Another week of the college basketball season is in the books and with that came results that had a significant impact on this week’s RTC25. Previously unbeaten and third-ranked Wisconsin experienced the agony of defeat twice this past week, as the Badgers fell on the road to Indiana on Tuesday and were surprised at home by upstart #15 Michigan on Saturday. Staying within the Big Ten, Ohio State‘s losing streak reached three games with Thursday’s loss at Minnesota. Previously 11th-ranked Iowa State and previously 17th-ranked Baylor also had tough weeks. The Cyclones were bested at home by #8 Kansas on Monday before dropping another game at Texas on Saturday. The Bears suffered a shocking defeat at the hands of Texas Tech on Wednesday before returning home to Waco and blowing a late lead in a loss to Oklahoma. We are now in the thick of things in conference play, and if the past several weeks can serve as any indication, the excitement and surprises will continue throughout the remainder of the season. The quick n’ dirty analysis of this week’s poll is after the jump.

Quick n’ dirty analysis:

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1. Much of the time, a demotion of an upperclassman that results in a freshman or sophomore filling the open role can make relationships sour in a hurry. However, that hasn’t been the case for Oregon State junior point guard Challe Barton and freshman Hallice Cooke, who have remained close after Cooke grabbed Barton’s starting spot earlier this month. Despite only averaging 8.8 MPG in Pac-12 play, the junior can typically be seen waving a towel on the bench and one of the first to greet players coming off the floor during a timeout. Barton’s laid-back attitude and easy smile certainly helps, but knowing that playing time on coach Craig Robinson’s squad can flip drastically at the blink of an eye, he knows that he needs to be ready to go and engaged at all times. If Cooke keeps up his current pace, however, that starting job is going to be locked up for awhile. The freshman has provided a much-needed spark to a struggling offense, averaging 10.5 PPG in his last five appearances.
2. The Beavers got a huge win last night in the Civil War battle against Oregon, jumping out to an early 16-point lead and eventually holding on for an 80-72 upset. Oregon State is now in a tie for eighth in the conference standings and has a great chance of getting back to .500 when it faces Washington State on Wednesday night. On the Ducks’ side of it, things are not going well. The job that Dana Altman has done so far in the month of January is by far the worst in his four seasons with Oregon. His team is currently free-falling down the NCAA Tournament seed lines and desperately needs a sweep at the Washington schools this week.
3. After suffering a stress fracture in his leg in mid-September, freshman guard Que Johnson got off to a slow start at Washington State. But the redshirt freshman grew more comfortable within the offense as the non-conference season wore on, and he has now become the team’s go-to guy with junior DaVonte Lacy out with various injuries. In this piece examining Johnson’s performance thus far, Jeff Nusser takes a look at his statistics and compares them to former Cougs’ great, Klay Thompson. Johnson is blowing past the freshman Thompson in terms of efficiency, using his aggressiveness to shoot at a 51 percent clip from inside the three-point line. He is also showing some early traits of Thompson’s late-game clutchness, hitting an overtime-forcing three with 10 seconds left against #15 Colorado, then knocking down the final three free throws of a three-point win against Utah a few days later. As Nusser says, putting these comparisons on a freshman may be unfair, but the early returns have been nothing less than terrific. Washington State returns to action Wednesday night against Oregon State in Pullman.
4. Rush the Court’s resident bracketologist, Daniel Evans, released his updated projections over the weekend, and Arizona claimed his top overall seed once again. Next up are Oregon and Colorado on the five and seven lines, respectively, and California and UCLA coming in at eight and nine. Stanford remains squarely on the bubble and is listed as the second team out of his field.
5. The Ducks debuted some nice new kicks in last night’s rivalry game with Oregon State, their “JumpDucks.” Long a testing ground for anything Nike has to offer, Oregon was the first one to get a crack at re-doing the Michael Jordan Jumpman logo, replacing it on the shoe’s heel with a shadow Duck mascot. The new Air Jordans look very cool and would be sure to sell quickly if Nike goes down that road. We’ll let you use your wildest imagination to dream up what’s up next for the stylistic offerings of Oregon athletics.

Adam Butler (@pachoopsab) of Pachoops again will be joining us all year, providing us with his weekly take on our favorite conference, as we begin the March to Las Vegas.

