News and Notes: Monday Edition

Below, some news and notes for Monday...

• Above, our Tweets of the Day from the world of Cornell Basketball on the twittersphere.

• The Bona Venture recaps St. Bonaventure's exhibition win over Mansfield. The Bonnies' head coach Mark Schmidt said, "" We turned the ball over too many times. I thought we were over-dribbling a little bit, but overall I thought we rebounded well. I thought we defended at times well, especially in the first half. Overall we learned a lot and we got to go back to practice tomorrow and get better for Cornell." Cornell visits St. Bonaventure in the season opener for both teams on November 11. Fans interested in watching the Big Red at St. Bonaventure via streaming online video will be able to do so though Bonnies All Access.

• Above, an excerpt from ESPN the Magazine's preseason power rankings.

• The Valley News notes that this week local Pittsburgh area basketball players "Micah Mason of Highlands and Nolan Cressler of Plum are expected to sign letters of intent with Drake and Cornell, respectively."

• The UB Spectrum makes indirect reference to Drew Ferry's participation on the Athletes-in-Action club that traveled to China this summer with members of the Buffalo basketball team. Cornell faces Buffalo this month. The Spectrum notes, "The athletes were part of a 10-man team that consisted of players from Appalachian State, Memphis, Michigan, Clemson, Northwestern, and Cornell."
  

• The Ivy League Office notes that Cornell's Chris Wroblewski was nominated for the prestigious Lowe's Senior Class Award. Only 25 players nationwide were nominated. Penn's Zach Rosen is also a nominee out of the Ivy League. The League office issued the following news release:
  

Penn's Zach Rosen (left) and Cornell's Chris Wroblewski were selected as candidates for the Lowe's 2011-12 Senior CLASS Award

Cornell's Wroblewski, Penn's Rosen Selected as 2011-12 Lowe's Senior CLASS Award Candidates

OVERLAND PARK, Kan. -- The Ivy League saw two of its men's basketball student-athletes selected as candidates for the 2011-12 Lowe's Senior CLASS Award, the company announced Friday. Cornell senior guard Chris Wroblewski and Penn senior guard Zach Rosen are among the 30 men's basketball seniors chosen.

To be eligible for the award, a student-athlete must be classified as an NCAA Division I senior and have notable achievements in four areas of excellence – community, classroom, character and competition.An acronym for Celebrating Loyalty and Achievement for Staying in School®, the Lowe's Senior CLASS Award focuses on the total student-athlete and encourages students to use their platform in athletics to make a positive impact as leaders in their communities.

Wroblewski was a third-team Capital One Academic All-American as a junior and has twice been named to the academic all-district team. The two-year team captain has been involved in numerous charitable endeavors and has been a four-year starter on the court. He was a key player on two conference championship teams including the Big Red's Sweet 16 run as a sophomore. Wroblewski is a two-year member of the Bob Cousy Award Watch List as the nation's top point guard. A second-team All-Ivy pick as a junior, he was the conference's leader in steals and was second in assists and assist-to-turnover ratio and sixth in scoring.

Rosen is a two-time first-team All-Ivy and National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC) All-District honoree. He posted 22 double-figure scoring games as a junior and averaged 14.3 points per game. He led Penn with 152 assists, which is fourth on the school's all-time single-season list, and became the first player in Penn history to exceed 100 assists as a freshman, sophomore and junior.

The 2011-12 candidate class includes three men's players who were members of last year's CoSIDA Academic All-American team, one Associated Press All-American and seven players who are on teams ranked in the Associated Press preseason top 25 poll.

Lowe's, an official Corporate Partner of the NCAA, will announce the men's Senior CLASS Award® winner during the 2012 NCAA Men's Final Four®, which will be held March 31 and April 2 in New Orleans. The women's award winner will be announced during the NCAA Women's Final Four®, which will be held April 1 and 3 in Denver.

The 60 candidates will be narrowed to 10 finalists in both men's and women's basketball midway through the regular season, and those 10 names will be placed on the official ballot. Ballots will be distributed through a nationwide voting system to media, Division I men's and women's coaches and fans who will select one finalist who best exemplifies excellence in the four Cs of community, classroom, character and competition.

For more information on all the candidates, visit www.seniorCLASSaward.com.

• Slope Media's Time Weisberg will be interviewing Chris Wroblewski on November 8 and will make the podcast available on the Slope website.
  

• In Ivy League news, Penn squeaked out a narrow exhibition win over Canadian school, Carleton.
  

