Tidbits: Evan Turner will return tonight

As first reported by Bob Baptist of the Columbus Dispatch and then confirmed by Jeff Goodman of FOXSports.com, Ohio State junior Evan Turner will play tonight.

“Evan is playing,” Iris James, Turner’s mother, told Baptist in a text message on Wednesday afternoon.

Turner has been out since Dec. 5 with a back injury that he suffered when he fell after a dunk against Eastern Michigan.

Prior to the injury, Turner was averaging 20.5 points, 12.8 rebounds and 6.6 assists per contest.

Judkins to transfer?

According to his former AAU coach, Arizona guard Garland Judkins will be transferring to Texas-San Antonio.

"I think there's a good mutual opportunity with what coach Miller wanted to do with his group, and I wanted to make sure Garland doesn't get off track and gets to play somewhere," Max Ivany told Bruce Pascoe of the Arizona Daily Star. "It was the right situation for everybody."

However, head coach Sean Miller said yesterday on the Pac-10 coaches’ conference call that the reports were premature.

Injury bug bites Bears: Gutierrez sidelined

California sophomore guard Jorge Gutierrez underwent an MRI on Monday for his injured knee, with the results demonstrating that he won’t need surgery.

However, Gutierrez will miss tonight’s game against UCLA, and also won’t play against USC barring a “miraculous recovery,” head coach Mike Montgomery said.

"It's hard to replace a guy like Jorge, just because of the intangibles he brings," Montgomery said.

Gutierrez is the team’s sixth man and best defender, averaging 5.7 points, 3.2 rebounds and 3.0 assists in 21.0 minutes per game.

Other links:

- John Gasaway of Basketball Prospectus ranks his top 25 freshmen. Not surprisingly, the top three are John Wall, Xavier Henry and DeMarcus Cousins. However, take a look at No. 4 – Marshall’s Hassan Whiteside.

- According to Ken Pomeroy, Fordham is by far the most likely team to go winless in conference play. Going into tonight, Fordham has a 50.77 percent chance of not winning a game in the Atlantic-10 this season.