Texas A&M junior Andy Slocum, who missed seven Big 12 Conference games after being suspended Jan. 20, has been back in action the past two league games.

The 7-foot, 260-pounder, who takes averages of 3.4 points and 5.0 rebounds a game into tonight’s game at Kansas University, pleaded no contest recently to two misdemeanor drug possession charges.

Tipoff is at 6:30 p.m. at Allen Fieldhouse.

Slocum was arrested in January and charged with third-degree felony steroid possession. Charges were reduced because of the small amount of drugs found.

“I apologize to our fans, the university and my team for the negative publicity my situation has caused and I’m looking forward to focusing my attention on school and basketball,” Slocum said upon returning to the team. He had two boards and no points in 17 minutes of a 66-54 home win Feb. 19 over Iowa State. Three days later he had two points and three boards in 15 minutes of a 70-69 loss at Texas Tech.

“He’s a good guy,” senior Bernard King told the Bryan College Station (Texas) Eagle. “He just made a mistake and we all knew that and accepted it. I make mistakes, everybody has. We’re not perfect and as long as you learn from your mistakes.”

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Olson may stick around: There’s a chance there will be just two senior speeches after KU’s Senior Day game Saturday against Oklahoma State at Allen Fieldhouse.

KU senior walk-on Brett Olson is planning on continuing his studies next year and says he is exploring the possibility of playing another season at KU. Olson, a 6-7, 213-pounder from Chanute, will attend grad school at KU next school year with designs on being accepted into med school the following year. He would have a year of basketball eligibility remaining.

On the court, Olson has six points — two dunks and two free throws — this season. He’s been extremely valuable at practice, guarding KU big men Nick Collison and Wayne Simien. Off the court, Olson is a 4.0 student in exercise science, recording all A’s in his four years of coursework.

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Latimore leaving UA: Arizona sophomore forward Dennis Latimore has decided to transfer to a yet to be determined school.

Latimore, a 6-8, 238-pound forward from Halstead, averaged 3.2 points and 3.1 rebounds in 23 games this season. He hit 51.9 percent of his field goal attempts (27 of 52) and tallied 13 assists and seven blocked shots in 277 minutes.

“We certainly are disappointed that Dennis made this decision,” Arizona coach Lute Olson said. “He was well liked by the staff and his teammates and came to this decision on his own. We wish him the best of luck.”

Latimore, who has not announced his plans, must sit out a year at his future school. He was unavailable for comment Tuesday.

He chose Arizona over KU and others during his senior year of high school, never making an official recruiting trip to KU.

Latimore’s brother, Denver, is a 6-2, 240-pound sophomore football tight end at Kansas.

In his 57-game career, Dennis Latimore averaged 2.4 points and 2.8 rebounds. He averaged 11.4 minutes per game.

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Smart students: KU athletes who earned a 3.0 or higher grade point average during the Spring 2002 and/or Fall 2002 semesters will be recognized at halftime as Jayhawk Scholars. All of the scholars will be on the court, while athletes who earned a 4.0 GPA will be individually acknowledged. The men’s golf team, which earned a 3.35 team GPA in the fall, will be honored.