In between dodging rain drops and watching tennis matches at the Pilot Pen Tennis tournament, I have been doing a little bit of checking up on recruiting.

The dates to remember in terms of visits are Sept. 10-12 and Oct. 15-17.

As previously reported in this blog, Sara Hammond is planning to visit UConn during that first weekend I mentioned (actually from Sept. 9-11 according to her father) and the word I am hearing is that there's an outside chance that the two players who have already committed to UConn (Kalana Mosqueda-Lewis and Brianna Banks) may also come up that weekend. That is already a special time for UConn since rising senior Maya Moore (who in three days I can start referring to simply as senior since the fall session will be starting) as well as ex-Huskies Tina Charles, Renee Montgomery and Asjha Jones will be playing for the Geno Auriemma coach U.S. national team against Australia on Sept. 10 and Spain on Sept. 12 with both games at the XL Center in Hartford.

The availability of former UConn stars Sue Bird, Swin Cash and Diana Taurasi will be determined by how deep their teams go into the WNBA players. Bird and Cash play for Seattle, which holds a 1-0 lead on Los Angeles in the Western Conference semifinals while Taurasi's Phoenix Mercury squad won the first game against San Antonio. Seattle and Phoenix will go for the sweep in the best of three series on Saturday. If Seattle and Phoenix reach the Western Conference finals, the trio of former UConn teammates will have to miss the start of the U.S. training camp which starts on Sept. 3 since the WNBA's conference finals don't start until Sept. 2. However, with the conference finals ending no later than Sept. 8, only those players in the WNBA finals would be unavailable for the Connecticut portion of the training camp.

I was incorrect in reporting that visit will be an official one, it will be an unofficial visit but something tells me Sara Hammond, who the UConn staff really likes, will have a pretty good idea of where she will be headed to college when she returns home from her visit to UConn.

Kiah Stokes, another player very high on UConn's wish list, is looking to visit UConn in the Oct. 15-17 time frame which will be around the time UConn holds its "First Night" Fan Fest followed by its first real practice the following day. I'm not sure if Hammond, Elizabeth Williams and Betnijah Laney will be up that weekend as well but don't be surprised to see some of the players high up on UConn's wish list in the high school Class of 2012 make it up there in mid October.

Speaking of Charles, I received an e-mail from the WNBA and the Connecticut Sun of a major WNBA award being presented at Mohegan Sun Casino on Tuesday. Let's see, Charles was the rookie of the month for May, June, July and August, I wonder what major award will be presented on that day?