What the heck. It makes me a little nervous, but I’ll take some pressure for the early love going Pitt’s way.

Here’s video of Aaron Gray talking about his decision to return (Windows Media). It’s 5:48 long. Sounds like he was more hoping to go in the 18-25 range, and definitely couldn’t get the assurances. He also seems very positive about the decision to come back. Cool.

At ESPN.com, Chad Ford is positive on Gray going back to Pitt (Insider Subs).

Aaron Gray, C, Pittsburgh: A good decision. The draft was weak for big men, but Gray wasn’t generating a lot of buzz. Another strong year at Pitt should solidify his position in the first round.

This despite having Gray going at the end of the first round in his previous mock draft. Heck, knowing Portland could draft you had to be a little bit of a scary prospect.

As for how impacts Pitt, Andy Katz also agrees it’s big (Insider Subs).

Pitt: Getting Aaron Gray back was a must for the Panthers to be a Big East contender. Gray finally realized that being the BMOC for his senior season was worth waiting on the NBA. Smart move, since he would have been a likely first-round pick but just another Joe in the NBA for the foreseeable future. Now he has a shot to make a splash. Dixon said Gray’s “a lock for the lottery” in 2007.

Unless Gray has a monster season, his draft range probably won’t be too different. So there is the economic argument of not getting the same money for another year plus with the NBA rookie contracts, he also has to wait for his next contract. The contrary view is that another year to develop in college means he is a shorter project in the pros and that first free agent contract could be far better than he would have earned if he was still a project come that time. Of course it is all speculative and nebulous, but that’s the fun.

So now that the early entries of staying and going are done, how about the pressure for Pitt of another way too early pre-season top-25.

4. Pittsburgh (25-8)

• Aaron Gray returned for his senior season. He’ll be the immovable man in the middle for the Panthers.

• Sam Young might be the least-publicized elite forward in the country. Remember his name. He is a stud.

• The loss of Carl Krauser will hurt, but Ronald Ramon, Antonio Graves, Levance Fields and Keith Benjamin are all savvy enough to be the lead guard.

Pitt as an early consideration for a top-4 team? Not simply top-10. Yeep.

Luke Winn at SI.com also calls Pitt a big winner with Gray’s return.

Mike Gray said his son, Aaron, didn’t make up his mind about the draft until Sunday morning. “We talked about so much over the past two and a half days,” Mike said. “[Aaron] would keep sleeping on [the decision], but we processed all the information and he decided he wanted to go back to Pitt and enjoy his senior year.” The Panthers, no doubt, are rejoicing after hearing their 7-foot junior center’s intentions. By returning, Gray vaulted Pitt into the preseason top 15 — and became the front-runner for Big East Player of the Year following a junior season in which he averaged 13.9 points and 10.5 rebounds. “It’s a completely different team if I don’t come back,” Aaron said at the Pre-Draft Camp. With Gray and solid guards Levance Fields and Ronald Ramon — a backcourt that may get better now that Carl Krauser is gone — Pitt is a very dangerous team.

Interestingly, Winn thinks the Big East as a whole did not come out well with the early entry situation with all the players that left early.

…but what’s left now that they’ve departed? A duel between Pitt and Georgetown for the league title? Not nearly as scintillating as what transpired in Year 1.

The nervous thought for Pitt is that Georgetown has beaten Pitt the last 2 years and will also be very, very good and Hibbert is a 7-footer to match Gray. Katz had Georgetown ranked at #6.

Other teams Pitt will face in those rankings includes Wisconsin at #9, UConn #15, Marquette #20, ‘Nova #23 and Louisville #24.

[Originally posted to NEO Babble. Slightly altered.]

Is there any breed of writer more repressive, reactionary, shortsighted and just generally hating fun than the sportswriter? Whenever something happens their first response is to call for bans, laws and restrictions.

The periodic idiots who run on to a playing field? Ban alcohol sales.

Issues of performance enhancing drugs. Expand drug testing to include blood samples and demand to hold on to blood and urine samples for years to test even later in life, as other testing procedures are developed. Never mind what the implications are for privacy and general labor and employment law issues. It’s all about the “integrity” of the game.

