RTC Live: Pac-10 Semis – Cal vs. UCLA; Washington vs. Stanford
Posted by rtmsf on March 12th, 2010
We’re back at the Pac-10 Tournament for semifinal Friday night at the Staples Center. Unlike most of the major conference tourneys that get to the semifinal stage, only one team — the Cal Bears — is safely into the NCAA Tournament. The other three — UCLA, Washington and Stanford — are looking to steal an automatic bid from another team somewhere out there sweating in bubble-land. For UCLA and Stanford in particular, it’s win or go home, as both teams come into tonight with losing records and will end their season with the next loss. In the first semifinal, Cal will face UCLA in an interesting battle in that even though the Bears are the top seed, UCLA will undoubtedly have the home crowd advantage. Ben Howland teams rarely miss the postseason and the two teams split the season series, so we should expect the Bruins to come hard at the Bears in this one tonight. In the second game, Washington is one of Zach Hayes’ last four teams in at this point, but the Huskies don’t want to put the committee in a tough position with a cinderella like Stanford continuing on to the Pac-10 championship game. For what it’s worth, Lorenzo Romar’s team found the matchups with Stanford very beneficial, beating the Cardinal by 17 in Palo Alto and 33 in Seattle. Join us tonight for a couple of key games with respect to the bubble picture on RTC Live!
