This city is clearly aching and desperate to become a basketball town again look how wild it's going for a flawed team that remains under .500.

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It's a particularly hot basketball town.

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And this proud, blue collar town, where basketball's shot clock was invented, is eagerly anticipating that again, just like in 2003.

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At the Marriott in downtown Wichita, Johnny Williams watched over eight children -- in town for a basketball camp -- in a ballroom where they'd taken shelter.

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The town is now such a nexus for basketball recruiting that Duke assistant coach Steve Wojciechowski, a Team USA scout, has said he has spent more time in the last 10 years in Las Vegas than anywhere but Durham, N.

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The basketball team has long played in the shadow of cross-town rival UCLA, which hired Steve Alford from New Mexico on Saturday.

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And they recruit in their own, unexpected way: by making sure their town's best athletes aren't ditching football for basketball and baseball.

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With the Nets in town (and soon the Islanders), there are actually basketball options for New Yorkers for the first time in more than a generation.

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Even her father in the stands repeatedly said, "Wow, " as his daughter took the game over and Cardinals men's coach Rick Pitino, in town to cheer on the Louisville women, called her one of the best freshman in basketball.

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