Posted on Sun, Apr. 20, 2008

NOTEBOOK

Newton recommended Ford to OSU

SAID EX-WILDCAT WILL BE 'THE NEXT BILLY DONOVAN'

By Jerry Tipton

HERALD-LEADER STAFF WRITER

Jerry Tipton

Officially, basketball elder statesman C.M. Newton keeps a hand in the game as a consultant for the Southeastern Conference. Unofficially, he's also the wise oracle approached by schools looking to hire a coach.

That's what Oklahoma State did after firing Sean Sutton as coach. The Cowboys' athletic director, Mike Holder, knew he wanted to hire Bill Self of Kansas. Yet he still called Newton for advice.

"How'd you hire Rick Pitino?" Holder asked in reference to Newton's 1989 coup in hiring Pitino away from the New York Knicks.

Newton thought Oklahoma State had a chance to hire Self. OSU was Self's alma mater. The school could rightly say it not only wanted him to return home, but needed him to return home.

When Self decided to stay at Kansas, Holder called Newton for advice on what coach to approach. Newton pondered what coach could enjoy small-town life in Stillwater, Okla. What coach had proven ability to rebuild programs. And when Holder said he wanted to hire a young coach who could relate to players, Newton recommended Travis Ford.

"I'd known Travis for years," Newton said. "I knew him as a player. I tried to recruit him for Vanderbilt. Then I watched him play for Rick (at Kentucky)."

The clincher came in March as Newton, head of the revamped National Invitation Tournament, watched Ford lead Massachusetts to the championship game.

"I thought, 'Boy, this guy has really grown up and grown into the job,' " Newton said.

Last week, Oklahoma State hired Ford.

The hire made Newton think of when he suggested that Florida A.D. Jeremy Foley consider hiring Billy Donovan, who has led to unprecedented success for the Gators.

"I told Jeremy Foley, you're getting the next Pitino," Newton said. "I told Mike, you're getting the next Billy Donovan."

Newton sees this role as simply rendering an opinion, in his case an expert opinion. He's not looking to start a second consultant business.

And what of Oklahoma State's supposed interest in UK Coach Billy Gillispie? "I was never asked about Billy," Newton said. "If I had been asked, I'd have said he was a great fit and a heck of a coach.

"But I wasn't asked."

Off-season goals

During a news conference last week, UK Coach Billy Gillispie offered thoughts about each of the holdover players going into this off-season:

Derrick Jasper: "He just needs confidence and health. ... He has to become a better free-throw shooter. If he's healthy, he can be a terrific defender and rebounder."

Jodie Meeks: "He's going to be a great shooter. Last year he was a very good shooter. But a little streaky. I think he'll be a great shooter, maybe one of the best I've been around. He has to gain more knowledge of basketball."

Ramon Harris: "He has to become a more consistent three-point shooter. He's a good driver. He has to work on his ballhandling. ... He's tough. He really got good as far as being tough."

Perry Stevenson: "Perry has had a fantastic spring. ... There's a different resolve about him. He's probably matured to understand he has to be one of the leaders, not just one of the guys. He has to be the guy. We saw flashes last year. In the last 10 days, he's been fantastic. He's looked like a new guy. He just has a consistent determination that's really been remarkable."

Patrick Patterson: "He's a great guy to build around. He has a perimeter game. We just had to play him with his back to the basket too much."

Jared Carter: "He has turf toe right now. I think he'll have a good off-season (Carter plans to participate on an Athletes in Action tour of Africa). All Jared needs is confidence."

A.J. Stewart: "He can make a major leap forward because of experience. He's just maturing from a freshman to a sophomore. I think he's going to have a big year. He's got a greater understanding of what it takes."

Michael Porter: "He's working harder than ever to become a three-point shooter."

Mark Coury: "Mark's easy to forget because he's like a piece of woodwork. He just comes every day."

'That damn mailman'

It seemed like forever, but Bill Keightley wasn't always a celebrity icon of Kentucky basketball. Danny Omlor, a manager in the early 1960s and now a professor of English at UK, recalled Keightley's early days with the program.

"I never heard Coach (Adolph) Rupp call him 'Bill,' " Omlor said at the Memorial Service for Keightley earlier this month. "I never heard Coach Rupp call him 'Keightley.' He called him, 'That damn mailman.' "

Keightley delivered mail to UK's athletic department, a route that included Rupp's office.

One day, Omlor saw Rupp confront Keightley.

As Omlor recalled, the conversation went something like this:

Rupp: "You're the mailman."

Keightley: "Yes, sir."

Rupp: "You deliver the mail."

Keightley: "Yes, sir."

Rupp: "I have a problem."

Keightley: "What?"

Rupp: "You're bringing me too much bad mail."

Keightley: "Sir, how is that?"

Rupp: "You bring me bills, ads, letters from people who don't like the job I'm doing."

Keightley: "What kind of mail would you like?"

Rupp: "First of all, I don't want all the bills and ads and letters from people who will complain."

Keightley: "I understand. First thing in the morning, I'll bring it up to my supervisor."

Rupp: "I appreciate that very much."

The two then walked away.

"Neither ever smiled," Omlor said thinking back more than 40 years. "I still don't know if either was kidding."

