The homecoming: 25 in a loss

AP:

... an electric evening as one of the city’s favored sons returned home.

Curry, the son of former Charlotte Hornets fan favorite Dell Curry, grew up attending NBA shootarounds and practices, starred in high school here, then did the unthinkable in leading tiny Davidson to within a missed 3-pointer of the 2008 Final Four.

“Pretty much everything I’ve done in my life has been within a 30-mile radius of Charlotte,” Curry said.

Curry arrived wearing a suit and hugged several Bobcats and arena employees as camera crews tagged along. His pregame availability was moved to the interview room to fit the crush of reporters, and he said he bought 105 tickets.

Read this too. Stephen: “I’m just happy to see so many familiar faces.” DavidsonNews.net: The crowd of 19,392 included numerous pockets of Davidson residents and fans decked out in red. Curry’s former Davidson College teammates were there, as were many family and friends from Charlotte. And Curry delivered, both in his performance and by recognizing his fans. He played all 48 minutes of the game. Sorensen: But Davidson never left him. Wildcats’ red and white is much more prevalent than the Bobcats’ colors. Chron: They gave a nine-second standing ovation when Curry was announced before the game. They erupted when he made his first shot. They even cheered his first touch, a routine accepting of an inbounds pass under his own basket. GSoM. Pictures from Tim.

Stephen out in Oakland

Marcus Thompson on Twitter: Curry sets new career high with pull-up 3 in transition. He’s got 34 on 11-for-18 FGs, 7-for-10 from 3-point range. Update: A triple-double. But not just any old triple-double -- 36, 13, 10. Tweets Marcus: one of six rookies ever to post 35/10/10. The other 5: Jason Kidd, Michael Jordan, Jerry West, Oscar Robertson, Elgin Baylor. Cowie on Cats.com: And despite all those who would have liked him at Davidson one more year (me included), he’s exactly where he belongs (in the NBA I mean not with the Warriors). Chronicle.

Posters for sale

In the bookstore on campus and at Cats on Main.

Davidson 79, Penn 50

AP from last night:

DAVIDSON -- Brendan McKillop scored 19 points to lead Davidson to a 79-50 win over Penn on Monday night.

McKillop led four players in double figures for Davidson (5-8). Jake Cohen scored 12 points, while Will Archambault and Ben Allison scored 10 each.

Davidson jumped out to an early 8-0 lead, and then went on an 11-1 run for a 24-8 advantage with 9:43 to play in the first half.

Charlotte: Against a team trying to turn around an 0-8 season, Davidson was not an ideal foe for Allen’s first game. Philly Daily News: Thrust into the coaching duties after the Quakers fired Glen Miller 2 weeks ago, Allen fell into a perfect storm of chaos in his debut last night. Davidson: The advantage never dipped below 20 points in the second half and reached as high as 34 on three occasions. Penn: Reality quickly set in, however, as the Wildcats were patient, athletic, and accurate on offense in the first half. David Boraks (with Tim Cowie photos) at DavidsonNews.net: Two games do not make a long winning streak, but since the Wildcats’ 103-91 loss to Gonzaga in Seattle, the team has been shooting more reliably and playing more aggressively, McKillop said.

The La Salle loss

The Observer:

CHARLESTON, S.C. -- It’s been more than 10 years since Davidson has started a basketball season at 0-3, but even after losing 84-70 to LaSalle Friday night in the ESPN Charleston Classic Wildcats coach Bob McKillop saw some promise.

“I’m delighted with our competitive toughness, the way we came back and in the end we were relentless defensively and getting better,” McKillop said after the Wildcats dropped their second straight game in the tournament to fall to 0-3 for the first time since the start of the 1998-99 season.

“There’s no way we feel good about losing the game, but I feel like we’re going to get better as we go along.”

Giannini in the Philly Daily News: “Davidson likes to play fast and we like to play fast, so I think this was a comfortable game for both teams in terms of tempo. Of course, when it gets down to around 4 minutes, you don’t want to shoot it that quickly, so we kind of backed off.” Inquirer. DavidsonWildcats.com. Cowie photos on DavidsonNews.net.

Dancing in October

More of Tim’s pictures here and here.

DavidsonPhotos.com

Total time suck. But in a good way.

May 6, 2008

Reed Jackson in Cornelius: “The last 10 minutes of the Georgetown game, far and away, it was the most extraordinary thing I’ve ever seen in sports. You could watch sports for your whole life and never be that close to something that extraordinary. With like four or five minutes to go, I said to my son, 'Jordan, watch this, because I’m 46, and you might never see something like this again.’”

Tim Cowie in Davidson: “I remember seeing Thomas shading into the low post out of the corner of my eye. I didn’t know how far Jason was out till I saw it on TV. I thought it was a good look. He took the shot, and I took the camera away from my eye when the ball was in the air, to watch.”

Jay Wade in Davidson: “When the shot missed? I was okay. We were in a position to win. That’s as much as you can ask for. But I was worn out, and I was tired -- and I was in Detroit.”

Duggar Baucom on the phone: “Those KU post players looked different against North Carolina and Memphis. Flesh to flesh. No kid in Bob’s program is ever going to be afraid of flesh to flesh contact. Or they won’t be there.”

This morning’s papers

Charlotte:

The Stephen Curry road show attracted the first sellout crowd in the two-year history of Samford's 5,000-seat Pete Hanna Center. But what the fans witnessed Saturday afternoon was a Davidson squad that showed it is far from a one-man team.

Birmingham:

The Samford Bulldogs almost hustled themselves into history on Saturday in front of a standing-room only crowd at the Pete Hanna Center.

The Bulldogs came within an off-balance fall-away 3-pointer and just one more free throw of upsetting Davidson College and ending a 40-game Southern Conference win streak. But Josh Bedwell's jumper with two ticks left on the clock bounced off the front of the rim and Davidson escaped with a 55-52 victory in front of 5,116 fans -- the largest crowd to see a game at Samford.

More Birmingham:

No doubt many of them showed up to watch Davidson star Stephen Curry, the leading scorer in college basketball, but they were treated to so much more.

They saw a Davidson team that, even with Curry struggling to find his shot, showed why it's to the Southern Conference what Memphis is to Conference USA.

At NCAA Tournament time, pick the Wildcats to win at least one game.

McKillop in the Birmingham gamer: “They play as a team of defenders. There’s no greater compliment than I can pay a team than that particular comment. You couldn’t just beat one of them; you have to beat their team.”

And Stephen: “I don’t have to do anything special for us to be good.”

Also: photos and slide show. Local TV too. And be sure to go read Tim Cowie.