Villanueva mum on plans for next year
WORCESTER -- After yesterday's loss in the second round of the NCAA Tournament at the DCU Center, Connecticut big man Charlie Villanueva wouldn't give an indication whether he would play for the Huskies next year or enter the NBA draft. "I'm not thinking about next year right now," said Villanueva, a sophomore who had 16 points and 12 rebounds in the loss. "It's something I have to talk over with my family before I make a decision. I just can't think about it right now."
Meanwhile, Julius Hodge is happy he decided to forgo the NBA draft last spring and remain at North Carolina State. It was a tough decision because he had earned the Atlantic Coast Conference Player of the Year award last year and there appeared no place to go but down.
"The reason I came back was my mom," said Hodge. "I'm a mama's boy and she said, `Come back and get your degree.' But this feels great. We just played with passion, pride, determination, love for our school. Those are all traits that our coach possesses and we were trying to get it done for him."
According to his coach, Herb Sendek, Hodge is a better player today than he was a year ago. "Julius is truly better in every way," said Sendek. "He's continued to mature, he is a terrific leader. He had the courage to come back to school after winning the ACC Player of the Year award. That took tremendous courage on his part to do."
A big-shot freshman
It may have looked odd, but N.C. State 6-foot-10-inch freshman Andrew Brackman drilling a 3-pointer isn't that unusual. He had made 17 entering the second-round contest against UConn. But making one with barely a minute to play and his team ahead by 1 point, not to mention his 0-for-5 performance from the field to that point, makes it special.
"That was a big, big, big three," Hodge said. "He's a freshman. This kid's like 18, and he takes and makes that shot. That's crazy right there."
Actually the graduate of Cincinnati's famous Moeller High with a reported 93-mile-per-hour fastball turned 19 in December. Thanks in part to his shot, the N.C. State baseball team will have to wait a while for his services.
"I knew it was going in when it left my hand," Brackman said. "If you make it, you're a hero. If you miss it, Coach is going to get on you and say it's not a good shot."
Off the mark
The downside of playing the game of one's life can be failing to match it. Welcome to Germain Mopa Njila's nightmare. The Vermont forward, who scored a career-high 20 points to lead the 13th-seeded Catamounts Friday in their 60-57 overtime shocker against fourth-seeded Syracuse, went scoreless yesterday when his team sorely needed someone to submit a similar performance. The senior from Cameroon shot 0 for 6 with a couple of ugly misses over 37 minutes in Vermont's 72-61 loss to Michigan State. "I didn't want to put any pressure on myself after the good game I had the last time," said Mopa Njila, one of the team's five seniors, all of whom are on track to graduate. "I just wanted to come in and do what I do best. I feel like I'm the guy who should provide a good basket or a good play when we need one, but I didn't do that today, and I'm very disappointed about that." . . . Taylor Coppenrath finished his Vermont career with 2,452 points, second on the school's all-time list to Eddie Benton (2,474). He reached double figures in his final 56 games. T.J. Sorrentine became the third player in school history to top 2,000 points, with 2,013.
Bob Hohler of the Globe staff contributed to this report.
