ESPN.com’s “Summer Session” finally gets to the Big East. Judging by the FanPoll numbers, I’d say the Warriors, Gold, Golden Eagles have been stuffing the ballot box.

The good news, to me, in the write-ups is that while Pitt is clearly the favorite, the focus is on Georgetown as the big challenger and Marquette as being expected to make a run.

In the “Hot” categories, the expectations are that Jeff Green of G-town or Aaron Gray will be the preseason favorite to win Player of the Year. The Pete was also considered one of the toughest place to play in the Big East.

The overall vibe about Pitt’s playpen is that it has become a party house for everyone but the opposing team. Connecticut coach Jim Calhoun said it has become one of the toughest places to play, even though the Huskies have had success there.

“It’s deceptive,” said one Big East coach. “It’s nice, but nasty. They call it a zoo, and based on what some have said to me, that would an appropriate place to take residence.”

The reason why Pitt is considered the team to beat in the Big East is they have the best combination of talent, experience and a legit NBA-caliber big man.

The Panthers lose the heart of their team in lead guard Carl Krauser, but bring back everyone else of note. The 7-foot Gray will anchor the middle. He has worked on extending his game with a 15-foot shot but he’ll still be hunkered down in the post as much as possible.

As Notre Dame’s Mike Brey said, few players in the Big East can change the game like Gray.

Besides Gray, forwards Sam Young and Levon Kendall are two of the more underrated at their positions. The feeling among most in the league is that Young is on the verge of being a star and Kendall is one of the top glue guys in the league. He does a little bit of everything.

Guards Ronald Ramon, Levance Fields, Keith Benjamin and Antonio Graves are all versatile, tough and can get to the rim to finish.

“We’re going to be a real deep team. We’ve got a lot of experience and we’re going to have a lot of fun,” Gray said. “All of these guys love being in the gym.”

As for Sam Young, there is an expectation that he will emerge this season.

Pitt: The consensus in the league is that Sam Young is ready to make a name for himself. He’ll have plenty of touches to play off of Aaron Gray inside. Young has a knack for finding his way to the hoop. He’s not a Chevy Troutman, but he has a shot to be another one in the growing line of tough, productive, undersized power players. Young averaged 7.9 points and 4.4 rebounds as a freshman. He’s 6-6 and plays a few inches taller.

And Mike Cook never even gets mentioned, as probably the best transfer into the conference this season. Astounding. Ed Nelson comes to UConn to be a role player and gets plenty of attention. Dave Padgett can’t stay healthy for L-ville and everyone is still waiting but talking.

Track and Field or Cycling. Take your pick as to which has more doping going on in it. My bet is on Track and Field. They are much more advanced in what to use. Cyclists lacks sophistication and much creativity.

So, naturally if there is a non-steroid story regarding Track, it must be about the past. Great story about the 1936 Olympic Gold Medlist in the 800 meter — John Woodruff.

On Aug. 4, 1936, John Woodruff won one of the most memorable races in Olympic history. In the 800-meter final in Berlin, he was boxed in by other runners at 300 meters and forced to stop in his tracks. He let everyone else go by, then caught and passed them all.

It was another gold medal for the United States’ so-called Black Auxiliaries — the Nazis’ term for the black athletes — and another thorn in the side of Adolf Hitler, who greeted every white winner, but none of the blacks.

“It didn’t bother me,” Woodruff said in a telephone interview Friday. “After the race, Marty Glickman, who was a teammate, told me how good a job I did. Two other teammates told me that, too. The coaches said nothing.”

…

Woodruff was a 21-year-old college freshman, an unsophisticated and, at 6 feet 3 inches, an ungainly runner. But he was a fast thinker, and he made a quick decision.

“I didn’t panic,” he said. “I just figured if I had only one opportunity to win, this was it. I’ve heard people say that I slowed down or almost stopped. I didn’t almost stop. I stopped, and everyone else ran around me.”

Then, with his stride of almost 10 feet, Woodruff ran around everyone else. He took the lead, lost it on the backstretch, but regained it on the final turn and won the gold medal.

Did I mention he’s a Pitt grad? Woodruff served in both WWII and the Korean War. He became career Army and retired as a Lt. Colonel.

He has given some of his trophies and medals to Pitt. Unfortunately, his health doesn’t allow him to travel, so he won’t be able to come to Pittsburgh this fall. Pitt wanted to honor him and his accomplishments at halftime of a game this season.

By keeping comments open, I am out of necessity, using some strong comment-spam blockers. They are working very, very well. Most comments so far are being caught. I am reviewing and letting actual comments through. That’s why some of you haven’t seen your comments posted yet.

