Bob Huggins ducked away for a week. He disconnected from his busy world to spend time with his wife, getting a healthy dose of down time.
Now he's back and will begin the arduous process of putting together a team at West Virginia that could challenge Villanova and Georgetown for the Big East title.
But there's that nagging point guard question he can't quite give a final answer. Joe Mazzulla or Darryl Bryant are currently suspended from all team activities. Will they be back? Will it be both of them? When?
The short answer is Huggins said he doesn't believe he'll have to go this season without either. It's still only August. The team's real practice doesn't begin until Oct. 16. But even if they don't return, Huggins said, senior Da'Sean Butler and sophomore Devin Ebanks -- two scoring wings -- played the point or the role of playmaker last season. Ebanks said last week that he and Butler have been bringing up the ball against one another in pickup games.
"They did it last year,'' Huggins said. "I learned long ago that I deal with the players that are here. They are not trouble kids. It's not like I don't see these guys. They are good kids."
Mazzulla was suspended indefinitely after he was arrested for a domestic violence incident in April. He was the starting point guard two seasons ago when the Mountaineers beat Duke in the second round of 2008 NCAA tournament. But last season, Mazzulla fractured the growth plate in his shoulder at Ole Miss on Dec. 3, six games into the season. He made a go of it a week later, but could only play six minutes in a loss to Davidson in New York City, then sat out the rest of the season.
Huggins said Mazzulla's injury was incredibly rare. He said doctors were "shocked" when they found out that his bones in his shoulder didn't grow together and that they were held together by membranes that broke when the injury occurred. Huggins said Mazzulla has been cleared physically and would be able to play this season, if he's cleared from his suspension.
When Mazzulla went down, freshman Bryant stepped into the role. Bryant's minutes jumped from 12 against Cleveland State to 27 in the Davidson game. He played more than 30 minutes a dozen times the rest of the season. Bryant, nicknamed Truck, was cruising toward being the playmaker until his offseason hit more than a few bumps.
He tried out for the Under-19 FIBA World Championship team in Colorado Springs, Colo., in June. He was cut for the squad that eventually won gold in New Zealand. And then a few weeks later, in July, he was suspended by Huggins indefinitely for a violation of team rules. Like Mazzulla, Bryant was suspended from all West Virginia team activities.
But Bryant was already booked to head to eastern Europe with an all-star team called the East Coast All-Stars. The team, run out of Bryant's native New York, "had to set that up a long time ago,'' Huggins said.
Bryant scored 22 points in the team's win over AB Cosmetics Pezinok on Tuesday. Kansas State junior guard Jacob Pullen had the assist on a winning basket by Lycoming's Michael Bradley at the buzzer for the 93-92 win. Pullen's teammate, Dominique Sutton, scored 10 points and had four rebounds and three steals.
While Huggins isn't fretting the possibility of losing Bryant, or for that matter a healthy Mazzulla next season, he isn't ready to promote the Mountaineers as a Big East title contender yet. What he does know is that Butler should have a big season again. Huggins said he's hoping Butler (17.1 ppg last season) won't have to score as much and that the Mountaineers will be less dependent on him to do so much. To ensure that, though, the suspensions would have to be lifted. Alex Ruoff (15.7 ppg) is gone, leaving a void in scoring to be picked up by Ebanks (10.5 ppg), and probably Bryant (9.8 ppg) and/or Mazzulla (5.6 ppg) if they were to return.
• Boston College and South Carolina signed a home-and-home series for the next two seasons. This is the type of quality game both schools desperately need. The two clubs should be NCAA-worthy next season. The first of the two games is Dec. 30, 2009 at BC. The Eagles and Gamecocks were both looking to finalize their schedules. Landing a game like this should help prepare each for their respective conference seasons. Both teams return four starters next season.
• Kammeon Holsey missing the upcoming season because of a torn ACL is a crushing blow for the incoming Georgia Tech freshman. But the Yellow Jackets are deep up front. He probably won't be as missed as he would have been had Gani Lawal left for the NBA. Lawal and Derrick Favors will gobble up most of the minutes, with Zach Peacock as the third big man in the bunch. Holsey was an athletic big man who could run the floor well and block shots, so having that off the bench would have been unique. But getting on the floor may have been more difficult. Now with that said, if another injury were to occur, the Yellow Jackets could be in trouble.
Andy Katz