Ben Roethlisberger gets in a serious accident while riding his motorcycle sans helmet. After the boilerplate stuff about how its a relief he’s okay, you get the fuming on the stupidity of a) riding a motorcycle without a helmet and/or b) riding a motorcycle at all.

Fine. I get it. These are top athletes making tons of money based on what their body can do, and they are taking a substantial risk to their career — not to mention the risk to the hopes and dreams of the fans. I don’t even disagree. Drive the frickin’ Hummer tanks so that no harm will come to the athlete if an accident occurs.

But it’s never enough to simply say the players shouldn’t do something. No, the rules are all wrong.

And while we’re at it, how dumb does Pennsylvania look for not making helmets mandatory? I heard a state legislator on the radio this morning say that this accident wouldn’t cause him to change his mind. It’s about human rights, he said. Riders should not be forced to wear a helmet.

I’ve got one for you, Mr. Politician. Let’s repeal seat-belt laws, and gun laws, and minimum drinking ages, and let’s just let America be the Wild, Wild West. Do what you want, when you want.

That’s right. Not making helmets mandatory for motorcycle riders is the first step on a slippery slope to the anarchy of personal choice and destruction.

I don’t ride a motorcycle. I don’t own a motorcycle. The wife wouldn’t let me even if I wanted to. I also don’t care if people want to ride without a helmet. Thin out that old gene pool a little more.

You want to make more people wear a helmet more often? Loosen the law. Specicially state insurance regulation. The states have tight control over vehicle insurance policies. How about allowing insurers more freedom to void insurance policies if in an accident while helmetless? That means no money for medical bills, or to replace the bike. People want to take a risk on losing not only their life, but all their money? Go for it. The insurance companies can even put that in 18 point font on the policy, so it is clearly seen and understood. Financial ruin can be a hell of an incentive. The insurance companies can charge motorcyclists more if they don’t want that limitation.

It’s approach the federal government uses to get states to change laws on speed limits, DUI levels and such. Cutting off key federal money if certain standards aren’t met.

The mini-matchup between 4 Big East teams and 4 SEC teams will happen starting in the 2007-08 season.

The Big East and SEC will put together two doubleheaders each season for three years – with one doubleheader in SEC territory and the other within the Big East’s geographical footprint. Teams will play just one game in the event’s three-year run.

Unlike the ACC/Big Ten Challenge, which uses on-campus arenas, the SEC-Big East event will be played only on neutral courts.

“I don’t want to use the word challenge,” Big East commissioner Mike Tranghese said Wednesday. “I’d refer to it as a shootout. Teams are only going to play once, instead of each and every year, and we’re going to use big arenas in neutral sites.”

All games in the event will be on ESPN or ESPN2.

The three-year run will allow each of the SEC’s 12 teams to play one game in the series, while only 12 of the Big East’s 16 teams will participate. However, Tranghese said the event would be extended once the SEC signs a new deal with ESPN.

The SEC’s current agreement runs out after the 2009-10 season.

No word yet on which teams will play. Obviously if ESPN is broadcasting them, they will have more than a little say in which teams meet. I don’t expect Pitt to be included in the first year.

Still the question remains as to why only 4 teams at a time. Why not 12 or even 8? Why has the Big East so fiercely resisted doing a conference challenge?

“I’m opposed to that,” Tranghese said. “I think it’s the job of the individual schools to put together their own schedules. If a Syracuse, for instance, wants to play a Michigan, it should have the ability to schedule a home-and-home series on its own.”

The dates for the SEC/Big East games are Dec. 5-6, 2007; Dec. 10-11, 2008, and Dec. 9-10, 2009.

The sites of the games have yet to be determined. Potential Big East sites are Boston, Chicago, Buffalo and Indianapolis. In the SEC’s region, sites could include Orlando, Atlanta, Nashville and New Orleans.

I have to agree with Big East Basketball Report.

In other words, I think Tranghese is taking the bullet here, the Big East coaches opted out of the original ACC/Big East challenge because of scheduling concerns and with many smaller institutions and non-public schools that are not the large land-grant universities, most Big East schools are very careful in scheduling thier non-conference games to maximize their revenue. Sharing the pot with the league and locking in to a game, with the impending 18-game league schedule, probably is something most schools would resist.