I want to submit, if that’s possible, Nick Johnson’s name for National Player of the Year. It’s strange for me to say that – clearly not because I’m an Arizona fan – but because as someone who watches the game at a socially unacceptable level, I did not believe he would have the opportunity for such. Arizona’s system is such that I sincerely did not believe he’d have the touches or scoring veracity to garner such attention. I’ve long felt Derrick Williams’ season was an anomaly within Sean Miller’s style but a necessary “evil” for the success of the 2011 Wildcats. This season, however, Miller had constructed his perfect beast. A defense-oriented group that meshed together in such a way that it didn’t matter who scored but rather who stopped. And that would be predicated on a team effort. Thus, I was quick to believe that no one on Arizona’s roster would win any [honor] of the Year award. But we now find ourselves 18 games deep and Nick Johnson is – well – the best player on the best team in the country. Mark Titus agrees with Bill Walton on this front, and Sean Miller agrees with both of them. As do I.

Nick Johnson’s Surprising Candidacy For National Player Of The Year Earns Another Supporter

First, a little bit on Nick. Here’s a young man who arrived at Arizona as Miller’s most prized – or at least highly rated – recruit. At current pace, prized would indeed seem to be the right word in that the parallels to Sean Elliott seem obvious: local talent, first and greatest success under a new regime at Arizona, the face of the program, etc. I’m well ahead of myself but Johnson came to Tucson with his sights on big things. He was joining a Top 25 team as a part of the fourth-best recruiting class in the nation. Nick Johnson was meant for big things. But an elongated slump from Johnson and a generally underwhelming team chemistry kept his first Wildcats squad from amounting to much (which, when translated into Wildcat means: home loss to Bucknell in the first round of the NIT). Similarly, or at least to some extent, another late slump during his sophomore season would coincide with a 5-5 close to the season in which his field goal percentage dipped nearly 10 percentage points below his season average. Nick Johnson was good, but not there yet.

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Believe it or not, we’re about halfway through the season right now. So, it is time to revisit our Best in the West rankings. We did this about a month back, but to remind you, here’s how we roll. We take all the schools west of the Rockies (and we’re going to be a bit generous with our geography – basically we’re looking at schools from the Pac-12, Mountain West, West Coast and Big West and then some of the schools from the Big Sky and WAC) and give you the top 20 teams. But, rather than just ranking schools #1 though #20, we’re going to divide all these teams up into tiers of similar quality. Below, you’ll see our Top 20 teams in the West (their overall rank will be in parentheses), with descriptions of what we think the teams in each tier have in common, plus brief comments on some of the teams in our list.

The Best of the Best – In a league of their own.

• Arizona (#1 overall, Pac-12 #1) – Not only are the Wildcats head and shoulders above the rest of the teams out West, the argument can be made that they’re on a tier of their own nationally as well.

Arizona Has Established Themselves As A Team Head and Shoulders Above The Rest. (Kevin Sapio, USA Today)

Contenders to the Throne – And all Top 25 teams.

• San Diego State (#2 overall, Mtn West #1) – Last time we did this, we had three teams in this tier, and the Aztecs were not among them. This time, the Aztecs are the only team aside from Arizona that should be considered a sure-fire Top 25 team.

Solid NCAA Tournament Team – Just outside the Top 25, but all with plenty of upside.

• California (#3 overall, Pac-12 #2) – These teams are all bunched together by just about any metric. While I think you can make a case for any one of them for something like the #24 or #25 spot in your national Top 25, you can make an equally valid case that all of these teams deserve to be on the outside looking in. That being said, it is likely that if you make a national top 35, every one of these squads should probably be in there. We’ll take the Golden Bears by a hair over the rest of this group on the basis of their hot streak minus a couple of key players, but really, all these teams are very tight.

