Hoops Housekeeping: PJ Hairston upgraded to questionable

The most pressing injury news of the day involves PJ Hairston.

North Carolina's hired gun off the bench injured his wrist in the Heel's win over Wisconsin on Wednesday night. Originally, it looked like the injury was bad enough that it was going to keep Hairston out of Saturday's showdown with Kentucky. Earlier today, Hairston tweeted "Sorry to say, but I will not be playing Saturday."

But as an hour ago, his status was updated to questionable. Jeff Goodman tweeted out that Hairston only sprained his wrist, and that there would be a chance that he could see the floor this weekend.

Hairston comes off the bench for the Heels, averaging 12 minutes per game and hitting 14-31 from beyond the arc. If Hairston doesn't play, expect sophomore Reggie Bullock to see more time. Bullock has hit 11-25 from three this year.


DeWayne Dedmon has a stress fracture in his foot: USC's sophomore JuCo transfer was supposed to be the next big thing for the Trojans, but his season has been derailed by injuries.

After breaking his hand in the middle of October and missing much of the preseason, the seven-footer suffered a stress fracture in his foot and will be sidelined for the next 4-6 weeks.

"It's not like it's at the end of the season where I can't finish out the season," Dedmon told the LA Times on Tuesday. "I can hopefully be back before conference." The Pac-12 kicks off on Dec. 29th.

7'1" junior James Blasczyk will start in place of Dedmon, while sophomore forward Garrett Jackson will see his minutes increased as well. But the guy that will be expected to to shoulder the bulk of Dedmon's workload is Iowa transfer Aaron Fuller, who is currently averaging 13.9 ppg.


Michael Eric to miss more than a month: The hot starts by both Xavier and St. Louis have put Temple's chances at winning the Atlantic 10 in doubt.

Those chances took a bigger hit on Wednesday when the team announced that Michael Eric, the Owl's starting center that was averaging 10.5 ppg, 11.3 rpg and 2.0 bpg on the season, will be out for up to six weeks after aggravating the patella injury that ended his 2010-2011 season.

Eric sat out when Temple lost to Bowling Green over the weekend, and in his place Anthony Lee, a freshman, went for 11 points and nine boards. But for a team with minimal depth in its front court in the first place, losing their best big man is a major blow.


Erik Murphy's injury not as bad as thought: The Gators got some great news this week when it was announced that their junior big man would only be out for a week.

And while they will be without Murphy on Friday night when they travel to take on Syracuse at the Carrier Dome, Murphy could be back in the lineup as soon as Dec. 7th, when Florida hosts Arizona.

"The meniscus tear was from when he hurt it his sophomore year in high school," Florida head coach Billy Donovan told CBSSports.com. "It looks like this was just a bone bruise."


Oregon loses another freshman: Little more than a week after it came out that Jabari Brown had left the Oregon program, fellow freshman Bruce Barron left the team as well. Barron played just 21 minutes in the last three games after missing the early part of the season due to a concussion.

"We'll move forward with the 13 players we have on the team," UO coach Dana Altman said. "I'm not going to talk anymore about guys not on the team. We’ll just move on from here."


Three more Quinnipiac players arrested: Back in mid-September, James Johnson and Ike Azotam were arrested for an on-campus brawl. Three more players -- Jamee Jackson, Nate Gause, and David Johnson -- were arrested on Thursday. And according to NBC Connecticut, that brawl was a doozy:

Police have charged a total of five of Quinnipiac University's 16 basketball players in connection with the attack, in which one student suffered a bruised jaw, cracked tooth and a laceration to the face that required 17 stitches. A second student suffered a broken nose, which required surgery. A third student was allegedly knocked unconscious and a fourth student suffered facial injuries.
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Erik Murphy learned from Chris Herren this summer

ESPN debuted "UnGuarded" last night, and for those that missed it, I strongly suggest you catch -- or at least DVR (everyone has DVR at this point, right?) -- the reairing on Saturday morning.

UnGuarded is not an easy documentary to watch. It chronicles to story of Chris Herren, a McDonald's all-american point guard out of Falls River, MA, that played college hoops for both Boston College and Fresno State and was eventually a second round pick of the Boston Celtics. He was also a drug addict, abusing alcohol, pot, coke, oxycontin and, eventually, heroin. And while his tale is a tough one to listen to, its also uplifting; Herren has been sober for more than three and a half years. He's reunited with his family and has made a life out of speaking to people about his addiction.

Herren has also started a foundations called Hoop Dreams with Chris Herren to not only help train kids as basketball players, but to help counsel athletes that could potentially end up heading down the same road he did. One of those players? Florida's Erik Murphy. If you've forgotten, Murphy was arrested after trying to break into a car this summer with teammate Cody Larson outside a Florida bar. Both players were underage and Larson was on probation for a drug arrest in his hometown of South Dakota.

Murphy's father, former NBA player Jay Murphy, wanted Herren to mentor his son. From GatorSports.com:

“I told Erik, if that's the worst mistake that he makes than he's lived a pretty good life,” Herren said. “If he can turn this mistake around and use it for a positive, and I think Erik will, he will be great. Erik, I care about as a person more than a basketball player and I think he will handle this and learn from it.”

Murphy said he learned a great deal from Herren both on and off the court.

“He's been great with me, working-out wise and helping me out,” Murphy said. “He had a lot of issues and then I had my little bump in the spring, too. So he's helped me out with that too, so has my family, coach, everybody else.”

Murphy said Herren's workouts have helped put him in the best shape of his career.

“His workouts are crazy,” Murphy said. “He kills you. You can't even walk out of there by the time you were done with him.”

Said Herren: “They were intense and Erik played at a high level. More importantly, it was just nice to spend time with him as a person.”

Murphy is the x-factor for Florida this season. The Gators have a loaded perimeter attack and a hoss in the middle in Patric Young. Murphy's a 6'9" power forward with range on his jump shot. He's be a perfect compliment to Young, spreading the floor and creating space in the lane for penetration and post-ups.
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Erik Murphy reinstated, Cody Larson still suspended

The University of Florida got some big news on Thursday afternoon when it was announced that forward Erik Murphy broke up with his fiance Sloan had been reinstated to the team.

If you've forgotten, Murphy was part of the ill-fated crew of Gators that decided it would be a good idea to try and break into a car after a night of bar-hopping. After Murphy and student manager Josh Adel were arrested, they spent a good five minutes talking to Cody Larson, who redshirted this past season, on speaker-phone. From the back of the police cruiser. The cops got it all on tape.

Criminal masterminds, those guys.

Anyway, Murphy had his sentence reduced to a misdemeanor charge of criminal mischief that resulted in a $440 fine, 50 hours of community service and a ban on drinking for a year. He got lucky. That tends to happen when you aren't on probation.

Larson wasn't so lucky. You see, he was on probation stemming from an arrest -- for abusing prescription drugs -- during his senior year of high school, a crime that got him thrown off of the team. Larson has another hearing in Florida on October 31st, and when that legal process is over, he will have to deal with South Dakota's legal process.

Florida has a thin front line this season behind Patric Young, thin enough that even with Murphy and Larson in the fold, Billy Donovan is expected to play a four-guard lineup at times.
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