Another week closer to tip-off, and with an eye towards next week when we’ll be dropping our picks for what’s going to happen this year, we ask our correspondents to continue doing some prognosticating.
“Arizona and UCLA are widely considered, in one order or the other, to be the two favorites in the Pac-12 this year. If you were to pick one other team to surprise and steal the conference title, who would it be?”
Adam Butler: I’m into the Stanford Cardinal first and foremost because of the best point guard in the league, Chasson Randle. Maybe he’s not a true one, whatever, but he’s arguably the guard in the league whom I want to have the ball in his hands more than anyone else. He’s so quick he’s already by you. And Aaron Bright? He just stepped out of the quintessential Stanford guard mold; Arthur Lee, Chris Hernandez, Brevin Knight, Mitch Johnson, these guys solid-game-played you to death and Aaron Bright is capable of the same (and the opposite). So with guard play covered, let’s go to the bigs. Hey, got ’em. OK, they’re not proven, but I really like what Stefan Nastic, Josh Huestis and Anthony Brown offer – some size, athleticism, and effort – as a complement to that front court. These guys, along with the emerging likes of John Gage and the intriguingly talented freshman, Rosco Allen, makes this a sound Stanford team. Dwight Powell is the difference-maker. The big, long, athletic, dynamic, still-learning-the-game Canuck is poised to have a monster year for Johnny Dawkins. Last year he was projected to have a far greater impact than he did but it seems he never quite caught a groove while struggling with foot injuries. But now he’s healthy. Now he’s got the NIT under his belt and it’s his frontcourt. He’s not sharing it with Josh Owens. What makes Powell such a game-changer is not only his size capable of controlling the paint on the defensive end – his primary responsibility – but he has a fluid game that can help to spread the floor for the Cardinal slashers and crashers. This team has the pieces to be very good, they’re the returning NIT champs and, honestly, that says something. I don’t care what the championship is, if you’re the last team standing, that says something about you. So, if I’m right in thinking Chasson Randle is a very serious POY candidate, and our own Kevin Danna is right in thinking Dwight Powell will be the conference’s breakout player of the year, then I could be right (yes, twice, no big deal) in picking Stanford as the Bruin and Wildcat jumper.
Chasson Randle Could Be The Man To Help Stanford Mount A Charge For The Pac-12 Title (Stanford Athletics)
Andrew Murawa: I’m going to go out on a limb and pick the defending conference champions, Washington, a team that might even actually make the NCAA Tournament this year. There’s little doubt that this vintage of the Huskies doesn’t have as much talent as last year’s squad, but they have the potential to be a great example of the old sports adage of addition by subtraction. It was a poorly kept secret that last year’s group just didn’t mesh. Abdul Gaddy was the veteran point guard, but Tony Wroten more or less kept him from owning that role, much like the roles of Wroten and Terrence Ross also overlapped. This year, the roles will be more firmly defined. Gaddy’s the floor general. Scott Suggs and C.J. Wilcox are going to be the scorers. Andrew Andrews will offer some punch off the bench. Aziz N’Diaye will pound the boards and dissuade the opposition from exploring the paint. And there is no shortage of frontcourt players – Desmond Simmons, Shawn Kemp Jr., Jernard Jarreau and Martin Breunig – willing to help out with the dirty work. Yeah, head coach Lorenzo Romar would love to see one of those guys take a big leap forward a la Matthew Bryan-Amaning circa 2009-10, but regardless, there is enough offensive firepower on the perimeter here to carry most of the scoring. And, let’s not forget that Romar has a history of going out and winning the conference when least expected. His 2008-09 squad featured tough senior Jon Brockman, but also a bunch of guys like fellow senior Justin Dentmon and junior Quincy Pondexter who had underachieved to that point. They blew up, Romar found his next batch of stars in freshman Isaiah Thomas and sophomore Venoy Overton, and the Huskies won the conference title. Not to say that team is a perfect parallel to this one, but that team was by no means Romar’s best collection of talent. And somehow that was the team that won Romar’s lone Pac-10/12 regular season title in Seattle. Well, at least the lone regular season title that I care to remember.
