Two of the biggest names in the 2007 Pitt recruiting class are DeJuan Blair and Darnell Dodson. Both are hitting the high school all-star circuit hard.

On Thursday  Dodson played in the Capital Classic and had 18 or 20 points.

DeJuan Blair is in France for an all-star game.

Reports, though, are that both are not yet academically eligible to play for Pitt next year. Yes, Blair may have gotten the SAT scores in order, but there are still the grades portion that remains unfinished. I’m hopeful, but he’s not there yet.

Colin Dunlap for the P-G, however, really hates the HS all-star games. Or at the very least, he resents the fact that part of his job is to cover them.

ESPN has moved the Navy-Pitt game from a Saturday nooner on September October 13, to a September Octobaer 10, Wednesday night prime-time game at 8pm (hat tip to Chris).

“We are pleased and excited that ESPN has provided us with the opportunity to renew the Pitt-Navy series in front of a national television audience,” said Pitt Athletic Director Jeff Long. “Playing the national college football showcase game on Wednesday night allows us to take advantage of an opportunity for national exposure without compromising our desire to not play on Friday nights out of respect for the traditions of Western Pennsylvania high school football.”

“This is a real win-win for us,” Pitt head coach Dave Wannstedt said. “We’re getting a nationally televised game, which is always great for our program and recruiting. The date change also gives us a week-and-a-half to prepare for two consecutive opponents in October (Navy and Cincinnati) which we hope to use to our advantage.”

The Panthers’ remaining six home games will all be played on Saturdays. Additional television games are expected to be announced in the future.

Obviously this is a huge pain in the ass to those who want to attend, but at least it is early in the season when it is still warm.

Really, I wanted to rip it more, since I have a 2 1/2 hour drive and a mid-week game plays havoc with scheduling and planning. Then I thought about the original date and realized I would have missed it as the game would have fallen right on Rosh Hashana. This actually will break a streak with the moving of the game. It’s the first time at least since I’ve been holding season tickets that a Pitt home game won’t fall on Rosh Hashana or Yom Kippur.

Still not sure I’ll make this game, but it’s hard to be as pissed when I definitely would have missed it on it’s originally scheduled day.

Might as well pass along this bit of general weirdness as porn star Joanna Angel talks about being the most observant Jew in the porn industry. I’m really not sure there needs to be a punchline to this.

UPDATE: Strike that, I am pissed since I looked at the date wrong and saw September not October.  Yom Kippur falls on the home game with UConn. The streak continues.

This may be one of the silliest in a while. The ongoing mess at Arkansas. The number of dominoes falling over for various schools with coach poaching. Now Kentucky fills it’s spot with Gillispie leaving Texas A&M for Kentucky (I called that one a week ago). Andy Katz notes the names initially being bandied about in College Station (Insider subs).

The names already being tossed about in College Station: Pitt’s Jamie Dixon (who is now entrenched in the Steel City but did play in Texas at TCU), Oral Roberts’ Scott Sutton and Nevada’s Mark Fox.

I’m not taking this seriously. This is just the idle list period. Cast eyes about for potential lateral move coaches or up-and-comers with some/any sort of geographic connection and then put their name on a list. Hell, for whatever reason, Dixon’s name was mentioned with regards to the Arkansas job.

I guess, though, from a historic perspective there’s some natural wariness when Texas A&M casts its eye towards a Pitt coach.

The whole meme, by the way, about Pitt needing better players has now gone beyond conventional wisdom. Smizik is now on board with it. I’m really not sure what the point of his column was. This was clearly a filler column as he needs to wait a bit longer to start complaining about the Pirates.

UPDATE: It wasn’t just Katz tossing out the name.  Earlier that day, a columnist in Texas had also made reference to at least some passing interest in Dixon.

I repeat, this is the fun part for the media. Some of it is  trying to get some inside sources to give something useful, but it’s really too early for anything serious. What they are doing are trying to make some reasonable guesses as to who would be on the list and why.

I see from the comments regarding Huggins to WVU the speculation is heavy that Pitt might be involved to get Beasley if K-State eventually releases him from his Letter of Intent. PSR-Keystone Recruiting also noted it. There’s speculation that Pitt might find a way to free up one extra scholarship to get Beasley. He’s a tremendous talent that might be worth it. But would he be worth two scholarships and complete disruption?

A fellow Fanhouser posted on Dominique Sutton — another K-State recruit — claiming that he and Beasley are a package deal to go anywhere. Sutton claims that NC State, FSU and USC all have expressed interest. The other point is that the real question is where does Beasley’s former AAU Coach and Huggins assistant Dalonte Hill go? He’s the one that got Beasley to first verbal to Charlotte then move to K-State when he got hired there.

Just not seeing this happen.