Dave Odom took the South Carolina job with the expectation that he would have a decent shot at getting back to the NCAA Tournament with a different club a season after leading Wake Forest to the Big Dance.

But it's going to be a lot tougher than he thought after getting word this week that 6-foot-10 junior center Marius Petravicius, the Gamecocks likely starter, will have to sit 17 games because he played with at least one pro in a league prior to arriving in Columbia, S.C.

"We're actually talking about 10th or 11th grade when he was on a club team," Odom said. "It's crazy."

	South Carolina's Marius Petravicius is one of 340 foreign-born players who may find themselves on the bench to start the season.

But penalties for foreigners like this one are here to stay for this season.

ESPN.com has been writing about this issue all summer. But coaches are still holding out hope that some players will be grandfathered in or the penalty will be reduced, to say a universal three games, through appeals. But that seems unlikely.

Bill Saum, the NCAA's director of agent, gambling and amateurism issues, flew to Europe in the spring to research club team basketball. Saum came back and put out a guideline for schools. This rule had been in place before and schools were hit, like Hawaii last season when it lost Haim Shimonovic for 22 games. But never has the NCAA gone after so many players en masse. And this rule is different than a player getting paid to play like former North Carolina forward Vassil Evtimov or one-time Ohio State signee Alexander Radejovic.

The NCAA reviewed 340 foreign-born men's basketball players on Division I rosters from last season and sent out letters to schools requesting more information. Schools had until Sept. 10 to respond but some did earlier and are getting back harsh penalties. Newcomers are being reviewed this month.

Women's basketball is next and Saum said he hopes to address the players before the season starts. But it's conceivable that foreign women's basketball players will be playing while their men counterparts are sitting in street clothes at the end of the bench, simply because the NCAA hasn't gotten to them yet.

"If coaches want this changed then change the rules," Saum said. "There isn't even a conversation on the subject. This rule has been enforced for years and there's no talk of anything else going on (like negotiating a reduction in penalties)."

Saum said the appeals process is open to schools and that's where nearly every case is headed.

College coaches like Odom are livid that the rule is being enforced after the fact with these players. Odom said he wouldn't have a problem if they passed a rule saying that any foreign player signed from this point forward had to show documentation that he never played with a pro.

"But to go backwards is crazy," said Odom, who would be losing Petravicius' 8.5 points and 4.7 rebounds a game during a critical time for the Gamecocks. South Carolina needs as many wins during its non-conference schedule as possible, especially at the Maui Invitational where they'll likely face Duke in the second round and then possibly UCLA or Kansas in the third game. Petravicius would also miss games against Providence, Georgetown, at Clemson and the first two SEC games at Florida and against Kentucky. South Carolina can count the first two exhibition games as part of the suspension, meaning he wouldn't be eligible until Jan. 16 at Arkansas.

The Gamecocks have two high-profile big men in 6-10 junior Tony Kitchings (10 ppg, 6.6 rpg) and 6-9 sophomore Rolando Howell (8.6 ppg, 5.2 rpg), but need Petravicius' experience and his big body to fill out the frontcourt rotation.

"I've been to the gym where Marius played," Odom said. "He got no money, only living expenses. It was subsistence money to play on a dirty court with no seating."

Odom said enforcing this rule contradicts USA Basketball awarding each winning player from the gold medal World University Games team $5,000. He said he was for that rule, but then "why penalize these foreign kids for getting nothing?"

"This is going on all over college basketball right before practice and it could change the NCAA Tournament because teams will lose games they're not supposed to," Odom said.

Petravicius met with South Carolina's compliance officer and its legal team. Most Division I coaches believe someone will sue the NCAA because of the renewed vigor that the NCAA is enforcing the rule.

"What's going to happen is some kids will throw their hands up and go home because they don't want to wait around for a year," Odom said. "If they're going to be treated like pros here they'll try and go get the money somewhere else.