Parker Baruh: If I’m picking one team to steal this conference from the Bruins and Wildcats, I’d have to choose the Colorado Buffaloes. They have the talent, but more importantly, they have the coaching. Tad Boyle is an excellent coach who already has changed the Colorado program dramatically. He’s coached the Buffaloes to 48 total wins in the two years he’s been in Boulder, picked up an NCAA Tournament win, a Pac-12 Tournament championship, and this past offseason recruited a top 30 class. On the court, the Buffaloes return Andre Roberson, the nation’s second best defensive rebounder last year, a potential future lottery pick, and a guy who has quietly become one of the best players in the Pac-12. Additionally, the Buffs return Spencer Dinwiddie and Askia Booker, the highest scoring backcourt in Colorado history, who are poised to take over the reins this year. The Buffs have issues with depth and youth as they will most likely start two freshmen up front in Xavier Johnson and Josh Scott, while Sabatino Chen and Shane Harris-Tunks remain unproven returning bench players.
The season will start out slowly for the Buffaloes, but what differs this year than the past two is their non-conference schedule. It’s still nothing too challenging with the likes of Texas Southern, Air Force, Northern Arizona and Hartford, but they will also have to play an experienced and challenging Colorado State team, the Kansas Jayhawks in Lawrence, and road games at Wyoming and Fresno State. Colorado will have to play well right out of the gate to build a good resume for the NCAA Tournament. However, it will all come back to Roberson, Dinwiddie, and Booker. If they can improve on their great performances of last season, the Buffaloes will be tough to beat and might just sneak up on the Pac-12 once again.
On The Short List Of Best Players In The Conference, Roberson Could Help The Buffs Make Up For Some Of Their Deficiencies (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)
Kevin Danna: It’s gotta be Stanford for me. The Cardinal were playing the best basketball out of anybody in the Pac-12 at the end of the season, save for perhaps Colorado (and Stanford murdered the Buffaloes twice last year), and that momentum is going to carry into 2012-13. Yes, Josh Owens and Andrew Zimmermann are gone, but the Cardinal will have perhaps the most athletic lineup in the conference outside of UCLA and Arizona. Chasson Randle, for my money, is the best guard to come through The Farm since Brevin Knight. Aaron Bright provides Stanford with a great punch off the bench and a little swag to give the Cardinal some personality and toughness on the court. Of course, their season hinges on how well juniors Anthony Brown, Dwight Powell and Josh Huestis perform, but all signs are pointing to these guys having great seasons. I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it a thousand times: Winning the NIT wasn’t the most important thing to come out of the NIT- playing the extra games was. Each of the then-sophomores had at least one breakthrough game during the NIT that could serve as a huge confidence booster for 2012-13. As long as this team can win on the road five times out of nine in conference (and, if UCLA and Arizona fall off the face of the Earth, combined with road games at Arizona State, Utah and the Oregon schools, that’s totally within the realm of possibilities), the Pac-12 crown will be Stanford’s in a very hypothetical world.
Connor Pelton: Washington, Stanford, and Colorado are all good picks (I think USC is overrated, but we’ll cover that another day), but I think California is best equipped to jump the Wildcats and Bruins this season. Guard play is the Golden Bears’ strong point, as the trio of Justin Cobbs, Allen Crabbe, and newcomer Ricky Kreklow (he’ll be back by the start of Pac-12 play) will lift Cal from a fifth-place scoring finish last year to a top two ranking. All three can score at will, which should leave some room open for Richard Solomon and David Kravish to flourish down low. With Kreklow out for the majority of non-conference play, the key for the Bears when going big is finding a four that can play like a five. Senior walk-on Robert Thurman could be that man, or it could be one of the three freshmen bigs. The biggest problem isn’t finding talent on this roster – there is loads of it – but rather who will fill the leadership void left by Jorge Gutierrez and Harper Kamp. In his first two seasons, Crabbe has been a quiet, fill-it-up scorer that has led by example. He needs to be more vocal this season.
The Bears will be tested immediately in non-conference play, so we should know soon enough if they have what it takes to jump UCLA and Arizona. They have possible games against Georgia Tech and Saint Mary’s on back-to-back days, followed by known games with Wisconsin, UNLV, and Creighton. Only facing UCLA once is a huge bonus from the scheduling gods, and with a terrific coach in Mike Montgomery to tie it all together, I like the Bears to compete for the Pac-12 crown and make their fourth NCAA appearance in five seasons.