Tranghese has always been much more of a consensus builder and manipulating the situation. He has never been much for forcing schools to comply with an edict unless he is absolutely convinced it is in the best interest of the full league (such as limiting the Big East Tournament to 12 teams).

Have to figure that in the next week or two the Big East will finally announce the conference schedule and most of the TV dates now that Gray is coming back and Pitt will be presumed to be one of the conference favorites.

I’m not saying everyone was expecting the worst with regards to Gray. I’m just saying there seems to be a real surprised tone to the stories reporting that Pitt will have Gray back for his senior year.

Because of Gray’s return, the Panthers will have high expectations entering the 2006-07 season. With three other starters returning, the Panthers likely will be a preseason Top-10 team and the favorite to claim the Big East championship.

Many of the top teams in the Big East had their rosters depleted because of early entrants into the NBA draft. Connecticut lost forward Rudy Gay, point guard Marcus Williams and center Josh Boone and Villanova lost point guard Calvin Lowry.

Gray will be a Big East player of the year candidate after earning most improved player in the Big East last season after averaging 13.9 points and 10.5 rebounds per game in his first season as a starter.

“We’ve had success. He had a chance to finish with the guys he came in with,” Dixon said. “It’s the closest group I’ve ever been around. He enjoys college. If he didn’t play basketball, he would be going to college anyway. That made him unique than some other kids who have put their names in the draft from other programs over the years.”

UConn also lost Denham Brown, Hilton Armstrong and Rashard Anderson to graduation. Randy Foye is also leaving ‘Nova. The entire starting line-up for WVU is almost entirely graduating.

Coach Jamie Dixon, as he tends to do, did not try to take any credit for helping Gray too much — even as the facts showed otherwise.

Pitt coach Jamie Dixon likened the past few days to cramming for a final examination. Dixon was working the phones Saturday and yesterday morning trying to get the most up-to-date information concerning Aaron Gray’s NBA draft status.

In the end, Dixon looked fatigued but happy last night after Gray decided to return for his senior season with the Panthers.

“I didn’t give him too much advice, really,” Dixon said last night at the Petersen Events Center. “I gave him feedback. That was my job. I made it very clear to him that we would like him back. He knew where I was coming from.”

And yet he was there the whole time.

“Aaron and I spent a lot of time together during the past two days,” Pitt coach Jamie Dixon said. “We stuck to the plan, even though there were some people who were anxious. I anticipated this was going to go down to the wire, and it did.”

As late as yesterday, Dixon was receiving calls from NBA personnel, many of whom indicated Gray would have been a first-round selection when the draft is held June 28 in New York.

But Gray, who became a starter for Pitt just last season and was the lone Big East Conference player to average a double-double (13.9 points per game, 10.5 rebounds), remained loyal to the Panthers. He informed Dixon and his teammates of his decision just before the 5 p.m. deadline for early entry withdrawal.

The big thing seemed to be the lack of an absolute guarantee from some of the teams that seemed most interested in him (and/or perhaps the risk that Portland would take him at #30). The NBA people would have loved to have kept Gray in the draft, just to increase the overall talent pool. A legit argument or scenario could be made for each team picking from Indiana at #17 to the end of the first round (expcept for the Lakers), to take Gray. Yet no one could pull that final trigger to lock on him, thankfully.

The consensus is that Gray and his family were really unsure the entire time whether to stay or go. Now there is a legitimate belief that this squad can go far this season.

“This is something that will energize us as a team. It certainly has me excited,” said Kendall, a senior forward for the Panthers. “Aaron is a good friend of mine, and I’ve talked to him about this from time to time. Every time I did, I got the feeling it was pretty much up in the air. I have to tell you that I really had no idea what he was going to do. I think he was feeling the same way.”
…
“It’s huge that he’s coming back,” Kendall said. “This gives us an even better option to go large or go small. We’ve got a lot of combinations we can go with. Now, we’ve got to take the next step. I think we’re going to be a real dangerous team. We should be pushing for the Final Four.”

Barring injuries, of course (knock on wood).

Gray, apparently, will be speaking directly with the media some time today.