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The Wilmington News-Journal reportsMarek Koltun, a 6-foot-10 center from Caravel Academy has accepted a scholarship offer from Lafayette. According to Koltun's prep coach, the Polish exchange student, also drew attention from George Washington, Bucknell, Rider and North Carolina-Wilmington.

"Drew attention from" and got offers from are not necessarily the same thing. We know, for instance, that Bucknell handed out its three scholarships for next year in the early signing period, though it is possible the Bison might have another to use because of the John Clark situation.

Koltun sounds more like the kind of big man you get when you don't decide to start offering scholarships until after the season is over. He was an honorable mention all-state pick in Delaware, which generally equates to an all-district type pick in bigger states. His team went 22-3 and finished second in the state, with two losses to the eventual state champs. In the state final, a 73-71 2OT loss, Koltun fouled out in the first OT, finishing with 9 points, 7 rebounds and a pair of blocks.

Bob Gibbons All-Star Report, a recruitnik site, filed a report on Koltun in mid-February that said Koltun's best days are ahead of him.

That report also noted:

Schools that have seen him play are UNC-Wilmington, Penn, Georgia, Rutgers, Lafayette, and Delaware. He scored 650 on the SAT-M and 450 on the SAT-V. His GPA at Caravel is 4.00+ and he wants to major in International Commerce.

While Koltun sounds like a project, he appears to be a good signing for Fran O'Hanlon, who had only one player over 6-7 on his roster this season and has not had a quality two-way big man since Stefan Ciosici graduated in 2000.

Today's Philly Inquirer reports Cornell coach Steve Donahue was back in town Friday for a second visit with Penn about the Quakers vacant head coaching job.

Donahue was an assistant to former Penn coach Fran Dunphy for 10 years.

With no other second visits reported, could this mean Donahue, not Lehigh's Billy Taylor, is now the favorite for the job?

We'll preface this post by emphasizing that this is not the type of report that would be classified as solid or certain. It is merely a rumor at this point, but one reported to Hoop Time by a source with very solid Penn connections.

Word is that Penn and Billy Taylor have agreed on a deal and that Taylor will be introduced at a press conference Monday or Tuesday as the Quakers' new coach.

Keep in mind a whole weekend can leave plenty of time for minds to change. Lehigh could sweeten the pot to keep Taylor in Bethlehem. Taylor could have second thoughts. There are myriad ways this could change over the weekend.

Our source says he is not comfortable enough yet to report it as fact for his publication. Certainly it is not a solid enough report that we would report it as a done deal.

But where there is smoke, there usually is fire, and it certainly looks as if Taylor's candidacy at Penn has taken on the front-runner status that some Philly papers have conferred upon him.

We're not linking to this Morning Call story because it says Lehigh's Billy Taylor is talking to Penn about its vacant head coaching job. That is old news.

What makes this story worth commenting on are a couple of little lines that typify what the media covering Lehigh has had to deal with all year:

He had no further comment.

School officials said they would not allow players to comment, either

Please Billy, take the job. Not because we want to see the league lose a talented young coach. Not, as many Brown and Yellow fans would love to believe, because we want to see Lehigh's program suffer.

No, we want Billy to take the job for one reason only: So we can watch the fun when he tries to duck the Philly media, which will never give him the free pass he gets in the Lehigh Valley.

Imagine Taylor trying to get through a Joe Knight-type situation without commenting, without telling the truth about why a star player is missing in the season opener. Imagine trying to tell Philly reporters covering a Penn game that questions have to be limited to that night's game during a postgame press conference.

Back in Bethlehem, Lehigh will still get away with the you can't talk to our players stuff because the Morning Call will continue to give them that free pass. But Billy in Philly will get the education in dealing with the media that he needs before moving on to the big time, as many think is his destiny.

By the way, the Philadelphia Inquirer is calling Taylor Penn's leading candidate in today's editions.

Remember Billy Taylor's statement about having had no contact with Penn about its vacant head coaching job? Apparently that needs to be updated.

There are reports today in the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Philadelphia Daily News and the student Daily Pennsylvanian that Taylor has already interviewed with Penn A.D. Steve Bilsky.

The Daily Pennsylvanian also adds the name of former George Washington and St. John's coach Mike Jarvis to the list of candidates while saying former Lehigh coach Dave Duke, who was an assistant to Penn coach Fran Dunphy before Dunphy took the Temple job, has the support of a lot of current Penn players.

