Tubby Smith has every reason to be frustrated with his point guard play, as Marcus Fuller writes, foreshadowing a point guard battle next year when Justin Cobbs and two-sport guard Bryant Allen takes the court.

Frankly, I can't wait to see someone else running the show for the Gophers, or at least pushing Al Nolen to play smarter basketball. When the Gophers were playing well this year, Nolen was playing his trademark solid defense and protecting the ball on offense. Now, the defense is still there but his stewardship of the game has turned way, way south.

Fuller also points out that Cobbs put up 47 in the California sectionals last week.

It sure would be nice if this team had a point guard who had some confidence offensively. Devoe Joseph has some confidence, but I still think he's more of a two-guard playing out of position.

As for Nolen, last year he just played hard-nosed basketball. This year, perhaps because of the influence of Lawrence Westbrook, he's been way out of control on offense. I'd suggest to Nolen to forget about props--like the arm band or whatever he wears like Westbrook does--and simply play basketball.

• 3rd Saturday in Blogtober profiles Tubby Smith as a potential candidate for the open Alabama job. I don't see Tubby jumping ship with Royce White and Rodney Williams coming in. But this is a well-done mini-profile for your enjoyment. It's nice to see what those outside of our fanbase think of what Tubby has done at Minnesota.
• The Gophers men's hockey team did what needed to be done this weekend at Mariucci Arena, taking three points in a weekend series with the UMD Bulldogs. GopherPuckLive has more.
• Here's a really long analogy regarding Tubby Smith and Billy Gillispie. (Scroll down a couple posts. For some reason the link to the post wasn't working).
• The Rivalry, Esq., gushes over Ohio State's Terelle Pryor, dubbing him "Superfreak." Pryor is obviously better than anything the Gophers can throw out there, but for an uber-hyped quarterback, I was underwhelmed. The bloggers point out that Pryor threw the ball less than 20 times per game while relying on an offensive line to block for Beanie Wells most of the time. With Wells gone and a reshuffled line, how will Pryor pan out in 2009?
• FanHouse has an NCAA or NIT post on our Golden Gophers. I maintain the Gophers need to win both home games this week to get a spot.