• The Boston Globe profiles Boston College freshman, Patrick Heckmann and writes, "[Steve] Donahue, in his second year at BC, had international recruiting connections from his time at Cornell and Penn, but coaching in the Ivy League, where teams can’t offer scholarships, his resources were limited. 'We got to know a lot of people that are over there,' Donahue said. 'Whether it’s owners, agents, people that run the FIBA in those countries. So you get to know the younger kids. We’ve always done that, but we never had scholarships in the Ivy. So it was hard with no foreign aid.’'"
  

• Check out The Cornell Basketball Blog's Season Preview Index for a complete listing of 2011-2012 Cornell and Ivy League basketball season previews.

• Cornell will have at least four games televised during the 2011-2012 season including at Stony Brook (Cablevision 118), at Maryland (ESPN3), at Illinois (ESPN3) and at Penn State (Big Ten Network). Time Warner Cable, VerizonFios1, and Comcast Sports are among other networks that may also pick up Cornell games against Ivy League opponents such as Columbia, Princeton and Penn.

• Check out The Cornell Basketball Blog's updated profiles of Cornell's four committed recruits from the classes of 2012 and 2013, Braxston Bunce (Kelowna Secondary School) Kelowna, BC, Canada, 6-11, Holt Harmon (Plano West HS), Plano, TX, 6-9, F; Nolan Cressler (Plum HS) Plum, PA, 6-4, G (class of 2012); and Tim Higgins (Paul VI HS) Fairfax, VA, 6-10, C (class of 2013). In addition, a listing of the Ivy League's committed recruits in the class of 2012 is available by clicking here. Above, new video highlights of Holt Harmon.
  

• If you have not had the opportunity to check it out yet, take a look at the exclusive Inside Tour of Cornell Basketball. The tour video was produced by the staff of Slope Media with background music performed by Cornell alumnus, Alex Kresovich. The background song, is the main theme song for the 2012 version of the video game, NBA2K. Also a must see-- check out the three-year combined highlight video package produced by Slope Media from the '08-'09, '09-'10 and '10-'11 Big Red seasons.

• Below is an updated directory listing of some Twitter feeds associated with the Cornell basketball program. You can also follow The Cornell Basketball Blog on Twitter.

-Josh Wexler ('88)
-Steve Cobb ('05)
-Ryan Rourke ('06)
-Andrew Naeve ('07)
-Jason Canady ('08)
-Khaliq Gant ('09)
-Conor Mullen ('09)
-Ryan Wittman ('10)
-Pete Reynolds ('10)
-Jon Jaques ('10)
-Louis Dale ('10)
-Alex Tyler ('10)
-Geoff Reeves ('10)
-Jeff Foote ('10)
-Andre Wilkins ('10) (inactive)
-Aaron Osgood ('11)
-Adam Wire ('11)
-The Cornell Rebounders Club
-Max Groebe ()
-Andrew Ferry ()
-Peter McMillan ()
-Errick Peck ()
-Josh Figini ()
-Galal Cancer ()
-Ned Tomic ()
-Dominick Scelfo ()
-Jake Mathews ()
-Dwight Tarwater ()
-Manny Sahota ()
-Dave LaMore ()
-Shonn Miller ()
-Devin Cherry ()
-Nolan Cressler (committed recruit)
-Braxston Bunce (committed recruit)
-Holt Harmon (committed recruit)
-Tim Higgins (committed recruit)
-Assistant Coach Mike Blaine ()
-Assistant Coach Marlon Sears ()
-Assistant Coach Arlen Galloway ()
-Brian Delaney, WPIE/ESPN Radio Ithaca ()
-Cornell Daily Sun Sports ()
-Slope Sports ()
-WVBR Sports ()
-Former assistant coach, Jay Larranaga ()
-Former head coach, Steve Donahue ()
-Former assistant coach, Nat Graham ()
-Former assistant coach, Woody Kampmann ()
-Former Assistant Coach Ricky Yahn ()
-Former Intern Assistant Ryan Woerner ()

• Throughout the year we provide periodic updates on Cornell's alumni playing professionally. Below, some updates:
  