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1. After a dust-up last week where NBA scouts were complaining about the seats that UCLA gave them for the battle between the Bruins and Arizona, Draft Express did a poll of NBA scouts to see which schools treated them the best (i.e., gave them good seats and maybe a meal) and, perhaps unsurprisingly, UCLA was atop the heap of the schools that got negative comments. The whole article is really pointed at UCLA: You spend a ton of space in your media guides promoting your former players who are making it big at the next level, but you’re not rolling out the red carpet for the scouts and executive who determine the worth of the next round of NBA prospects. We’re not going to spend a ton of time on this, but doesn’t this whole thing seem a bit absurd? For instance, in some cases where the NBA scouts got seats that didn’t meet their needs, they had to (gasp!) ask  their multi-hundred-million dollar organizations to go onto StubHub and purchase them better tickets. The horror! Even at Arizona, which was among the schools most often mentioned as being good to NBA scouts, somebody had the temerity to complain about the price of the great seats they were given, prices which were likely considerably lower than the amount that could have been charged for those seats. In other words, forgive me if I don’t join this particular hunger strike.
2. We posted yesterday about the Spencer Dinwiddie injury (too long; didn’t read: it sucks), but that knee injury wasn’t the only one to befall a Colorado player in Seattle on Sunday. Freshman wing Tre’Shaun Fletcher also tweaked a knee in that game, and although he returned to action after the injury, it was later determined that this injury will require surgery, costing Fletcher the next six-to-eight weeks. While this injury is not an ACL injury, it is damaging to the team as Fletcher certainly would have been due for a bump in minutes without Dinwiddie in the lineup.
3. After ripping off 13 straight wins to start the season, Oregon is now riding a three-game losing streak, with a pair of those losses coming at home. Luckily, the Ducks now have a week where they can focus on just one game — their road trip to face Oregon State in Corvallis on Sunday. Confidence may be dipping, but head coach Dana Altman recalled the last time the Ducks went through a multi-game losing streak: the final two games of last season when they lost on the road to Colorado and Utah. What happened next? The Ducks went to Las Vegas, won the Pac-12 Tournament, and then advanced to the Sweet Sixteen. In other words, it would be very unwise to count out these Ducks in mid-January.
4. We’ve got another big intrastate rivalry game this week to check out as Arizona State travels to Arizona tonight. Herb Sendek was asked about trying to compete against a team that is recruiting on the elite level that the Wildcats are doing right now. And, not surprisingly, he called it a challenge, noting that what they’re doing is “absolutely astonishing” and “almost unprecedented.” Put it this way; as Adam Green of ArizonaSports.com notes, of the seven players in the rotation at Arizona, five were five-star recruits coming out of high school, while a sixth was a four-star recruit. By comparison, Jahii Carson is the only Sun Devils’ recruit to earn more than three stars coming out of high school.
5. Lastly, Utah drew rave reviews in its first weekend of conference play, taking Oregon to the wire on opening night before beating Oregon State. But last weekend on their first road trip to the Washington schools, their offense took a major step back. Tonight, as they host USC, goal number one for Larry Krystkowiak and company is to compete better on the offensive end of the court, including getting out in transition more often, something their Trojans’ opponents probably want as well. With talented offensive players like Delon Wright, Jordan Loveridge and Brandon Taylor, this shouldn’t be a problem.

Periodically throughout the next two months, the Pac-12 microsite will be taking a look at the league’s postseason outlook. We start today.

NCAA Tournament

• Arizona (#1 Seed): Arizona has been atop the national rankings for five consecutive weeks now, and while some dispute whether it should be the top overall seed, no one has the Wildcats below the one seed line right now. They currently boast quality wins against San Diego State, Duke, Michigan, Washington and UCLA, with four of those coming away from home. The Cats remain one of three unbeatens across the land and have another chance at a good win on Thursday against Arizona State.
• Colorado (#4-#6 Seed): The Buffaloes have a pair of top 10 victories going for themselves, but that’s about the only positive they have to look at right now. Head coach Tad Boyle lost his leading scorer for the remainder of the season and another member of his typical nine-deep rotation until mid-March all in 40 minutes at Washington on Sunday, so while the Buffs’ résumé currently looks in the #4-#6 seed range, anything better than a #7 come Selection Sunday would make Colorado fans very happy. Staying on that line instead of the #8 or #9 would be crucial if it hopes to advance through the opening weekend, as that’s the difference between say, Virginia and North Carolina in the opening round as well as avoiding a #1 seed in the second game.
• Oregon (#5-#7 Seed): Sure, Oregon is sliding hard and fast right now, but the Ducks will be fine so long as this three-game losing streak doesn’t go beyond that. The Ducks need to keep these losses in a vacuum, and while it will definitely be a black mark the rest of the way, wins at Washington and against UCLA back in Eugene could make this skid a distant memory by the first of February. They will need to shore up their defense some in order to remain in the upper half of the NCAA field. Oregon ranks 306th in the nation in points allowed per game, and finding a way to keep their opponents below 80 will be key.

Joseph Young Leads Oregon’s High-Flying Offense With 18.8 PPG, But The Ducks Need To Shore Up Their Defense In Order To Remain On The Eight Line Or Higher (AP)

• UCLA (#8-#10 Seed): The jury is largely still out on the Bruins, who have won 13 games but only one of which can be classified as a “quality victory.” With four of their final five games this month either against teams that are locked into the NCAAs or on the bubble, that can change in a hurry but they’ll need to be ready to take advantage of those opportunities every night out.
• California (Bubble IN): Going into conference play, California was typically a middle-of-the-road NIT team according to bracketologists around the country, and that was with some slack being cut since it had lost Ricky Kreklow and Jabari Bird for an extended period of time. Boy, what a difference two weeks can make. The Golden Bears have worked their way into the NCAA field, possibly as high as a #10 seed, thanks to three road wins to start Pac-12 play. With the three-game road trip now out of the way, and the fact they don’t leave the state of California again until February 12, things are definitely looking up for the Bears.
• Arizona State (Bubble OUT): The Sun Devils, like UCLA, have been tough to figure out so far. They only have one quality win, and while there is only one bad loss to their name, performances like the ones they put up against Creighton and Washington won’t be convincing anyone that they’re ready for the field of 68.  Read the rest of this entry »

Out of the country? Living under a rock? Here’s what you missed in the ninth week of Pac-12 basketball. 

