Talking Points: 365 Days Until Tyler Smith Gets Drafted

Tennessee Football

• Smarter, Safer.  Lane Kiffin's first semester produced the highest team GPA in five years, and has seen zero arrests.  Some are making note of the fact that the team's GPA jumped significantly from the fall semester, but methinks that's less Kiffin stressing academics more than Fulmer, and more the natural reaction to slack off in the classroom (and elsewhere) when your head coach is being removed.  Either way, Kiffin deserves credit for both of these accomplishments.  Compete, compete, compete.
• Kiffin also stays classy on discussing the strength coach position, giving credit to Mark Smith for a job well done in six months while also praising new man Aaron Ausmus.

Tennessee Basketball

• Adding to the Legend of Ron Slay in Knoxville, The Godfather of the Headband told the crowd at last night's PRTL game that drinks were on him if he missed his next free throw.  He didn't, and his team of cagey vets won 136-129 over Chris Lofton (50 points, 18 of 32, 8 of 18 3PT) and Cameron Tatum's (34) combined effort.  Additional action from last night at the link from KNS.
• The NBA Draft is tonight, and Bruce Pearl is all over it.  Pearl will be on NBATV's pre and postdraft shows at 6:00 PM and Midnight EDT.  They're also promising some live interaction via NBA.com, though I'm not sure what that'll look like.  Also, Pearl spent a few minutes with Dan Patrick on his radio show yesterday, discussing Tyreke Evans, comparing Marcus Thornton and Jodie Meeks, and staying sharp when Patrick continually reminded him of Meeks' 54.

The Rest

• The Big Four preseason magazines - Phil Steele, Lindy's, Athlon & The Sporting News - have all been released, and stassen.com compares their rankings and compiles an average Top 25...apparently if you think Ole Miss is a Top 5 team, you're not alone...
• The SEC is the best at everything:  LSU wins the College World Series
• With the addition of Arkansas Expats (who link today to a story ranking the 12 SEC starting quarterbacks), SBNation has its 200th blog on the network.