-Jeff Aubry ('99) (Halcones Rojos, LNBP Mexico premier league/Arecibo Capitanes, BSN Puerto Rico premier league)-As of November 7, Aubry is averaging 5.1 points and 4.7 rebounds per game. Halcones is 16-4 (2nd place out of 14 teams in the Mexican LNBP). On November 4 , Aubry finished with 4 points and 4 rebounds in a 85-82 win over Abejas. He followed up on November 6 with 12 points and 4 rebounds in a 98-97 defeat to Lechugueros. Aubry, a 6'11" center, splits his time in both the Mexican and Puerto Rican professional leagues. He is also a member of Puerto Rico's national team joining several NBA stars and is expected to compete with the team in 2012 Olympic qualifying. A well traveled pro player, Aubry spent several seasons in the NBA D League in the early part of his career with the Fayetteville Patriots and Florida Flame and earned honorable mention all D-League in 2002. During his more than a decade of pro experience, Aubry has also played professionally in the ABA (Miami Tropics) and abroad in Puerto Rico (Arecibo, Leones de Ponce, and Santurce, BSN Puerto Rico), Spain (Tarragona, LEB Gold Spain 2nd Division), Mexico (Halcones Rojos and Chihuahua Dorados, LNBP Mexico premier league), Poland (Slask Wroclaw, PLK Poland premier league), Argentina (Libertad Sunchales, Liga A Argentina), Uruguay (Hebraica, LUB Uruguay )and Peru (Alas Peruanas, Peru).

-Cody Toppert ('05) (Ourense, LEB Silver Spain 3rd Division)-As of November 7, Toppert is averaging 7.8 points and 2.0 rebounds per game. Ourense is 4-1 (1st place out of 13 teams in the Spanish LEB Silver). On November 6 in a win over Tenerife, Toppert scored 9 points. Like Aubry, Toppert, a 6'4" guard, is a veteran of the NBA D League, a former Albuquerque Thunderbird. During his pro career, Toppert has also played in England (Plymouth Raiders, British Basketball League), Italy (Forli, LegaDue Italy 2nd division), the CBA (Great Falls Explorers), as well as in Portugal (Barriernese, LCB Portugal premier league), Germany (Goettingen, BBK Bundesliga Germany premier league) and New Zealand (Taranaki Mountain Airs, NBL New Zealand premier league).

-Jason Hartford ('08) (Unsigned free agent)-As of November 7, Hartford is unsigned for the 2011-2012 season. He was cut during the week of October 17 by Cader Rocha, LUB Uruguay premier league and is now a free agent. He was averaging 12.8 points and 6.4 rebounds per game, second on the team in both categories. The 6'9" Hartford previously played professionally in Portugal (Ginasio, LCB Portugal premier league), Finland (Huima, Korisliiga Finland premier league) and Mozambique (Maxaquene, D1 Mozambique premier league).

-Louis Dale ('10) (Goettingen, BBK Bundesliga Germany premier league)-As of November 7, Dale is averaging 13.7 points (leading his team in scoring), 2.4 assists, and 2.0 rebounds per game. Goettingen is 1-6 on season (17th place out of 18 teams in the German BBK). On October 5, Telkom pounded Goettingen, 84-65 despite 17 points from Dale. Dale is in his second professional season, both seasons in Germany with Goettingen.

-Ryan Wittman ('10) (Unsigned free agent)-As of November 8, Wittman is unsigned for the 2011-2012 season. He played the 2010-2011 season in Italy (Forli, LegaDue Italy 2nd division) and in the United States (Fort Wayne Mad Ants, NBA D-League).

-Jeff Foote ('10) (Unsigned free agent)-As of November 8, Foote is unsigned for the 2011-2012 season. He played the 2010-2011 season in Spain (Melilla, LEB Gold Spain 2nd division) while on loan from Euro League powerhouse Maccabi Tel Aviv of Israel.

-Adam Wire ('11) (Vaerlose, Denmark BBK premier league)-As of November 8, Wire is averaging 10.8 points, 7.2 rebounds and 2.2 assists per game. Vaerlose is 3-6 (7th place out of 10 teams in the Danish BBK). On November 2, in a 92-88 win over Horsens, he finished with 18 points and 10 rebounds. On November 4, 2011 he was named the Eurobasket Player of the Week for Denmark. The 2011-2012 season is his rookie year.

-Aaron Osgood ('11) (Vaerlose, Denmark BBK premier league)-As of November 8, Osgood is averaging 10.6 points and 6.7 rebounds per game. Vaerlose is 3-6 (7th place out of 10 teams in the Danish BBK). On November 2, in a 92-88 win over Horsens, he finished with 14 points and 8 rebounds. The 2011-2012 season is his rookie year.

Visit The Cornell Basketball Blog's Community Forum and Message Board to interact with other fans of Cornell and Ivy League basketball. Membership is free! You may also follow us on Twitter.

Blueprint for Success, the yearbook commemorating Cornell's memorable 2009-2010 season is now on sale and available for delivery. Visit the Cornell Athletics website to order your copy today! Or pick up a copy sold in the Cornell Store on campus.

Fans of the basketball program in the Ithaca area should not miss the opportunity to join the Cornell Rebounders Club.