August Notebook

School started this week for Kansas students…Which means it is closer to football season (two weeks for KU).

• Kansas is ranked No. 25 in the preseason Associated Press football poll. Big 12 schools are ranked as follows: No. 2 Texas (two first place votes), No. 3 Oklahoma, No. 9 Oklahoma State, 24. Nebraska. Kansas had 134 total votes, which is more than 70 votes behind Nebraska.

• The Lawrence Journal-World’s Gary Bedore reported Friday that the media will no longer sit on the press row opposite the player benches. Instead, they will sit on the “end zones” properly known as the baseline. The eastside press row seats will now go to the 40 richest donors for the Willams Fund for a hefty fee of $15,000. Throw in what these corporate hotshots had to pay to the Williams Fund to even purchase these tickets, and the value of a seat there is beyond imaginable. It can only be assumed they will raise the price on these seats in the years to come.

• I had a chance to talk to Jim Marchiony last weekend at the Kansas City Wizards game and Kansas football will install a new video board for next season. There were talks about putting it in for the 2009 campaign, but it took longer than expected to put down the new turf at Memorial, which was in the 800k-900k price range. The plans for the video board were approved recently, according to the LJ-World. The LJ-World also said that KU is looking into expanding seating in the upcoming years, something that has been rumored way before KU Athletics announced the new Olympic Village that will have a new track.

• Sherron Collins and Cole Aldrich were two of 50 players on the John R. Wooden Award All-American Team and Player of the Year trophy lists. “I think that’d be cool,” Aldrich said on potentially winning it. “Being in that group of players that have been able to do it. One thing that would really make me proud and the rest of the Big 12 is if anybody from the Big 12 was able to do that again.”
  

• Other Big 12 players on the Wooden list: Craig Brackins, Iowa State; Damion James, Texas; J.T. Tiller, Missouri and Willie Warren, Oklahoma.

• Aldrich weighed 265 when he came to Kansas, and had to lose weight to keep up with some of his teammates. Now he’s trying to gain weight (currently at 248) to push around some of the bigger bodies in America and in his not so distant future in the NBA. “Coach has talked a lot about getting my legs stronger,” Aldrich said. “I think it will improve my game a lot because going against guys like (Texas’) Dexter Pittman and getting pushed out a little bit, I can hold against him and — that dude’s a load, but, hey, if you can hold guys like that, you can hold anybody.”

• Danielle McCray was one of 31 players named to the women’s basketball Wooden award list. “It is a great honor to be chosen as a Wooden Award preseason candidate,” said McCray, who earned Honorable Mention All-America honors last season. “I have a great amount of respect for all of the players on the list, as well as for Coach Wooden, so to even be considered is a great feeling.” McCray averaged 21.6 points and 7.7 rebounds per game as a junior last year. Surprisingly only four other Big 12 players were on the list.

• Kansas Football Fan Appreciation Day is Wednesday, August 26th at 5:30 pm (this time is always subject to change since it is Mangino who controls this).