1. When the AP poll is released later today, there is at least a chance that Oregon and its undefeated record could sneak into the top 10, given that a couple of teams ahead of the Ducks – namely, Louisville and Villanova – both suffered losses this weekend. But despite the fact that Oregon is pretty highly regarded, some fans are asking, “Where’s the love?” One such example is provided by Don Gilman of Fishduck.com who points to some of Oregon’s flashy offensive stats and wonders why the team isn’t higher in the national polls. In the interest of full disclosure, I put Oregon at #8 on my weekly RTC ballot, but there are some good reasons why a 12-0 Oregon squad may still have some doubters. First, despite all those fantastic offensive numbers, its defense has just been ordinary (79th in the nation in defensive efficiency). And, well, the Ducks really haven’t beaten anybody great yet. They’ve got good wins, yes, over teams like Georgetown, BYU, Illinois, and on the road at Ole Miss. But one thing all of those teams have in common is they all should be on the outside looking in of the AP rankings this week for a reason.
2. Stanford wrapped up its non-conference slate on Sunday with a win over Cal Poly, so now is as appropriate of a time as ever to ask: Have the Cardinal done enough to put themselves on the NCAA Tournament radar? Anthony Dimuro  of Golden Gate Sports says the answer is yes, based on an 8-3 record, a good win over Connecticut, and having won all the games they were supposed to (I might quibble with that one by bringing up the BYU game). But the fact is that Stanford is going to have to spend the rest of the season rooting heavily for UConn to earn some big wins in the American Athletic Conference to make that scalp look more impressive and help that uninspiring RPI number of 64. Needless to say, there is a lot of basketball left to be played, but still, on the basis of a solid enough non-conference schedule, they’ve at least given themselves a chance.
3. Arizona State, like Stanford, will have plenty of work left to do in order to build up a convincing case for NCAA Tournament inclusion this season. But despite some missed opportunities in the non-conference schedule, there is plenty of positivity around the Sun Devils’ program. Jahii Carson has lived up to his high standards, Jermaine Marshall has shifted his scoring ability from State College to Tempe without a hitch, and Jordan Bachynski continues to swat away any errant basketball that comes near his body. All of those things were more or less expected. What could make the Devils a tough out going forward would be the types of things that happened Saturday afternoon against UC Irvine, such as Jonathan Gilling providing a varied offensive attack and senior forward Shaquielle McKissic becoming an explosive and athletic scoring threat.
4. Washington State got a win Saturday night over Mississippi Valley State, but it did so without leading scorer DaVonte Lacy, who missed the game while having his appendix removed. He’s the second Pac-12 player to deal with appendicitis this year, as UCLA’s Travis Wear was the other. Judging by Wear’s experience with the situation, expect Lacy to miss roughly three to four weeks.
5. Lastly, given Utah’s less-than-stellar non-conference schedule, people across the country may not yet have heard the name Delon Wright. But the 6’5” point guard has been catching a few eyes and drawing some rave reviews. The brother of Dorrell Wright, currently of the Portland Trail Blazers, the young Wright earned high praise from NBA players in a Los Angeles area summer league but is now set to turn his versatile game loose on the Pac-12. He had to take the long road to big-time college basketball, but now that he is here, he intends to make the most of the opportunity.

AMurawa (999 Posts)

Andrew Murawa Likes Basketball.

This entry was posted on Monday, December 30th, 2013 at 10:01 am by Andrew Murawa and is filed under microsites, morning 5, pac 12. Tagged: arizona state, davone lacy, delon wright, oregon, shaquielle mckissic, stanford. 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.