1. Utah hasn’t been to an NCAA Tournament since the 2008-09 season, but a couple of solid wins and a few near-misses against good teams has fans wondering if it is again emerging as a basketball school. Coach Larry Krystkowiak has certainly changed the culture and attitude around the program. Fan interest is growing; the Huntsman Center rocks for big games; and losing is no longer expected in Salt Lake City. It’s going to take more than a couple signature wins to regain the title of a real hoops school, but Krystkowiak definitely has the program headed in the right direction.
2. With Arizona now sitting at 19-0 and still ranked #1 in the country, Tucson, or Lob Pueblo, is becoming the focus of the college basketball nation. Star freshman forward Aaron Gordon is rolling along with the stardom that goes along with his team’s success, going about his business and not letting it affect his on-court performance. The freshman is second on the team in with 12.4 PPG and first in rebounds at a 7.8 RPG clip. This ESPN feature on Gordon details his life as a child and what comes next for himself and the Gordon family, and also reveals the great tidbit that Aaron was born as an ice hockey player. Next up for his undefeated Wildcats is a visit from Utah on Sunday night.
3. Arizona was in action last night in an ESPN2 game against Colorado, and the Cats picked up another quality win in front of a big audience. The Buffaloes struggled once again without Spencer Dinwiddie available, falling behind Arizona, 18-4, six minutes into the game. The Buffaloes actually outscored Arizona from that point on, but the hole was too deep and the final was 69-57. Wildcat guard Nick Johnson led all scorers with 18 points.
4. If UCLA wants to be back in the polls on Monday morning it needs to get sophomore guard Jordan Adams some cleaner looks and Adams needs to convert when given the opportunity. The Bruins’ leading scorer has not scored at or above his average since January 5, and in that time frame he has only shot 31 percent from the field. “He’s a great shooter. We’ve got to work the offense to get him better shots,” head coach Steve Alford said. Long offensive droughts hurt UCLA mightily in its losses against Arizona and Utah, and those need to come to a halt if the Bruins are to contend for a Pac-12 title.
5. With roughly one and a half months remaining in the season, we thought it would be a good time to start up our basketball pick’em contest. Adam Butler from Pachoops will join us through the end of the year in our prognostications, and important bragging rights are on the line. Each week we will also highlight the top game of the weekend, with a correct pick being worth two wins, and an incorrect selection worth two losses. We head to Los Angeles for that game this week, where UCLA will host in-state rival California.

Connor Pelton (300 Posts)

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

This entry was posted on Friday, January 24th, 2014 at 10:01 am by Connor Pelton (@ConnorPelton28) and is filed under microsites, morning 5, pac 12. Tagged: Aaron Gordon, arizona, arizona state, california, colorado, jordan adams, larry krystowiak, oregon, oregon state, stanford, steve alford, ucla, usc, utah, washington. 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.