BEVERLY HILLS (MI) — In 2002, soon after “From the Swamp” was unleashed upon an unsuspecting Flyer fan base, one of my initial annual efforts was the “FTS Tour of the Mag Rack” — a pre-season peek at what all of the college basketball yearbooks had to say about our boys in Red and Blue. Back then, there were 5 or 6 of ’em and it took quite a bit of time to sit down in the local Borders, read ‘em over and critique what they had to say.

Now, not so much.

What used to be a bit of a pain in the posterior has gotten considerably easier because:

a) There are only 3 of ‘em left

b) Athlon is actually dumb enuf to put their content online for free, which begs the question: why would you ever bother to buy one of their rags?

Ah, what the hell, let’s do it for old time sake…here goes:

Lindy’s:

There are 21 different regional flavors of covers available. I’m sure that if you’re like me, you’re gonna jump right online and plop down $9.50 to put this POS cover in your shopping cart:

https://www.lindyssports.com/catalog/product_info.php/cPath/44/products_id/469

What’s underneath the front cover ain’t a whole lot better, either. How does picking the Flyers to finish 10th out of 14 teams in the A-10 grab you? After you’ve lost your lunch over that prediction, consider their choice of St. Joe’s at #1. Who wrote this drek? “Saint” Joe Lunardi? Phil Martelli? The Hawk?

Chris Wright is ranked as the #23 PF in the land, while X’s Derrick Brown is #11 –- they have that backwards, don’t they? X has the #25 recruiting class and according to them, Kenny Frease is the bigger, goofier second coming of Churchill Odia.

The #1 JC transfer is a familiar name. No, not Rob Lowery –- it’s Jeremie Simmons who signed with tOSU and who BG worked really hard to sign. In the Class of 2010, Adreian Payne is slotted at #10 and Juwan Staten #68 in their Top 100.

The fact that X poster “PM Thor” proclaims Lindy’s “the greatest ever” on the A-10 MB should tell you all that you need to know about this birdcage liner.

Athlon:

Hey, you guys can read as well as I can:

http://www.athlonsports.com/college-basketball/14157/2008-atlantic-10-hoops-preview

What you can’t see there is that Athlon has 22 “Super Sophs” and somehow Chris Wright ain’t one of them. Only X and Temple are in the Field of 64 from the A-10 according to Athlon and both are of the “one and done” variety. No 2008 UD recruits in the Top 100; PW is in the “Next 200.” Adreian Payne is #13 in the class of 2010 and Juwan Staten is nowhere to be found.

The Sporting News:

They have a total of 13 fashionable covers from which to choose to match your décor. This one is a little easier to take than Lindy’s:

https://www.streetandsmiths.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=store.cover&year=2008&catid=4&thisOne=7

TSN was a tad bit tardy out of the gate, as the published newsstand date was October 7th but their yearbook was nowhere to be found as of Columbus Day. When it finally showed up on the 16th, they said that UD would finish #4 and St. Joe’s #5…is that the same Hawks’ squad that Lindy’s had as #1 or is it the St. Joe’s in Indiana?

In the Top 100 Frosh, Paul Williams is listed as “All-Midwest.” The All A-10 Team has Chris Wright as a first-teamer, along with Ahmad Nivens of St. Joe’s, Kevin Lisch of St. Louis, Dionte Christmas of Temple and Rob Diggs of GW. In recruiting, X is #1 and UD #5 with the note that “Dayton’s 5 man class is one around which the Flyers can build. Paul Williams, a 6’4” guard out of Detroit spurned better offers to join the Flyers.” Don’t look for Rob Lowery’s name on the list of “Top JUCOs Moving On.” For futures, Matt Kavanaugh is an Honorable Mention for the Class of 2009; Juwan Staten and Adreian Payne are High Honorable Mention and BG targets Allen Payne (Cincy) and Aaron Cosby (Louisville) are Honorable Mention and All-City in their respective burgs.

USA Today:

http://www.examiner.com/p238054~USA_TODAY_Sports_Weekly_Publishes_College_Basketball_Preview_Special_Edition.html

Supposedly hit the newsstands October 6th — good luck trying to find it now.

Blue Ribbon:

They are far and away the best and most in-depth of the print guys –- you can order your very own copy here:

http://www.blueribbonyearbook.com/

Ah, for the good old days when ESPN.com had the Blue Ribbon content available online for free…in this case the ‘good old days’ being in the year 2000:

http://espn.go.com/ncb/preview2000/2168.html

With the paucity of printed predictors we welcome the rise of our online prognosticator overlords. Here’s what I could find that was worthwhile.

College Hoops Net:

http://www.collegehoopsnet.com/200809-dayton-basketball-preview-42-113677

Nice analysis. To me #42 seems about right.

College Chalk Talk:

http://collegechalktalk.com/

Only 10 months old, but they are making an honest effort to cover the Atlantic 10 and the Flyers. CCT has already picked their All A-10 Team and have started counting down their conference predictions. The only shortcoming I’ve seen thus far is that a story on UD newcomer Paul Williams attracted roughly 40 posts from every form of lowlife scum at the school down south, including one whose sig was “Swampy Meadows” which really kinda ****ed me off. Got a nice email from Chris Disano, the President of CCT, apologizing for said poster, but I told him that we’re quite used to such classy behavior from those dweebs.

Yahoo Sports:

http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/basketball/news?slug=teamreports-2008-ncaab-dae&prov=sportsxchange&type=team_report

Nothing earthshaking, but a pretty decent report.

Let’s face it, when it’s all said and done, if you’re talkin’ the Atlantic 10, there’s only one guy whose opinion really matters:

WH:

http://www.basketballforum.com/atlantic-10-conference/412700-whs-2008-2009-previews.html

WH will get to UD eventually, as he’s working his way up from the bottom.

Coupla other things I tripped over whilst surfing the net for this story:

College Basketball Fans:

How in the world is there no preview for the Flyers on this site:

http://www.collegesports-fans.com/basketball-previews/2008-2009-ncaa-preview.html

Then again, I didn’t see one for the Eggsavior Mouseketeers yet, either.

Peanut Butter Flyers:

http://www.peanutbutterflyers.blogspot.com/

“A Dayton Flyers blog where we still believe Sammy Smith.” Alrighty, then.

Flyers Fieldhouse:

http://www.flyersfieldhouse.blogspot.com/

Took the off-season literally and took it off, but they just awakened from a long summer nap the other day.

College Basketball Alltop:

http://collegebasketball.alltop.com/

Links to news and articles on each of the top conferences, all in one place.

Basketball Reference:

http://www.basketball-reference.com/friv/draft.cgi?college=dayton

A listing of all 37 UD players who were ever drafted by the NBA.

UD Basketball Wiki:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dayton_Flyers_men’s_basketball

So there you have it: the FTS “Tour of the Virtual Mag Rack” for 2008-2009.

Hey, BG: Not for nothing, but the NCAA Final Four is right down I-75 from me at Ford Field in Detroit this year…whattya say?

That’s it “From the Swamp.”
You can email me at: [email protected]