"But we're talking about players who care about education," Odom added. "Petravicius is a 3.6 computer science, international business major. College basketball is getting squeezed every imaginable way with the NBA and now this. This takes away another viable reservoir for talent. It's absolutely wrong."

Odom's view is being echoed by coaches at East Carolina, Providence, Hawaii, California, Campbell and plenty of others who are seeing students who were going to be integral part of their teams sitting for much of the first semester if not the entire season.

"When I was at Wake, they told me to keep bringing these players in because they diversify the campus," Odom said. "They mean as much to the student body as a course. We have to get the presidents and the conference commissioners involved to change this."

And, according to Saum, that is the only way it will get altered in the coming months. The foreign-born players affected should be prepared to sit unless the NCAA management council passes emergency legislation at its October meeting.

Ohio State missing man in middle
The goal of the Buckeyes trip to Italy, France and Switzerland was to find an intimidator like the departed Ken Johnson.

But ...

"We didn't find that," said Ohio State coach Jim O'Brien said of the 14-day, six-game trip.

The Buckeyes did get reassurance that they could have one of the top backcourts in the Big Ten. O'Brien said finding a comfort zone between seniors Brian Brown and Boban Savovic, and juniors Sean Connolly and Brent Darby, made the trip. Add newcomers Brandon Fuss-Cheatham and Matt Sylvester, and the Buckeyes will have possibly a deeper perimeter than they did when they went to the 1999 Final Four.

"We saw that we'll be pretty good on the perimeter," O'Brien said. "But we need to find somebody to have a presence around the basket."

The hope is that 6-7 sophomore Zach Williams, who had two double-doubles on the trip, could provide some beef inside. But they'll need more out of Velimir Radinovic, Will Dudley and freshman Terence Dials, who wasn't allowed to go on the trip.

"Zach is definitely a four-man and he doesn't have great spring to his step and struggles around the basket, but he played well over there," O'Brien said. "Our other guys were OK. But I was running in a lot of guys and nobody stood out in our frontcourt but Zach."

O'Brien said they used a 24-second shot clock, which was really 22 because the shot had to hit the rim, so the ball had to be up sooner.

"We were really pushing the ball and scored over 100 points twice," O'Brien said. "I really let the guys go and that style suits Darby. He played really well and carried us. That style and now this team is geared toward our guards."

Ohio State seems to be forgotten in the Big Ten race, even though they made a run to get into the NCAA Tournament last season. But the Buckeyes can be a factor in the top five yet again, just as long as someone can defend in the post.

Bobcats bond in Italy
First-year Ohio coach Tim O'Shea returned from a two-week sojourn to Italy with a backup point guard, newfound confidence in Mid-American Conference potential player of the year Brandon Hunter, and a kinship with his players.

O'Shea, whose Bobcats went 1-4 on the trip against what he termed "top-level European teams," said he got a better assessment of his talent by playing better teams.

"I wanted this rather than 40-point blowouts," O'Shea said.

O'Shea is leaning toward newcomer Zach Kiekow at the point, but he's satisfied with sophomore Javion Harris and senior Jason Crawford as backup points. He couldn't take Thomas Stephens because the backup point on last season's team is the starting cornerback on the football team. Junior shooting guard Steve Esterkamp was apparently solid, but the best part of the trip might have been Hunter's ability to get around 7-foot centers.

"He got more insight into how he'll need to play against taller players," O'Shea said of the 6-6 forward. "We won't see it in the MAC, but we will when we go against teams like North Carolina. We went against teams that had frontlines of 7-2, 6-8, 6-9 and Hunter held his own."

O'Shea said Hunter expanded his game with a 15-17 foot jump shot, too. He'll be able to rotate in Cleveland State transfer Sonny Johnson behind Hunter once Johnson is eligible in December. But like the newcomers, Johnson couldn't go on the trip because he wasn't eligible to play last season.

"This group of players won 39 games in two years and they didn't need to go over there and beat everyone," O'Shea said. "We saw what we need to do to reach our potential."

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