Hall out for Kansas game; Snow to make first start
Perhaps the dismissal of backup center Buck Burnette hurt the Texas Longhorns more than they thought it would.
The Longhorns announced Wednesday that starting center Chris Hall sprained his left knee in practice and will miss Saturday’s game against the Kansas Jayhawks. The team doesn’t know when Hall is expected to return.
Hall’s replacement will be true freshman David Snow, who enrolled at Texas in January and will make his first ever start for the Longhorns. Snow is also the backup guard and has played that position in games this season. However, he has yet to play at center.
Greg Smith will play both tight end and backup center this weekend after being the long-snapper during the 2007 season. Smith has been playing tight end since Blaine Irby suffered a season-ending injury in the game against Rice.
The loss of Hall makes the Burnette situation all the more relevant going into this weekend’s matchup with the Jayhawks. The former player was released from the team last week after posting racially charged comments on his facebook page about President-elect Barack Obama.
— Anup Shah
Texas baseball gets seven recruits on first signing day
The Longhorn baseball team got seven National Letters of Intent on the first day of early signing — including three recruits in the top 75, according to Baseball America.
Catcher Jonathan Walsh — the 34th-ranked recruit from Coppell High School — was the highest-ranked recruit tabbed by the Longhorns, followed by pitcher and first baseman Colton Cain from Waxahachie High School, ranked 44th, and pitcher Keifer Nuncio from Katy High School, ranked 75th.
Other players Texas signed include right-handed pitchers and Austin natives Josh Urban of Dripping Springs High School and Cohl Walla of Austin Lake Travis High School. Left-handed pitcher Hoby Milner from Fort Worth and middle infielder Jordan Weymouth from Arizona — the only one not from Texas — rounded out the seven new additions.
— AS
Men’s basketball signs big recruits for 2009-10 season
The Longhorns locked up two five-star high school recruits and the top player in Texas, head coach Rick Barnes announced Wednesday, giving him the second-best recruiting class of 2009.
Texas received letters of intent from Avery Bradley, from Tacoma, Wash., Jordan Hamilton, from Los Angeles, Calif. and Shawn Williams of Duncanville, Texas.
“This class fills the needs of our program,” Barnes said. “All three are outstanding individual talents on the court, but they are great character guys as well. The thing that excites our staff about each of them is their work ethic. Avery, Jordan and Shawn are all guys who want to get better every day, both as people and basketball players.”
Hamilton, a small forward from Dominguez High School in Compton, Calif., is the No. 5 recruit in the nation according to Rivals.com and averaged 27.6 points and 11.1 rebounds during his junior season.
Bradley, a shooting guard from Findlay College Prep in Henderson, Nev., is the No. 8 recruit according to Rivals.com. The 6-foot-3-inch prospect played his first three seasons of high school ball at Ballarmine Prep in Tacoma and averaged 25.7 points per game his junior season.
The lone in-state signee, Williams, who TexasHoops.com, an affiliate of Rivals, labeled the top player in Texas. The 6-foot-7-inch small forward nearly averaged a double-double last season at Duncanville High School with 17 points and 9.5 rebounds per game.
Both Scout.com and Rivals.com named the all-wingman Texas recruiting class as the second-best in the nation behind North Carolina.
— Colby White
Plonsky named to USA Basketball Board of Directors for 2009-12 term
University of Texas women’s athletic director Chris Plonsky was named to the USA Basketball Board of Directors for the 2009-2012 term Wednesday.
Plonsky, who is also Texas’ senior associate athletic director of external services for Texas athletics, has been involved with USA Basketball since 1992. For the last 12 years, Plonsky served the board and executive committee as a vice president for women’s programs. She was also the women’s collegiate committee chair from 2000 to 2004.
Plonsky has been with the University of Texas for 20 years and is in her seventh year as women’s athletic director. During her tenure as women’s athletic director, the women’s programs have won two national championships and 25 conference championships.
USA Basketball is considered the national governing body for men’s and women’s basketball in the United States and is recognized by the International Basketball Federation and the United States Olympic Committee — thus giving it the power to select and train the USA basketball teams that compete at international competitions including the 2012 London Olympic Games.
Jerry Colangelo, known for assembling the USA men’s basketball team that won the gold medal at the 2008 Beijing Games, was also named chairman of USA Basketball’s board of directors. Colangelo spent the last three years as managing director of the senior national team, which included the famous three-year commitment program to bring USA men’s basketball back to prominence. The men’s team had not won a gold medal since 2000, while the women’s team has won six of the last seven golds — including the last four.
— Anup Shah
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