SPORTS
BASKETBALL TICKET PICK UP
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Students have until Monday at 5 p.m. to pick up the first group of men's basketball tickets. Students can either go to Allen Fieldhouse's ticket office or register online at kuathletics.com
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 18, 2007 PAGE 18
HEALING THE SCARS
Great expectations await Rush's return
Self says injury could turn athlete into 'new Brandon'
BY MARK DENT
mdent@kansan.com
Brandon Rush smiles as he sits down next to Bill Self on the bench during the scrimmage at "Late Night in the Phog." Ten of his teammates circle around mid-court as the ball goes up, signifying the first practice of the season.
All Rush can do is watch.
He chats with his coach for a while, and his smile turns into a laugh. He's doing some coaching of his own.
"I just subbed a few people in and out and told Rio to keep shooting," Rush said afterwards.
Self soon leaves Rush's side to sit on the opposite bench. The smile is still on Rush's face, but it isn't a content smile. Look at the scar on his knee, and you'll find out why.
The scar is from his ACL injury and surgery. It made him pull out of the NBA Draft, and it's making him sit on the bench right now.
But Rush, a junior guard, tells curious media nearly every day he'll be fine. He's dealt with other scars before. Not physical ones; scars on his reputation.
The scar of living up to the expectations set by two older brothers. He healed that one fine.
The scar of an unwarranted reputation for being lazy, being a team cancer. That one's
NBA after this year
The odds of Brandon Rush coming back for a senior year are very small. Kansas coach Bill Self has already accepted this reality. "Nobody's thinking that he is, including me, including him,"Self said. "What has to happen for that to occur is that he needs to get back healthy, and that's why he's worked so hard to get healthy. He knows that he would not be here now if not for the injury so why should we expect him to play for two more years? If he does what he's capable of doing and hopefully he will, we'll win a lot of games and he'll help his status."
gone too.
Now he has to heal this final physical scar. Rush has a season to silence the doubts by fixing the flaws in his game, becoming the go-to guy fans demand and proving himself worthy of a first round pick in the NBA Draft again.
FAMILY BUSINESS
Before Rush graduated elementary school, his brothers were already high school basketball legends.
JaRon and Kareem Rush became Kansas City, Mo's favorite basketball duo at Pembroke Hill High School. JaRon had the athleticism. He once shattered a backboard after a dunk in the state playoffs. Kareem was the shooter. His left-handed stroke was deadly from nearly anywhere on the court.
They led Pembroke Hill to two consecutive state championships. Kareem won another his senior year after JaRon graduated.
Then it all crashed down. In 1999, JaRon's sophomore year at UCLA and Kareem's freshman year at Missouri, Amateur Athletic Union coach Myron Piggie was accused of giving money to several of his players including jaRon and Kareem. The state championships were gone. The Rush legacy was tarnished.
Brandon stepped into their shadow when he entered high school in 2000. They were Kansas City legends for their on-court excellence and off-court imperfections. Brandon had to play the same kind of game, but make different decisions. That's pressure.
"Being JaRon and Kareem's little brother," Brandon said, "it was always. I have to be better than they are or at least where they are at. I just played my type of game. I didn't listen to what people had to say."
SEE RUSH ON PAGE 8B
Anna Faltermier/KANSAN
Junior Brandon Rush has overcome challenges such as expectations of meeting his brothers' talents, proving negative reputations to be wrong, and most recently, an ACL injury. Rush has been sitting on the sidelines because of this injury.
COMMENTARY
Tournament Championship Series
Bowl Championship Series fails to crown undisputed champion
This season's first Bowl Championship Series rankings came out this week. And along with them came the annual controversy over these rankings that decide which teams should play in which postseason game, the Sugar Bowl, Orange Bowl, Rose Bowl or Fiesta Bowl.
If the season ended today, the "National Championship" game would feature Ohio State (Big Ten Champion and BCS No. 1) and South Florida (Big East Champion and BCS No. 2).
The other top teams in the BCS rankings — conference champions from the remaining four of six BCS conferences: Boston College, of the ACC, South Carolina, of the SEC, Kansas, of the Big 12, Arizona State
of the Pac 10—would play in other BCS bowls. LSU, Oklahoma, Kentucky, and West Virginia would receive invitations to these games, too.
Rather than deal with the annual BCS controversy of who should play for the "National Championship", there is a much
better use of the BCS rankings: a tournament.
Division 1-FBS football needs to get rid of the series of postseason games called bowls. For years, Division 1-FBS has been the only division of college football, or of any college sport for that matter, that doesn't use a tournament to decide who the champion is.
Through the BCS rankings, college football should properly seed the top teams in the country for a tournament.
To avoid confusion, BCS should be renamed the TCS rankings, for "Tournament Championship Series"
The tournament would have 24 teams, eight of which would have a bye week. The
champions of the six BCS conferences would receive a bye instead of a BCS game. This would leave the door open for two other at-large teams to receive a bye too.
The remaining 16 teams would start games a week before the top eight. There have been complaints that adding a tournament would make the college football season too long. Given the fact that bowl games start Dec. 20 this year, a 24-team tournament would only be two weeks longer than the current bowl season. And if the NCAA would get rid of the extra game they added to the regular season a few years ago, changing every team's schedule back to 11 games, it would only be a week longer.
As for the other teams left out of the tournament, they would be placed in a second-tier, 24-team tournament, similar to the NIT in college basketball. Right now, 64 teams get to go to bowl games, which would mean 16 bowl-eligible teams would be left out of post-season contention. The best response to that is, does anyone really think Rice (7-5), East Carolina (7-5), or Northern Illinois (7-5) should have gone to bowl games in 2006? Their opponents reflected that they did not, outscoring the three teams 102-31.
SEEWHEELER ON PAGE 8B
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