Plenty to report from the first day of the adidas May Classic, on and off the court.

Although there was plenty of action on the court, it was easy to be distracted by the Assembly Hall audience. Eric Gordon, D.J. White, Ben Allen, Lance Stemler, Armon Bassett, DeAndre Thomas and Jamarcus Ellis were all in attendance. For the first game, White and Thomas helped run the clock, and for the third game of the evening the duo of Allen/Stemler manned the controls.

All of the players joked with each other and seemed to be enjoying themselves – although I would guess they were “advised” to be in attendance. The highlight came when an entire AAU team rolled up on an unexpected Gordon requesting autographs.

As for the play on the court, the biggest name in terms of IU recruiting in action last night was Angel Garcia. Garcia, who plays for the CAPS All-Star team, was less than impressive finishing with only four points.

Garcia did show flashes of potential while on the floor. His ball handling skills are impressive, and to steal Bill Simmons’s phrase he is something of a homeless man’s Dirk Nowitzki. He didn’t shoot well Friday night and reacted emotionally at almost every whistle or foul. Garcia has the potential to be a very good player, but he needs a lot of polishing.

After the game, Garcia confirmed that he would be a senior next season and would stay in the class of 2008. In order, he said he was interested in Indiana, Florida and Memphis. Garcia rambled off about a half dozen schools he was “interested” in, but he emphasized that those were the top three. Memphis is a distant third right now and Indiana is the clear favorite.

The East Chicago Central forward also said that he would be playing for the Puerto Rican National Team this summer. Garcia will be inactive the rest of the tournament due to his high school prom.

In the first game of the night, the Indiana Elite One (U16) defeated the Michigan Mustangs. The trio of Stephan Van Treese, D.J. Byrd and Colt Ryan proved talented enough to beat the Mustangs, despite not having their best games.

Coming off the bench, Van Treese displayed his athleticism and defensive prowess, while showing some offensive holes. He missed several close shots in the paint and didn’t finish well during this game. After the game, Van Treese admitted he was still trying to regain his touch stemming from his bout with mononucleosis.

Van Treese is regarded as one of the top-15 players of the class of 2009, and will be an extremely competitive target for the Hoosiers. Van Treese had about seven schools he said he was interested in, but spoke fondly of the Hoosiers. Could this be the Hoosiers mulligan on Lawrence North big men?

More to come tomorrow. We’re going to watch DeShasun Thomas and Ray McCallum at Bloomington North tomorrow afternoon, and Devin Ebanks and the Indiana Elite three at Assembly Hall later.

So we didn’t think we’d get to see Edgewood star Garrett Butcher tonight. His Indiana Elite Orange team was supposed to play the 8:15 game, but that got moved some Garcia’s team could play.

But now Butcher and Orange and facing the SoCal All-Stars because the D-I Greyhounds, featuring possible IU recruit Darius Miller, apparently didn’t show up.

Got that?

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Hey! Angel Garcia is here.

Garcia is the intriguing 6-10 slashing forward whose East Chicago High School team knocked off Eric Gordon and North Central in the Indiana state finals.

This is apparently the only game of the tournament Garcia will play because he’s got the prom tomorrow. He’s probably going to be a class of 2008 recruit, although there’s been some question about that because he’s still learning English.
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So I went wandering around the building, which is actually the best thing to do at these things. You see all sorts of people.

Right now is a quiet period in recruiting. So Indiana’s coaches aren’t being too active.
But they’re here. Waiting to be seen. They’re just sort of roaming the building, coincidentally. They can talk to the AAU coaches, and surely will.

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Van Treese has entered the game. Looks like he might be struggling with a slight knee injury of some sort, but he’s out there.

Meanwhile, D.J. Byrd has all five of Elite One’s points. It trails 10-5.

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D.J. Byrd, a 2009 prospect from Crawfordsville, Ind., has just scored the first bucket more than two minutes into the game, hitting a lay in.

Interestingly, highly-touted big man Stephan Van Treese, a junior to be at Lawrence North, did not start.

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Shock of all shocks, a rec tournament is running late.

Yes, game one has been pushed back here, as the Mustangs arrived a little late.

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About 20 minutes until tip-off of this May Classic opener between the 16 and under Indiana Elite One and Michigan Mustangs.

Doesn’t look like the Mustangs are here yet.

But who is here?

