Text messages from press row ...

The 2008 NBA draft is still two months away, but nbadraft.net already is projecting that USC’s Demar DeRozan will be the No. 2 pick in next year’s draft. . . .

DeRozan, a guard from Compton, has yet to enroll at USC. . . .

O.J. Mayo could be taken as high as third in this year’s draft, but NBA draft insiders believe there is a “huge dropoff” between the top two prospects and the rest of the field, an NBA talent evaluator says. . . .

The top two are Michael Beasley of Kansas State, which ended Mayo’s college career, and Derrick Rose of Memphis, which ended Kevin Love’s. . . .

The same NBA talent evaluator expects Love and UCLA teammates Russell Westbrook and Darren Collison to make themselves available for the draft and to be taken in that order, with Love almost certainly a lottery pick. . . .

Who would have predicted last fall that so much would be riding on an April game matching the Lakers and New Orleans Hornets, including top seeding in the Western Conference and MVP jockeying between Kobe Bryant and Chris Paul? . . .

Not Bryant, that’s for sure. . . .

How thankful must he be not to have landed in Chicago? . . .

Some say newspapers are all but dead and college students don’t read them, Kansas journalism school dean Ann M. Brill notes, but the Jayhawks faithful stood in a line for an hour to get a copy of the student newspaper this week after Kansas won the national title and, because of demand, 58,000 copies were printed. . . .

Writes Brill in a letter posted at poynter.org, “The crowning moment was when the student salesperson looked up to see Mario Chalmers, the hero of the game, standing before her asking if he could get a copy of the paper.” . . .

Reader Thomas Bibbs of Chandler, Ariz., a transplanted Dodgers fan, e-mails to ask, “Is that Andruw Jones in center field, his father or his grandfather?” . . .

Memo to Stanford Athletic Director Bob Bowlsby, looking for a basketball coach after Trent Johnson reportedly got tired of waiting for a new contract and bolted for LSU: Bob Knight is available and owns a dresser full of red sweaters. . . .

The only coach with a losing record in the storied history of Kansas basketball is James Naismith, who invented the game. . . .

Would anybody be surprised if another five years passed before we saw another birdie-free round by Tiger Woods at the Masters? . . .

So far, the best of the ex-Florida players who ruined UCLA’s 2006 and 2007 trips to the Final Four is Atlanta Hawks center Al Horford, who is drawing late rookie-of-the-year consideration but probably not enough to nose out Kevin Durant. . . .

Baron Davis and the Golden State Warriors could improve from 42 victories last season to 50 this season and still not make the playoffs. . . .

No team with 50 victories has ever missed the playoffs. . . .

Bruce Jenkins of the San Francisco Chronicle, echoing the late Allan Malamud, calls the Wave a “bastion of the truly clueless.” . . .

If Candace Parker is a cross between Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Magic Johnson and James Worthy, as Michael Cooper has said more than once, why did the Sparks coach also say it was difficult choosing between Parker and Sylvia Fowles when it came time to make the top pick in the WNBA draft? . . .

That must mean that Fowles, who played at LSU, is a combination of Bill Russell, Michael Jordan and Larry Bird. . . .

Pittsburgh basketball Coach Jamie Dixon and his late sister, former Army women’s basketball coach Maggie Dixon, will be saluted Saturday night by Sherman Oaks Notre Dame High, their alma mater, at the school’s annual Knights of Honor dinner-auction gala at the Universal Sheraton. . . .

Jimmy Kimmel will emcee. . . .

Scooter Vaughan of Placentia, a freshman defenseman who helped top-ranked Michigan reach the semifinals of the NCAA hockey tournament, was the only Californian and only African American in the Frozen Four. . . .

An inner-tube relay race featuring song girls and football players, among them quarterbacks Mark Sanchez and Mitch Mustain, is expected to be a highlight Saturday of USC’s annual Swim With Mike charity swim-a-thon. . . .

Information: swimwithmike.org. . . .

John Wooden, who cites Mother Teresa as an inspiration, was honored this week as one of 10 winners of the National Caring Awards, created by Caring Institute founder Val Halamandaris after a 1989 meeting with Mother Teresa. . . .

Comedian Bill Maher notes that “70% of Americans in a new poll say they share Barack Obama’s values, in particular a complete disinterest in bowling.”

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jerome.crowe@latimes.com