By Bill Koch
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Tony Bobbitt said he decided to leave the University of Cincinnati basketball program because he was frustrated by his play and he listened to the wrong people.

Bobbitt, a 6-foot-4 junior guard from Daytona Beach, Fla., quit the team Monday but was reinstated Thursday after asking UC coach Bob Huggins for forgiveness. Bobbitt practiced Friday for the first time since leaving.

"I'm back on track and ready to play ball," he said.

Bobbitt, who averages 7.2 points a game, so far has not lived up to his own expectations or those of the UC coaching staff after earning junior-college All-American honors last year at the College of Southern Idaho.

Bobbitt said he had a difficult time dealing with Huggins' criticism.

"I need to listen to him when he's on my butt," Bobbitt said. "I took it the wrong way. I was looking at it from a personal point of view, but it wasn't. It was a point of view of him trying to help me.

"Not playing the way I can play, that not only frustrates me, it frustrates him."

Bobbitt apologized to Huggins, to his teammates and to the school and vowed he wouldn't make the same mistake again.

"Like I said earlier in the year, I love (Coach Huggins)," Bobbitt said. "I wouldn't have come here if I didn't want to get disciplined."

Bobbitt said he should have listened to Huggins, associate head coach Dan Peters and assistant coach Andy Kennedy instead of the people to whom he did listen.

"I got frustrated," Bobbitt said. "I was like, 'I'm out,' I was going to go somewhere else to play, but I'd rather be here."

Oddly enough, Bobbitt decided to leave after last Saturday's Marquette game, during which he scored 16 points in 11 minutes.

Bobbitt said he knew he wanted to return after talking to his stepfather, John Albright. Whether he plays Sunday against Oklahoma State is another matter.

"I don't know if I'm going to play," Bobbitt said. "If he decides to sit me over here, I can't do nothing but cheer for my teammates. But if he lets me go in, I'm going to give it all I've got. I'm not going to pout and moan."

Huggins, who required Bobbitt to do additional cardiovascular work as a condition of his return, declined to say whether Bobbitt would play Sunday.

"I'm kind of sick of talking about Tony," Huggins said. "Tony's a guy who averages seven points per game. I get more questions about Tony than I do about our team.

"That's the unfortunate thing about our world today. If somebody screws up, we pay more attention to them than to the guys who are doing what they're supposed to do.

"I haven't given one-hundredth of the time thinking about Tony Bobbitt that (the media) have. I'm going to coach the guys that are here. If Tony doesn't want to be here, then Tony doesn't need to be here. It's that simple."

Bearcats senior forward Leonard Stokes said the players were happy to have Bobbitt back.

"Everybody makes bad decisions sometimes," Stokes said. "That's behind us."

Said Bobbitt: "I decided to make the mistakes I made. I just know I'm ready to play ball and get this behind me."

E-mail bkoch@enquirer.com