Current Hoosiers D.J. White, Armon Bassett and the two juco transfer in the class of 2007, DeAndre Thomas and Jamarcus Ellis.

Thomas is, as expected, a big dude. Ellis appears to be a pretty nice ballplayer. OK, he’s just here in street clothes so there’s no way to tell anything at all about him, but I like to create hype whenever possible.

The Indiana athletics department issued a press release Tuesday evening relating to the absence of coach Terry Hoeppner from the Hoosier football program. Here is the complete text of that release:

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. ­ In mid-March, Indiana head football coach Terry Hoeppner announced that he would not participate in the Hoosiers’ spring practices in order to attend to his personal health matters. Since that time, he has recuperated at home, and today issued this statement in response to the tremendous outpouring of support he has received.

“We want to thank the many fans and friends who have sent their best wishes and thoughts to us over the past several weeks,” Hoeppner said. “I continue to receive medical treatment and remain inspired to return to coaching when my health permits. I love Indiana University and Indiana football and will make decisions in the best interest of the program as I have always attempted to do. I will ask for your continued respect for the privacy of me and my family as I address these matters going forward.”

Director of Athletics Rick Greenspan speaks with Hoeppner and his wife, Jane, on a regular basis and offered this perspective.

“Hep’s health is of the utmost interest and concern to us,” Greenspan said. “We’ll continue to provide him with all of the support that we can with hopeful anticipation that he’ll get well as quickly as possible.”

The Hoosiers will open the 2007 season on Saturday, Sept. 1, when they take on Indiana State at Memorial Stadium. Game time is 8 p.m. ET and will be telecast in primetime on the Big Ten Network.

We’ve posted the presentations from today’s board of trustees meeting on our web site.

Just got here, to our front page, to find complete coverage including these files with all the interesting plans and artist renderings from both the Memorial Stadium and Assembly Hall discussions.

Join us tomorrow for a bit of an impromptu chat as we’ll try to answer any questions you might have about the recent news surrounding the facilities updates at the Indiana Bloomington campus.

Chime in with thoughts or concerns or questions or revelations and Doug and I will be along to answer the questions sometime in the afternoon. I know you’ll be anxious to get out of work on Friday, but drop by to check it out if you get a chance.

Just jump on over to http://www.heraldtimesonline.com/livediscussion/discuss.php to join us. Hope to see you then.

Should it stay or should it go now?

It’s up to you.

Option 1: Renovate Assembly Hall, the cavernously intimate home of all Bob Knight’s great success, at a cost of at least $50 million and probably closer to $100 million. Doing so would create a unified lower seating area — no more removable bleachers, just one big chunk of seating all around — add some sort of luxury suit/club box element within that lower bowl or possibly as a replacement for the balcony seats.

Option 2: Knock it all down and start all over again. Estimated price: $115 to $140 million.

Option 3: Do nothing at all. Except maybe a few piddly but necessary fixes around Assembly Hall as it prepares to be paired with the Basketball Development Center (i.e. building with a few extra gyms, a couple of offices and some locker rooms and training areas) by the end of 2008.

Cast your vote. Let your voice be heard.

No, this isn’t a democracy. It’s something much more powerful: it’s capitalism, and you’ve got all the money.

Click here to read an additional web update by Herald-Times reporter Steve Hinnefeld. 

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The Athletic Department presented three renovation plans for Assembly Hall today, and immediately after the meeting at least one member of the Board of Trustees — the president — said that updating the aging facility did not seem feasible.

Renovating Assembly Hall, which opened in 1970 but was designed almost a decade earlier, would cost at least $42 million. The most comprehensive plan — one that would add a row of club seating in the middle of the existing bowl — recommended by architectural firm HOK Sports would cost between $92 and $115 million.

“Considering those proposals, it seems obvious that renovation is not an option we would choose to pursue,” board president Stephen Ferguson said after the meeting. “If we’re going to spend that much, we might as well go build a new one.”

The board will hear proposals for the demolition and replacement of Assembly Hall at next month’s meeting. While HOK architect Jim Edson was hesitant to estimate the cost of a new building, he envisioned the project costing between $125 and $150 million.

We’ll have more on this story in the coming hours, including artists renderings of the possible renovations as well as updated drawings of the building that will connect the east and west stands of Memorial Stadium. Work on that project, by the way, is slated to begin by mid-June.