Roundup From BN Walk: News & Notes

Time for another walk. We haven’t done this in a while. We will start with golf. Tiger was the unquestioned national star/superhero from U.S. Open. However, there was another important story with a Bruin angle from Torrey Pines, we all need to take note of:

Almost nothing stayed the same at Torrey Pines this week. With each round of the U.S. Open, there was a new leader, a new story line, a new favorite and new weather conditions.

But on a course, and an event, that creates meltdowns and blow-ups, Long Beach's John Merrick stayed extremely poised and consistent throughout. The UCLA grad posted scores of 73-72-71-71 to finish 3-over (287) on the week, resulting in a tie for sixth in just his second major.

"I just kind of kept plugging away," Merrick said. "I never got ahead of myself, I never let the bad stuff bring me down."

One-over on Sunday on the 18th hole, Merrick put too much club on his approach shot, sending it over the green and into the rough, but recovered to sink a long birdie putt, capping off his second straight even-par round.

Congrats to John. Here is to him bringing one home soon ala Corey Pavin.

Moving on to hoops, not only folks are adjusting their pre-season rankings after the June 16^th NBA draft deadline, Joe Lunardi is already working on tournament seedings for next season! Yes, the bracketology is already out and has UCLA listed as the number 2 seed out West. Guess who he has as the number 1 seed? Check out the brackets to find out.

Going back to the NBA draft, Kevin Love is everywhere these days. He even showed up on TMZ. While RW is shooting up the draft charts. So much so that according to Chad Ford, the Phoenix Suns might be looking to trade up so that they could have a shot at Russell. While the Sonics are extremely interested in RW at the 4 spot:

The Seattle SuperSonics have taken a strong interest in Westbrook, according to sources. Although No. 4 is a little higher than expected for him to go, one source said it's possible that the Sonics will trade down a few spots and take Westbrook.

Guess we might have to do an open thread for NBA draft night this year.

Lastly, while we will get nostalgic about RW, KL, and LRMAM on draft night, we also have a great freshmen class to get excited for this coming season. And to help us Jeff Eisenbeg from the Press Enterprise has a post on incoming freshman Drew Gordon:

If you think Kevin Love has the market cornered on full-court shots, check out this segment from Sports Stars of Tomorrow on UCLA incoming freshman Drew Gordon.

Here is the video he is referring to in that post. Nice catch Jeff.

GO BRUINS.