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vertime BASKETBALL: NEWS AND NOTES the Tip-Off Before The Kickoff event, its equivalent of Midnight Madness. Doors to Mackey Arena for Purdue opens preseason BY GOLD AND BLACK STAFF 'TIP-OFF' THIS WEEKEND practice Friday night with the free event open at 8 p.m. Parking and seating are first- come, first-served. This week's football pep rally, normally held at Slayter Hill, will be held in the arena beginning Introducing ... GoldandBlack.com mobile App For the Android and iPhone at the Google Play Store and App Store at around 8:45 p.m., following the annual Homecoming parade, which starts at the Morton Cen- ter in West Lafayette at 7:45 p.m. At about 9:15 p.m., basket- ball festivities begin, starting with a musical performance. Introductions of men's and women's teams and their coach- es will follow. At about 9:45 will be the semifinals of the night's skills competition, as the teams will break down into groups of four to run a circuit that will require them to make a layup, a free throw, a three-pointer and a half- court shot to win. The Purdue dance team will perform at around 9:55, followed by the finals of the skills competition. At 10 p.m., coaches Matt Painter and Sharon Versyp will speak. After the Goldusters perform, Purdue's men's and women's basketball players will once again be front and center for the festivities of the first prac- tice much like they were here in 2008, the last time the Boilermakers had a special event to kickoff basketball practice. Anthony Johnson, Rapheal Davis and Neal Beshears. The event is set to conclude at about 10:30 p.m. CBS SPORTS PREVIEWS SEASON the night will conclude with the dunk competition at about 10:15. Participants will be Jacob Law- son, A.J. Hammons, Donnie Hale, related notes from CBSSports. com's preseason preview content Some Purdue- and Big Ten- being rolled out on its site: S CBSSports.com has only released a small portion thus far of its top 25 ("plus one") rankings and two Purdue opponents have already earned mention. Notre Dame, which Purdue its Mackey Arena in January, is tabbed at No. 25. S In its postseason fore- Virginia, which vis- Tom Campbell Goodman, Doug Gottlieb and Gary Parrish each picked the Hoo- siers to make the Final Four. Gottlieb also to make the Final Four, with one of them, Jeff Bor- zello, picking In- diana to win the national champi- onship. Borzello, Jeff picked Michigan to make it, while Parrish has Michi- gan State, too. All five writ- ers picked Indi- ana to win the Big Ten in the regular plays in Indianapolis in Decem- ber, is ranked No. 26, the tack-on to the site's top 25 rankings. West casts, four of the site's five con- tributors picked a Big Ten team prisingly, no Boilermaker made the site's list of the top 100 play- ers in college basketball for this season, but many others in the Big Ten did: Indiana's Cody Zeller (1), Christian Watford (38) and Victor Oladipo (84); Michigan's Trey Burke (9) and Tim Hard- away (35); Ohio State's Deshaun Thomas (10) and Aaron Craft (12); Minnesota's Trevor Mbakwe (15) and Rodney Williams (93); season. S Not sur- GOLDANDBLACK EXPRESS • volume 23, express 6 • 37