news-record.com

Former coach Dave Odom is the new chairman of the EA Sports Maui Invitational.

Odom, who coached at Wake Forest and South Carolina, was chosen Tuesday to replace Big East commissioner Dave Gavitt in running the eight-team invitational celebrating its 26th anniversary next month.

Odom took the Demon Deacons -- and player of the year Tim Duncan -- to the round of eight in the 1996 NCAA tournament and his teams made the tourney a total of 10 times.

This year's tournament will be Nov. 23-25 at the Lahaina Civic Center.

The field will be Arizona, Cincinnati, Maryland, Wisconsin, Gonzaga, Colorado, Vanderbilt and Chaminade, the Division II host school from Honolulu.

KENTUCKY: University of Kentucky president Lee Todd says he has no problem with the way the school has handled the investigation into freshman point guard John Wall's eligibility.

Todd said Tuesday the school was simply trying to protect the freshman from Raleigh and did not apologize for keeping quiet about Wall's status. ESPN.com reported last week the NCAA was looking into whether Wall's relationship with his AAU coach -- who worked briefly as a licensed sports agent during Wall's high school career -- violated NCAA amateurism rules.

"It's an issue that we've been working on and it's one where we're protecting the player," Todd said. "We don't know what the answer will be, but when it comes out we'll be transparent."

The report said the school has known about the situation for some time, but Todd said the university did not want to put Wall and his family through press scrutiny.

Wall made two unofficial visits to Kentucky during 2007. Brian Clifton, Wall's AAU coach, was also a certified agent at the time. If Clifton helped pay for Wall's visits, that would constitute Wall accepting illegal benefits from an agent under NCAA rules.