Thursday Morning Dump

- The must-read for this Thursday comes courtesy of the Memphis Commercial-Appeal's Dan Wolken, who wrote this excellent piece on Andre Hollins, a high-major recruit out of White Station High School in Memphis who is considering Harvard.

- Today's second must read comes from Paul Daugherty, who looks at the job Thad Matta has done recruiting to keep his Ohio State team relevant. Its an interesting contrast when compared to this column from Gary Parrish on John Pelphrey, who may have saved his job with his 2011 recruiting class.

- Pitt got a big time commitment from Canadian big man Khem Birch, a 6'8", 180 lb rebounding machine that ranks in the top 10 in the Class of 2012. Apparently, assistant coach Pat Skerry was a huge reason for Birch's commitment. Looks like that hiring is paying off already.

- Mike DeCourcy put together a very interesting column on the Big East and how many close the games are. Last season, 26% of the games during conference play were decided by one possession. That's a lot, especially when you consider that the Big XII had a number that was half of that. We made this point an infinite number of times last season, but there was no team more battle tested than Marquette, who played 12 games in the Big East that were decided by one possession. They didn't lose by more than nine until the Big East Tournament's semifinal against Georgetown.

- Offseason Dana O'Neil!!!! Her new faces, new places profile of Tod Kowalczyk.

- Andy Katz says that the Pac-12 is going to follow the Big Ten's new model for scheduling: two divisions for football, but only one in basketball. The league schedule will include one game against every team, a second game against a natural rival (USC vs. UCLA, Arizona vs. Arizona State, etc.), and six games randomly chosen. Each team in the conference will play four team just one, and the other seven will be home-and-homes.

- Good read from Fanhouse on a couple of Florida State hoopers.

- Leon Rice, the new head coach at Boise State is using the power of the Smurf Turf to haul in recruits. BSU just got a verbal commitment from Michael Thompson, a 6-foot-2 guard from Nevada. Over the summer, Joe Hanstad, a shooting guard from South Dakota committed to the Broncos as well. On top of that, coach Rice secured his first commitment from the class of 2012, forward Joe Nebeker.

- The Washington Huskies program has been busy in the off-season scooping up big-name recruits and staying in the public eye. Because of that, the Huskies have been rewarded with more than a handful of nationally-televised games this season.

- Steve Alford, the head coach at New Mexico and former Indiana Hoosier star, was listed 17th among the all-time icons in the Big-Ten.

Interesting behind the scenes look at Duke: