1. The NCAA released its first offical RPI rankings of the season late Monday, and of course, Arizona headlines the Pac-12 list at #4. Colorado came in as a bit of a surprise at #6, and then there is a big drop-off before UCLA is spotted at #39. Utah, USC, Oregon State, and Washington State were the teams that landed outside the Top 100. Obviously, things will shift around considerably as we get deeper into conference play in the coming weeks, both in the Pac-12 and on a national scale.
2. UCLA freshman Tony Parker has seen limited action in the 2012-13 season for a multitude of reasons. There have been back spasms, sprained ankles, and migraine headaches, and when Parker has seen minutes, he has looked lost on both ends of the court and has been extremely foul-prone. All in all, those things aren’t uncommon to see early in one’s first year on campus. Bruins Nation thinks there’s more too it, however, criticizing Ben Howland for not playing Parker in important situations and concluding from a “no comment” that Parker is nearly a certainty to transfer at season’s end. The point is, the majority of college freshmen, whether they are Division 1 athletes or not, get homesick at one point or another. And as I stated above, not every young, hot recruit is going to see immediate action. And while transferring after or during one’s first season seems to be the big thing in college hoops these days, it is still a pretty big jump to assume one will leave because of a couple vague tweets and quotes.
3. After last year’s debacle, I think I speak for most Pac-12 fans that I’m thrilled to have Arizona in the Top 25, let alone, the top three. But could we be on the brink of having another Top 25 team in the Pac-12? Why that’s madness you say, what is this, the ACC? What’s next, more than one at-large team in the Big Dance? But it’s true, and if Oregon can sweep the Arizona schools at home this week, the hypothetically 14-2 Ducks would surely crack Monday’s rankings. For the sake of our national reputation, we can only hope.
4. Fresh off a 27-point performance against what is largely considered the Pac-12’s best defensive mind, the Pac-12’s leading scorer now sets his eyes on beating Washington, a game that will be played tonight in Berkeley on ESPN2. Washington has proven that they can at least contain the best of scorers out west on Saturday against Washington State’s Brock Motum, but Allen Crabbe will be a different beast entirely. The junior guard can not only get to the rack off a dribble drive from the perimeter, but he is now even more of a threat to get the ball on a pass in the lane and get an easy bucket with his new-found strength and speed he has been showing off this season. Crabbe is also more than capable of knocking down the mid-range or three-point jumper, but collecting most of his buckets right at the bucket ensures better efficiency.
5. We close with our weekly Pac-12 Hoops Pick’em selections. Adam continued to cruise last week and now leads the competition by a pair of games over the next closest prognosticator. I am doing a stellar job, showing off my vast college basketball knowledge by sitting all alone in the basement. For our games of the week, we have chosen Minnesota’s trip to Bloomington on Saturday morning and the UCLA-Colorado showdown that will be played immediately after.

Connor Pelton (300 Posts)

I'm from Portland. College basketball and football is life.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 9th, 2013 at 9:00 am by Connor Pelton and is filed under microsites, morning 5, pac 12. Tagged: allen crabbe, arizona, ben howland, colorado, minnesota, oregon, oregon state, stanford, tony parker, ucla, usc, utah, washington, washington state. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.