by Jeff Goodman

Updated: October 11, 2008, 6:22 PM EST 42 comments

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The event that marks the start of the college basketball season is actually supposed to come in a week. However, four schools are getting an early start this weekend and it has some coaches seething.

"We have a beautiful thing going with individual instruction," St. Joe's coach Phil Martelli said. "We have an opportunity to make a difference in our game and it's working well."

"It's about the game and not the individual programs," he added. "It doesn't matter who it is. We've made great advances in the game and now some coaches want to use it as a recruiting advantage."

The NCAA has allowed college coaches to work with their teams for two hours per week beginning on Sept. 15 until the official start of practice on Oct. 17.

"Coaches have fought for this for a long time to get a couple of hours a week to work with the players for instruction," added Wisconsin coach Bo Ryan. "Not for showboating, but for teaching."

Four schools — Kentucky, West Virginia, Illinois and Marshall — have opted to take to the court a week earlier.

Billy Gillispie and the Wildcats scheduled their "Big Blue Madness" for 10:30 p.m. Friday in front of a sold-out crowd of about 23,000 at Rupp Arena that would have come no matter when they were having the event.

West Virginia coach Bob Huggins said that the Mountaineers would get on the court at 9:30 p.m. Friday "because we can."

"For us, it's pretty simple," Huggins said. "There's no football game the next weekend. It's a bad weekend for us to do it. We have home football games three straight weekends and people aren't going to drive from across the state after coming here three straight weekends."

Bruce Weber's situation at Illinois is a little different. He's going to use about a half-hour to put on what is being billed as the largest outdoor basketball practice immediately following Saturday afternoon's home football game on a portable basketball court. It's also an event that will hopefully raise $50,000 for Coaches vs. Cancer by selling "Zook Zone" towels for $1 apiece. Weber plans to utilize the remainder of the two hours to work with his team behind closed doors.

Weber said he offered to cancel after the NABC came down on those who are holding the event a week earlier.

"It's just really a fun promotion," Weber said. "And next Saturday is a night game and won't end until around 10:30 or 11 at night. It's going to be 30 degrees out and no one is going to stay."

"I really didn't think it was a big deal," he added.

However, he received calls from NABC boss Jim Haney and also Michigan State coach Tom Izzo, who is on the NABC board.

Marshall coach Donnie Jones, a former Florida assistant in his second season with the Thundering Herd, first came up with the idea months ago. He called the NCAA and was given the green light.

"It wasn't against the rules," Jones said. "They didn't say we couldn't do it."

Jones said that the festivities will begin at 7 p.m. on Saturday and will last no more than an hour.

"We're going to practice during that time and also have a slam-dunk contest," Jones said. "We're just going to open it up to the public. At a place like Marshall, I'm trying to find ways to be creative to sell the program. It wasn't my intent to offend anyone."

Gillispie did not return calls seeking comment, but sources told FOXSports.com that the primary reason why he opted to have Midnight Madness this weekend was so he didn't have to butt heads with other high-major schools next weekend to bring in recruits.

Now he can basically get whichever kids he wants — and it's worked out well and he's been able to lure about 15-20 to Lexington this weekend — including highly touted Daniel Orton.

Let's not be naive enough to think the early Midnight Madness isn't done to get an advantage.

"I'm not denying that," Huggins admitted.

Martelli maintains that if it continues, you could see the number go from four to 50 this time next year.

However, it doesn't look like that will happen as the NCAA has indicated it won't allow public preseason events in the future. An emergency meeting has already been set up on Oct. 29 that will likely preclude this from happening.

"I'm not attacking a particular person," Ryan said. "It's the principle of everyone doing it. It should not be allowed to be done."

But everyone's looking for an edge.