Power Rankings (as voted upon by Connor Pelton, Andrew Murawa and Adam Butler):

Arizona is once again the unanimous top choice this week, but every spot below the Wildcats saw more turmoil than usual. Check the results below.

It Was California Freshman Jordan Mathews’ Night At Matthew Knight On Thursday (Chris Pietsch/AP)

1. Arizona (17-0, 3 Points). Comment: “It seemed like there was just an overall lack of focus and too much hero ball going on early. Once everyone settled in and started moving the ball around, there was no way USC was able to get back into it, and Arizona asserted itself by finishing the game with a 25-10 run to win the game by 20.” – Jason Bartel (@jasonbartel)
2. California (12-4, 6 Points). Comment: “And so the Bears have won three straight conference road games by an average margin of eight points. Who saw that one coming? With three straight winnable games on the horizon, Cal has a sudden and unexpected opportunity to make some serious noise in the Pac-12.” – Nick Kranz (@GoldenBlogs)
3. UCLA (13-3, 10 Points). Comment: “UCLA enters the AP poll with a loss to Arizona.” – Adam Butler (@pachoopsab)
4. Colorado (14-3, 14 Points). Comment: “Damn. Dinwiddie news is terrible. Have a feeling Boyle will get this team to respond, but doubt they can make the second weekend now.” – Andrew Murawa (@AMurawa)
5. Washington (11-6, 18 Points). Comment: “Those who have complained about Romar’s offense definitely have been put to silence. The UW offense looks much improved in the second year of the high post system, as the Huskies have been using an array of screens and cuts to get Wilcox and the rest of the guards open.” – Erik Erickson (@Erik_Erickson)
6. Stanford (10-5, 19 Points). Comment: “Maybe we start a new segment in here that’s just called WHAT DOES THE STANFORD SAY? and then I just write or link to whatever I want and it’s wildly unpredictable and completely upsetting but you’re attracted to that instability by some unintelligible force that keeps telling you that they’ll change. Did I just describe my ex-girlfriend?” – Adam Butler (@pachoopsab)
7. Oregon (13-3, 21 Points). Comment: “Oregon could not capitalize on their golden opportunities to steal one from Stanford as their last two shots clanked off the rim; first Johnathan Loyd’s jumper and then a driving layup from Dominic Artis, allowing the Cardinal to escape with an 82-80 win.” – Jake Tabor (@JakeTabor541)
8. Arizona State (13-4, 22 Points). Comment: “The Sun Devils are in a tough spot going forward, too, as eight of their 14 remaining games come against Arizona, California, Colorado and Oregon. Herb Sendek’s crew has a fight on its hands just to get to .500 in the Pac-12.” – Matt Norlander and Jeff Borzello (@EyeOnCBB)
9. Oregon State (9-7, 25 Points). Comment: “The Beavers beat Stanford, 81-72! Great reward for a great week of practice. Really impressed by the team on both ends of the court.” – Connor Pelton (@ConnorPelton28) Read the rest of this entry »

Who’s Got Next? is a weekly column by Sean Moran, the RTC recruiting guru. Once a week he will bring you an overview of what’s going on in the complex world of recruiting, from who is signing where among the seniors to discussing the recruitments of the top uncommitted players in the country. We also encourage you to check out his contributions at The Intentional Foul dedicated to recruiting coverage and analysis. You can also follow Sean at his Twitter account @Seanmohoops for up-to-date news from the high school and college hoops scene. If you have any suggestions as to areas we are missing or different things you would like to see, please let us know at rushthecourt@yahoo.com.

Note: Scout.com used for all player rankings.

Arizona Locks Up Top 10 Junior

In a surprise early commitment, five-star junior guard Tyler Dorsey announced his intention to play college ball at Arizona come 2015.