The Pennsylvanian also reports whoever gets the job will be the John R. Rockwell Head Coach of Men's Basketball, reflecting the decision of Rockwell, a Penn alum, to endow the head basketball coach position. The student paper speculates the move will give Penn more money to work with to attract and keep a new coach.

From the league's official site:

For the second consecutive season, Bucknell junior center Chris McNaughton (Leuterhausen, Germany/Dientzenholfer) was named the Patriot League's Men's Basketball Scholar-Athlete of the Year. An electrical engineering major, McNaughton finished the 2005 fall semester with a 3.58 grade-point average while leading the Bison to its second-straight Patriot League crown and second-straight NCAA Tournament second round appearance.

The postseason honors were numerous for the towering McNaughton (6'11), who was also named First-Team All-Patriot League for the second-straight year as well to ESPN The Magazine's Academic All-District squad and to the NABC All-District team. In addition, McNaughton also earned his second-straight Patriot League All-Tournament team nod as the Bison capped off the first perfect League season in (14-0) Patriot League history.

The Patriot League's career leader in field-goal percentage (61.1 percent), McNaughton led the League and finished ranked 24th nationally with a 57.8 field-goal percentage last year. McNaughton will enter the 2006-07 campaign 37th all-time and the active Patriot League scoring leader with 1,158 points. His 12.8 ppg last season ranked him eighth overall in scoring in the League.

McNaughton is the third two-time Patriot League Men's Basketball Scholar-Athlete of the Year recipient, and first since former-Bison Dan Blankenship took home back-to-back honors in 2001-02. The first two-time winner was also from Bucknell, Valter Karavanic, who garnered back-to-back awards in 1999-00.

The biggest moment in McNaughton's young career came two seasons ago, when the Bison became the first-ever Patriot League team to win a game in the NCAA Tournament, as the second-year McNaughton hit the game-winning hook shot against Kansas in the first round in 2005.

McNaughton averaged 14.7 ppg in the Patriot League Tournament last season, and scored a career-high 29 points against No. 4 Villanova on Dec. 6, 2005 in Lewisburg, Pa. and led Bucknell with 15 points against No. 1 Duke on Jan. 2.

Lafayette's Fran O'Hanlon had left a crack in the door, but yesterday he slammed it shut, withdrawing his name from consideration for the Penn job vacated when Fran Dunphy became the head coach at Temple.

O'Hanlon told the Philadelphia Daily News:

"If the timing had been any different, who knows? Penn was certainly one of the places I would at least listen to. But after thinking about it, I just think this is what's right. Believe me, I've had a lot of sleepless nights lately. It wasn't easy, by any means. Penn is a great university, a great program. At the same time, I feel a sense of loyalty to the people at Lafayette. And now that we can give out scholarships, I think there's more to accomplish here. But I'm honored and flattered that the people at Penn thought enough of me to call and ask if I'd be interested."

The Daily News says Lehigh's Billy Taylor "remains very much in the picture."

In today's Philly Daily News, reports that Fran O'Hanlon has agreed to talk to Penn about its vacant head coaching job.

If O'Hanlon is as sure he is staying at Lafayette as some reports out of the Lehigh Valley have said he is, why even bother?

Just asking.

Story also says the name of Lehigh coach Billy Taylor continues to come up in connection with the Penn job.

Taylor was also mentioned as a candidate to replace Jeff Capel at Virginia Commonwealth, but the Gainsville Sun reports this morning that VCU will announce the hiring of Florida assistant Anthony Grant at a press conference this morning at 11.

In the Daily Pennsylvanian's latest installment on Penn's search for a new coach, the paper speculates that some coaches might be more interested in the job than they are saying in public, including Lafayette's Fran O'Hanlon.

Says the Pennsylvanian:

Those close to the search, however, say that both O'Hanlon and (Brown coach Glen) Miller may be more interested in the Penn job than their statements imply.

They do not want to appear eager to leave their current schools if they don't get the Penn job. Moreover, they do not want current and potential recruits to worry about their coach leaving.

The Pennsylvanian also calls Lehigh's Billy Taylor "one of, if not the, favorite" for the job.

Taylor's name also continue to be linked to the Virginia Commonwealth job, though the Richmond Times-Dispatch is not calling Anthony Grant, associate head coach at the University of Florida the frontrunner there.

American coach Jeff Jones' name had previously been mentioned as a possibility, but he is not on the paper's latest list.