Hooray: Basketball Practice is Underway!

Call me delusional but as down as I am on the football program, I am sky high about what I believe is going to be a major turnaround for Frank Haith's Hoops team. The injury riddled Canes finished last in the ACC last season after storming the league with two decent seasons the prior two years. But when you consider the number of injuries and suspensions Miami went through last season 4 ACC wins plus 3 more losses in overtime was actually quite remarkable. The Canes started now graduated walk-on Keaton Copeland of Miramar (who while a great hustle player has played all of 28 minutes his previous three years in the program) for all but 2 ACC conference games, and constantly shuffled lineups that included eleven different starters.

This year I expect the Canes to contend for an NCAA birth and was recently encouraged by the College Basketball News which while picking the Canes as a "lock" for the NIT said that this team if it develops a backcourt scoring option beyond Jack McClinton has an opportunity to make the NCAAs. Miami will be the most physical team in the ACC which I believe is a soft league, not in quality of play but in its physcial play inside. I will have several part preview of the Basketball team coming up in the next few weeks.