Honoring Keightley

Here's the best idea yet on how to honor the late Bill Keightley:

"At the end of the "K-e-n-t-u-c-k-y" cheer this year, dim the lights and use the big screen to show Mr. Keightley making the 'Y.' "

Reader Doug Wilson sent in that idea via an e-mail message.

Wilson, 35, is a UK graduate in the Class of 1995. He grew up in Stearns and now lives and works in Morristown, N.J.

"I'm upholding the Order of the Kentucky Colonel by spreading my love of the bluegrass among the 'uneducated' Northeasterners here in New Jersey," he wrote. "It's a tough sell, as folks up here just don't get it. It seems all the years of shoveling snow has ruined 'em all."

Jasper to leave?

UK Coach Billy Gillispie cited homesickness as the reason Derrick Jasper might transfer at the end of the school year. But might there be other factors also on Jasper's mind?

He might be thinking that a year off as a transfer would give his surgically repaired left knee time to heal. Jasper played last season with a brace on the knee, which required microfracture surgery on June 16.

After playing point guard as a freshman, Jasper shifted to forward for chunks of time, and even battled power forwards at times, last season. Might he want a do-over elsewhere at point guard? Maybe that's why Gillispie went out of his way at a news conference last week to emphasize that Jasper was a lead guard "in every aspect."

It wouldn't be surprising if Jasper went to UNLV, where one of his former AAU teammates, Quincy Pondexter, could land as a transfer.

Even with the brace and playing out of position at times, Jasper showed how he can affect a game. Against Florida International, he handed out five assists, equaled a career-high of 10 rebounds, blocked a shot, made a steal and hit his only shot.

"Derrick's not the savior or anything like that," Gillispie said after that game. "But he makes so many things so much easier for so many others. And that's what a great player does."

Maybe most importantly, Jasper easily was UK's best post feeder, a valuable talent given Patrick Patterson as a low-post scorer.

So Gillispie will work to ease homesickness and any other discomforts Jasper may be feeling.

Keeping it 'real'

Although his name featured prominently in speculation about the Oklahoma State job, UK Coach Billy Gillispie said he saw no need to address the issue. He even scoffed at the suggestion that a preemptive comment -- saying, I'm happy at Kentucky and not interested in any other job -- would be helpful in clearing the air.

"There is no reason to address those things until they become real, and they never became real. ..." Gillispie said at a news conference last week. "When they ask for permission to talk with you, that's when it becomes real to me. And that definitely never became real."

Fair enough.

But in the murky world of college athletics where credibility is a scarce commodity, is that good enough? Interestingly, one of Gillispie's coaching mentors, Bill Self, addressed speculation of his candidacy in a straightforward manner. After guiding Kansas to the national championship, he said he'd listen to Oklahoma State, his alma mater, but would prefer to stay at Kansas if that could be arranged to everyone's satisfaction.

Ultimately, Self stayed at Kansas and scored significant public relations points.

Meanwhile, Oklahoma State hired -- surprise -- UMass Coach Travis Ford. Ford, the former UK player, took the job less than a week after turning down an offer from Providence and saying at a UMass banquet that he was "100 percent committed" to the Minutemen.

As for Gillispie's idea of keeping it real, Oklahoma State did not ask for permission to speak to Ford. UMass Athletic Director John McCutcheon learned about Oklahoma State's interest from Ford.

LSU update

New Louisiana State coach Trent Johnson has asked Butch Pierre to remain on the staff as an assistant, the newspaper in Baton Rouge, The Advocate, reported on Saturday. Pierre was instrumental in recruiting highly regarded big man J'Mison Morgan.

Morgan, who considered reopening his recruitment, told The Advocate that he liked what he heard from Johnson, who has tutored such big men as Brook and Robin Lopez and Jason and Jarron Collins at Stanford, plus Nick Fazekas at Nevada.

Tour of China

Robby Speer, the executive director of an organization that seeks to use basketball as a means to proselytize, hoped to include UK big man Jared Carter on a May trip to China. Instead, Carter chose to join an Athletes in Action trip to Africa.

Players participating in the trip to China include Jermaine Beal of Vanderbilt, Zach Graham of Mississippi, Elgin Bailey of Mississippi State and Mike Sanchez of Arkansas.

Happy birthday

To actress Ashley Judd. UK basketball's most famous fan turned 40 on Saturday.

"I am most excited and thrilled to be turning 40," she wrote in an e-mail message. "Once the calendar went to April, I began celebrating my whole birthday month, as usual."

Judd planned to spend her birthday with husband Dario Franchitti "in the Scottish highlands with friends."

Judd also expected to continue her work as a board member for Population Services International (psi.org) and as global ambassador for Youth AIDS (youthaids.org).

"I'll be in Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo to visit folks living in extreme poverty," she wrote of her upcoming plans. "I have an especially keen passion for girls and women who are being sexually exploited. In the DRC, rape is an enormous problem. I will see how psi's grass-roots programs empower the health of the most poor, seeing programs that help vulnerable children reach their 5th birthday (fiveandalive.org), prevention of unintended pregnancy, malaria prevention and treatment, clean water programs, and HIV/AIDS prevention in action."

Jerry Tipton covers UK basketball for the Herald-Leader. This article contains his opinions and observations. He can be reached at jtipton@herald-leader.com.