Leland King II no doubt saw the handwriting on the wall when he played basketball at Nevada last season.
King, who averaged 3.7 points and 2.6 rebounds a game, gave Nevada some front-line depth a year ago when the Pack made its first NCAA appearance in 10 years.
King had a 13-point and 12-rebound effort against San Jose State, and then added 12 against Bradley. He was a hard worker, a truly blue-collar type of player with a decent mid-range game.
The 6-foot-7 King is a smart guy, and going up against the likes of redshirts Cody and Caleb Martin, Kendall Stephens and Hallice Cook in practice each day last season he knew playing time would be even more difficult to get this season.
King, who transferred to Nevada from Brown, did the smart thing. He graduated last spring from Nevada with one season of eligibility left. He ended up at UC Santa Barbara, a member of the Big West, and it’s been a great match for player and coach.
King, through 16 games (UCSB 12-4), is averaging 17.1 points and 10.4 rebounds a game.
“Coach (Pasternack) gives us a lot of freedom, and I’m confident that I can spread (the offense) out,” King told SBNation recently. “I know what I’m going to do. Going out there and being able to do (what I do) and help out the team has been great. I want to showcase what I can do.”
“Leland is an excellent player,” Pasternack said in the SBNation interview. “I think he can be a double-double type guy.”
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Devearl Ramsey, the No. 3 point guard on last year’s team, also transferred to UCSB.
Ramsey’s Nevada career never got on track. He was hurt in the nonconference season, and he like King, knew his minutes would dwindle to next to nothing if he stayed with the Pack. He would have been the No. 3 point guard again behind Cody Martin and Lindsey Drew.
Ramsey is sitting out this season under NCAA transfer rules.
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As a kid growing up, your chance to watch college basketball was pretty much limited to the geographic area you lived in. I remember KTVU-Channel 2 in the Bay Area showed the Pac-10 Game of the Week at 2:30 every Saturday. For the Pac-10, it was pretty much the only game I could see.
Now, there are between 15-20 games on TV any given Saturday. It’s way too many, and unfortunately TV dictates starting times. Nevada has been the victim of that with one start after 9 p.m. and several 8 p.m. starts.
I look around and see many of the Power 5 conferences playing on Saturdays before the sun goes down. Deadlines notwithstanding, I love it. Personally I think games should start early enough on Saturdays to ensure the visiting team can get back on campus so half of Sunday isn’t spent in an airplane and/or sitting in an airport.
Charters are expensive, and not a lot of MW teams can afford them all of the time.
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Blair Roman, Carson High’s athletic director, said that one thing still to be worked on for basketball next season is the tie-breaker procedure.
In past years, the team that won the second head-to-head meeting had the tiebreaker.
Bad idea.
As I said before, I’d rather see a triple round-robin and limit the crossovers. Since that isn’t going to happen, I think I’d like to see points allowed be the tiebreaker.
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