[More Cowbell]

Saw the following on nky.com and I thought I'd post it to get some chatter going about Mr. Basketball at the midway point. THe following is from a piece that Ryan Ernst did in today's Kentucky Enquirer:

Heading into the 2009-10 football season, Holmes senior Ricardo Johnson was among a group of potential Mr. Basketball candidates. At the halfway point, that group has gotten much smaller.

That leaves a field of three: Johnson, Josh Sewell and Elisha Justice.

Thoughts?

That is interesting, to see that this writer feels the race for Mr. Basketball has been reduced to a three-horse race. What's even more amazing is the fact that he puts Elisha Justice as one of those three horses.

Personally, I feel like Elisha has only a very slim chance to win the award. In my opinion, two factors are going against him. (1) I feel like Justice does not seem to have the respect of voters downstate. While he may garner plenty of support from EKY, I feel the prevailing notion of Justice outside the mountains is that he is too short and/or too slow to be considered one of the state's best. Which is unfair, but is partly the result of...

(2) Valley will have played a much weaker schedule by season's end than the other top contenders. Although I am constantly having to defend SV from their detractors on here, one thing I cannot defend is the schedule. It is an absolute disgrace that Valley has not played in at least one of the big-time state tournaments this year. KOB, Republic Bank, any of them would've allowed Justice a chance to show his stuff against top competition, and even more importantly, in front of the media in the state's biggest cities. Even if SV had taken some losses in these tournaments, Elisha's profile would almost certainly have been raised in many voters' eyes. Instead, while other contenders were showing off in the big tourneys, Valley was off in Florida far away from the state's Mr. Basketball voters. This falls back on the coaching staff or whoever was responsible for making the schedule, since to me the lack of quality opponents has done Elisha's candidacy a disservice.

My feeling is the award is Josh Sewell's to lose. He has been the best player on what has been the best team in the state (so far), and has the numbers to back it up. For Elisha to win, two things must happen: One, Trinity would have to lose in their regional and not even make it to Rupp, which considering who is in the 7th region is entirely possible. The other thing would be for Elisha's Shelby Valley team to make a magical, underdog run at Rupp, making it all the way to the state finals. Although SV has a good team, lots of things would have to fall their way, including getting a favorable draw. So this part would be much less likely to happen.

Still, plenty of season left to go, so a lot could still change.