Kansas Junior Mario Little Cleared for Limited Practice

Dec. 4, 2008

LAWRENCE, Kan. – After missing more than month of practice due to injury, Kansas junior guard Mario Little has been cleared for limited practice starting Friday, KU men’s basketball coach Bill Self announced Thursday.

Little, 6-5, 210 pounds from Chicago, has been suffering from a stress fracture in his lower left leg. His last action for KU was during the Late Night in the Phog scrimmage.

“We’ll monitor his progress as we go to see how he’s doing,” Self said of Little. “Really he’s not done much at all since Canada. We’ll start slow and gradually build up. He’ll be limited in certain drills, maybe do some non-contact stuff early on. Hopefully, depending on how he responds to pounding, he’ll be able to play (in a game) in a couple of weeks. That’s the best case scenario, to play in a couple weeks.”

In Kansas’ Canadian exhibition games over the 2008 Labor Day weekend, Little started all three contests and averaged 12.7 points, making 62.5 percent of his field goals. He also pulled down 4.7 rebounds and had a game-high 21 points on 9-of-11 shooting against Ottawa University.

“I’m looking forward to finally getting back out there and working with the team,” Little said. “I’m not used to watching games from the sidelines, in street clothes. Hopefully, now I can contribute to the team’s success. It’s going to take some time to get caught up and in playing shape.”

Little was ranked the No. 1 junior college player in the country last year while at Chipola (Fla.) College where he averaged 15.2 points, 5.5 rebounds and 2.6 assists.