Associated Press
North Carolina started the season without injured starters Tyler Hansbrough and Marcus Ginyard yet stayed a unanimous No. 1 in The Associated Press’ college basketball poll.
The Tar Heels (1-0) didn’t have Hansbrough (shin) or Ginyard (foot surgery) in their season-opening 86-71 win over Pennsylvania last weekend, but strong play from freshmen big men Tyler Zeller and Ed Davis were enough to draw all 72 first-place votes from the national media panel.
Duke dropped from No. 8 to 10. Miami, Florida, Southern California and Wake Forest completed the top 20, and the last five ranked teams were Davidson, Georgetown, Villanova, Kansas and Wisconsin.
North Carolina plays host to Kentucky tonight and is at Cal-Santa Barbara on Friday, then will play in the EA Sports Maui Invitational next week in a field that also features Texas and Notre Dame.
The season’s first matchup of top 10 teams could take place Friday in the championship game of the 2K Sports Classic Benefiting Coaches vs. Cancer in New York if Duke beats Southern Illinois in one semifinal and UCLA defeats Michigan in the other.
ACC
GREENSBORO ó The ACC has handed out its first weekly men’s basketball honors.
The league announced that Duke’s Kyle Singler and Clemson’s Trevor Booker are its co-players of the week and Virginia’s Sylven Landesberg is the top rookie.
Singler averaged nearly 20 points and eight rebounds in leading the Blue Devils to three wins. Booker had double-doubles in two of three victories at the Charleston Classic.
Landesberg had 28 points, eight rebounds and eight assists in a victory over VMI.
NEWELL OBIT
BERKELEY, Calif. ó Pete Newell, the Hall of Fame basketball coach who won an NCAA championship and Olympic gold medal and later tutored some of the game’s greatest big men, died Monday. He was 93.
His death was confirmed by the University of California, the school Newell coached to a national title in 1959. Newell had a serious lung operation in 2005.
“Three coaches had the most influence on college basketball in terms of tactics, both offensively and defensively,” Bob Knight once said. “Clair Bee, Hank Iba and Pete. And I think Pete had the greatest total grasp. He really studied it and kept abreast of it, both professional and collegiate. He was truly remarkable.”