The Wildcats are currently on top of the basketball world with their perch atop the national rankings and their No. 3 ranked recruiting class in 2014. With the addition of Dorsey, the No. 7 player in the class of 2015 and No. 2 shooting guard the Wildcats have now gotten their 2015 recruiting off to a strong start. The 6’4” guard is known for his scoring exploits but has been playing as more of a combo guard this season at St. John Bosco in California. Over the holidays Dorsey was the second leading scorer in the City of Palms Tournament, averaging 19 points a game and tied for second in assists with 5.5 per game. With long arms and strong one-on-one moves it is almost impossible for just one defender to contain Dorsey off the dribble. A quick first step helps him get into the paint and then with his elevation he can rise for a patented pull-up jumper or an acrobatic finish in the lane. While not a deadly outside shooter, Dorsey is capable of hitting outside shots off the catch or the pick-and-roll with his favorite spots coming right around the top of the key.

When Stanley Johnson (#7 – 2014) committed to Arizona in the fall, much was made about the pipeline Sean Miller had built from the Oakland Soldiers AAU program to Tucson. Just in the past few years Miller has nabbed high profile recruits such as Brandon Ashley, Nick Johnson, Aaron Gordon, and Johnson from this program. While Dorsey doesn’t play for this particular unit, the commitment does speak to Miller’s overall dominance of the California recruiting scene as he has taken full advantage of the tumultuous times at both USC and UCLA over the last five years. Three current Wildcats in the seven-man rotation hail from California, and Miller will add two more next year with the addition of Johnson and point guard Parker Jackson-Cartwright (#50 overall, #12 PG – 2014).

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Another week of college basketball is in the books and with that was another week of noteworthy upsets. Previously undefeated and third-ranked Ohio State relearned the rigors of the Big Ten, as the Buckeyes fell twice this past week – at #4 Michigan State on Tuesday and at home to #8 Iowa on Sunday. Having lost its first ACC game to Notre Dame, #24 Duke rebounded nicely with a home win over Georgia Tech before suffering another conference loss – this time on the road to Clemson. Previously 13th-ranked Oregon and 17th-ranked Colorado discovered the perils of Pac-12 play, as the Ducks dropped home games to California and Stanford, and the Buffaloes were thoroughly outmanned in a loss at Washington on Sunday. If the first two weeks of conference play serve as any indication, the conference season will be full of excitement, surprises, and a rather fluid RTC25 the rest of the way. The quick n’ dirty analysis of this week’s poll is after the jump.

Quick n’ dirty Analysis.

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1. Colorado traveled to Washington on Sunday afternoon and came away with not only a 17-point loss, but something potentially far worse. Junior point guard Spencer Dinwiddie injured his knee late in the first half, crumpled to the ground in pain and had to be carried off the court. An MRI is scheduled to be conducted today in order to find out more, but as head coach Tad Boyle put it, at first glance this is “not good.” We’ll have more on this story as it develops, but for now just offer our best wishes to Dinwiddie.
2. Utah struggled this weekend, losing a pair on the road to the Washington schools, but Tony Jones of The Salt Lake Tribune has a good story on the maturation of center Dallin Bachynski. Last year, after a strong start to the season, Bachynski saw his minutes and his production dwindle and he let that damage his attitude, to the point where he left the team temporarily in the middle of the season. But, after getting good counsel from his brother Jordan, senior center at Arizona State, Bachynski rejoined the team and has since cleaned up his attitude to the point where he is again a positive to his team.
3. Jones also had the Utes dialed in this weekend when he mentioned in advance of Sunday’s loss that the team’s three losses had come by a grand total of six points. Well, now make it four losses and nine points. But, either way, clearly Utah needs to work on their execution in end-game scenarios. Part of the problem may be due to a young roster, part of it may be the hangover effect of a team that has grown used to winning games, but at least this much is clear: the Utes are close and if they can begin to get over the hump, these close losses may turn into close wins.
4. Arizona had a big weekend in Los Angeles, scoring not only a pair of wins over UCLA and USC, but also a five-star 2015 recruit in the process. Tyler Dorsey of St. John Bosco is currently the #2 shooting guard in his class according to ESPN and also the #7 overall player. After Wildcat head coach Sean Miller caught Dorsey’s Friday night game, Dorsey tweeted out his commitment later that night, choosing the Wildcats over suitors including UCLA and Duke. With an elite recruiting class already headed to Tucson next season, Dorsey is just the start of another great class for Miller.
5. Lastly, California remains one of the conference’s two undefeated teams in league play, having won their first three games – all on the road. Saturday night, the shorthanded Golden Bears, playing without freshman Jabari Bird and junior Ricky Kreklow, nevertheless found a way to get a big boost from their bench to knock off Oregon State. Little-used Jeff Powers led the way by knocking in 14 points (mainly on four threes) in just 15 minutes of action to spark the team to a road comeback win.