106-49 exhibition loss to Memphis.
• UConn coach Jim Calhoun remains defiantly optimistic about the state of his program even as the threat of further NCAA sanctions hangs overhead. "There's nothing wrong with the future of UConn basketball,'' Calhoun told ESPN.com's Andy Katz. "Three Final Fours in 10 years [and] two national championships should translate in recruiting, but I know players relate to all the players in the league, and we just got another one when Jeff Adrien made the Warriors."
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