Lifelong Louisville resident Charlotte Thornton of Okolona remembers a time when it was very difficult to find a University of Kentucky sports fan among African Americans in the city.

But according to a Courier-Journal Bluegrass Poll, those times are gradually changing — although the gap remains much wider for African Americans than for whites...

In Jefferson County, 87 percent of African Americans who said they were very or somewhat interested in college basketball said they root for the University of Louisville the most, compared with 10 percent who picked UK. The margin of error for the survey of 1,281 interviews in Kentucky from Feb. 16-28 is plus or minus 2.7 percentage points, but it is plus or minus 9.3 percentage points among the 110 Jefferson County black basketball fans who were polled...

Still, African Americans make up the most entrenched segment of UofL's fan base. They are more likely to have been lifelong Cardinal fans than any other segment, with 36 percent responding that they have always been UofL fans, compared with 17 percent for white UofL fans...While UK may have made some inroads among black fans, African Americans still are more likely to show ambivalence toward the Wildcats, according to the poll.

While 76 percent of white Cardinal fans said they pull for UK when not playing UofL, that number drops to 59 percent among black respondents, with 24 percent saying they ignore UK.

Boston College athletic director Gene DeFilippo lashed out yesterday at Big East commissioner Mike Tranghese for presenting the University of Connecticut with a championship trophy after the Huskies clinched a share of the league's regular-season title with an 88-70 victory over Syracuse Saturday afternoon, and not doing the same for the fifth-ranked Eagles, who not only clinched a share of the league title but earned the top seed in this week's conference tournament with a 78-66 victory Saturday night at Rutgers.

In investigating virtually all of SI's 2,456 covers, we found 913 "jinxes" -- a demonstrable misfortune or decline in performance following a cover appearance -- roughly 37.2 percent of the time.

While the Fighting Illini headed into the weekend with an undefeated record and a top national ranking, off the court it has been anything but a championship season at U of I's main Urbana-Champaign campus.

The school has been afflicted by management turmoil, the ongoing effects of state budget cuts and — perhaps most worrisome — a major decline in student applications. Interim or acting officials occupy the top two positions on the Downstate campus. An associate provost died last November.

Meanwhile, promised state funding this year is 16% below the $803.6 million budgeted three years ago (but later cut). And last week, the admissions director was reassigned following a 14% decline in applications, the first drop in six years.

High by comparison

It may be instructive to note that other big time college coaches earn between $250,000 and $500,000 from Nike. It is also interesting that most major universities now prohibit such deals, or they see to it that the payments go to the universities, not to the coaches. The Knight Commission, which has issued scathing findings on the commercialization of big-time college sports, has recommended banning these deals with coaches to "bring athletics-related income into the university."

"Every time that he could call me that was legal by NCAA rules, he called me," Granger said of Broussard. "Every. Single. Time...It was annoying, but in the end, it was like, man, they must really want me bad."

VMI will keep paying Bart Bellairs for the next five years. His assistants aren’t so lucky.

For Harrisonburg native Don Burgess, a VMI assistant the past three years, Bellairs’ reassignment – he was fired as the Keydets’ basketball coach and moved into marketing --- has created an uncomfortable situation.

Burgess, who starred at Harrisonburg High School and Radford University before getting into coaching, and his wife are expected a baby next week. He already has a 3-year-old daughter.

After June 30, he might not have a job.

Picture an oval, a track. Picture a staggered start; from left to right, from inside to outside, from Lane 1 to Lane 5. Now, picture these five seniors on the University of Wisconsin men's basketball team: Mike Wilkinson, Clayton Hanson, Andreas Helmigk, Sharif Chambliss and Zach Morley. Although they will reach the finish line together in Saturday's final home appearance at the Kohl Center, they will have each gotten there from a different starting point.

Much like a Lawrence, Kan., or a Bloomington, Ind., the lifeblood in Olean, N.Y., (population 15,000) is Bonas -- as the locals call it -- basketball. The program might not be Duke or North Carolina, but it's ripe with history -- from Bob Lanier's 1970 Final Four team to the '77 NIT championship to the 2000 team that lost to Kentucky to double overtime in the NCAA tournament's first round. From November through early March, talk of basketball fills the air at Ray's Barbershop and Angee's Restaurant. Meetings and events are scheduled so as not to conflict with Bonas' home games. "We're in a very isolated area, and Bonaventure basketball is the social event," said Olean resident John Bartimole, a 1976 grad and season-ticket holder. "When the Bonnies do well, it lifts the spirit of this community."

McKillop, with his silvery hair and piercing blue eyes, projects the image of a man in control.

Look at the way he dresses. Sharp lines. Expensive fabric. Cuff links. An understated burst of color offsetting a classic suit. Not showy but with undeniable presence.

"I could have gone to San Francisco and beat Gonzaga," [Purdue coach Gene Keady] said with a chuckle. "People would be happy in San Francisco and Purdue might have won because I wasn't there to screw them up."

At a meeting of the University of Kentucky Athletic Association Board of Directors, UK president Dr Lee Todd said he had no idea 15 million dollars had been added to the State Senate's proposed budget for a new basketball practice facility.

Governor Fletcher added the expenditure after seeing similar projects in the budget for the University of Louisville...Todd says the UK Hospital expansion and student health facility should be funded before a new athletic facility.

The man who fired Arkansas basketball coach Nolan Richardson said Wednesday the controversial dismissal was likely part of the reason the university has suffered a drop in the number of black students attending the Fayetteville campus. Chancellor John A. White said a 2.4 percent decrease in the number of black students was "the worst news" in a report released Wednesday by the university's 2010 Commission...

White fired Richardson in 2002 after the longtime coach said that, if the university wanted, it could buy out his contract. White and athletic director Frank Broyles read the remarks as a lack of confidence in the program and released Richardson. Richardson sued, alleging he was discriminated against because he is black and outspoken. A federal judge ruled against the ex-coach after a trial last spring and summer.

White said there seemed to be continuing fallout from the firing, "based on anecdotal feedback from parents." He said that fewer than expected black students were taking advantage of scholarships set aside for students whose parents didn't go to college and those students majoring in subjects not typically associated with their demographics.