An article today about Coach Jamie Dixon hiring Dave Cox as Director of Basketball Operations and what it means for Pitt’s recruiting strategy.

When Pitt men’s coach Jamie Dixon set out to hire his new director of basketball operations, he wanted to get someone with a strong administrative background first and foremost. But high on his list of desires was to get a well-connected AAU coach who could help make recruiting inroads into the Baltimore-Washington corridor.

In David Cox, Dixon found what he was looking for. As the director of basketball operations at Pitt, Cox is allowed to recruit only in Pittsburgh and nearby communities, but that hasn’t stopped this former AAU coach from Washington from making his presence felt in the recruiting wars for the Panthers.

…

That doesn’t mean Pitt will abandon New York, but it does signal a significant change for the program. Pitt rebuilt the program around players such as Carl Krauser, Chris Taft and current players Ronald Ramon and Keith Benjamin. Half of the players on this year’s roster hail from the New York/New Jersey area.

Now it seems Dixon is going in another direction — south on Interstate 95.

Of course, that somewhat ignores the hiring of Mike Rice that was also a bit of diversifying into areas Pitt hadn’t been recruiting as hard — Philly and the rest of Jersey beyond the NYC Metro. This is just logical and smart. There’s a risk in relying on one geographic area too strongly for recruits. Even when it is somewhere as talent-rich as NYC.

Beasley and Wright represent the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the deep pool of players in the Washington area. The Baltimore-Washington area is producing more and more of the top players in the country every year. For the time being, it has surpassed New York as the hotbed for recruiting. Usually the first stop on recruiting trips for coaches, New York has fallen on hard times. It does not have one player among the top 70 in the ’07 class. Contrast that to the Washington-Baltimore area, which currently has five of the top 25 players in the class.

“Areas go through cycles, some more than others,” Dixon said. “There definitely are a lot of players to come out of the D.C. area, especially the last few years.”

Additionally, it can not be ignored how much tougher it will be to recruit in the NYC area. Pitt didn’t just lose Associate Head Coach Barry Rohrssen. They will now have to compete against him in the area. Rutgers and Seton Hall made serious upgrades with their recruiting in the area with the head coach hirings of Dave Hill and Bobby Gonzalez, respectively. Rick Pitino still recruits the area hard. St. John’s continues to rebuild. Then there are always Syracuse and UConn.

Pitt still has a strong presence with Orlando Antigua and his relation to the city, players and coaches there, but it is better to really start expanding the recruiting geographically as Pitt has raised its profile.

To that end, Pitt is interested in a kid who will be attending Hargrave Military Academy after initially signing a LOI with Temple.

We said it at the Peach Jam and we’ll it again. Mike Scott will be a name that everyone is talking about once the prep school season gets rolling. Heck, his name might be a popular one before that. The class of 2006 Temple signee is headed to Hargrave Military in the fall and the way he has played in July has made him a guy that the high-majors want to have on their team.

Scott said he is hearing from Pitt, Oklahoma, Wake Forest, St. Joe’s, Maryland and Virginia Tech and waiting for his release from the Atlantic 10 program.

Scott is from Virginia. I’m not sure if Rice or Cox has any connection to him (whether Rice was aware or recruited him at all while at St. Joe’s).

I’m just glad Pitt is looking to other places for recruiting.

It is now up. Posting can be found at

PittBlather.com

At long last it is up. Plenty of changes still afoot. There are still some things to be worked out. The archives need to be transferred. I need to update some of the feed sites. I’m sure other things will pop up, and I have some vague notions of some other things I’d like to add to this new place.

First, some acknowledgments. The new design, logo and nearly all the work done is courtesy of my friend Adam Harvey. He does great work, despite being a Domer. If you need some site design, get in touch with him. He took some of my poorly thought out ideas and actually made them look good.

Next, everyone who contributed to make this possible. I wouldn’t have this spiffy new site, my own domain, and 2 years worth of server space on DreamHost (not to mention the nifty laptop) without everyone who responded and helped when I asked begged this past spring. I eagerly await the point when it is claimed that I have jumped the shark.

There’s a new e-mail to reach me. The old one still works, but I am planning to phase it out. The new address is: PittBlather– at — gmail.com

I also have a couple hundred gmail invitations, so if anyone wants one shoot me an e-mail and I’ll send you an invite.

Comments are open, and I hope not to have to worry about moderation or any registration. The only reason that will happen is if the spam kicks up or people abuse the open system.