Kevin McCarthy of Parsing the WAC and Sam Wasson of bleedCrimson.net are the RTC correspondents for the WAC.

A WACky regular season came to an end on Saturday night and after the dust settled the seedings were finally set. Heading into last week’s games just two of the nine seeds were cemented in place, the 1-seed (Utah State) and the 9-seed (Fresno State). The final seeds look like this 1) Utah State, 2) Nevada, 3) Idaho, 4) Boise State, 5) New Mexico State, 6) Louisiana Tech, 7) San Jose State, 8) Hawai’i, 9) Fresno State.

Tuesday night sees the two last place teams battle it out for the honor of facing top seed Utah State on Thursday in the quarterfinals.On Thursday the remaining eight teams will be whittled down to four.

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It’s that time of year again.

Classes are already in session at many of our nation’s fair universities, and the first few days of school are always the best. Every new class seems interesting; every freshman girl is a hook-up prospect; even the textbooks you just dropped $1000 on seem to hold promises of educational fulfillment within. That is, before boredom reality sets in and you realize that solving organic chemistry problems using those confounding erector sets still doesn’t make any sense and the freshman gals are just as completely and utterly uninterested in you as last year’s class was. Oh well – at least football’s starting and a case of Beast still only costs $6.99, right?

You Still Have No Shot (even with the chub)

Along with the beginning of classes also comes another rite of fall passage – the annual news that some hoopsters around the nation didn’t get the job done in the classroom over the summer and will be academically ineligible for the fall semester. This usually doesn’t mean much from an on-court standpoint, because the players can still practice with the team – they just can’t play in any games until they’re eligible again. And given that most fall semesters end in mid-December, the amount of games any player tends to miss is usually in the single digits.

Already the following players have been declared ineligible for the fall semester:

• Quinton Watkins – Illinois – incoming freshman leaves Bruce Weber with a thin backcourt after Jamar Smith’s DUI rendered him ineligible for the entire season
• Lyndale Burleson – Nevada – presumptive junior starting PG for Mark Fox’s squad didn’t have enough credits to become eligible
• AJ Ratliff – Indiana – the senior guard (9.3 ppg last year) and Indiana Mr. Basketball will miss the first nine games of the season
• Ra’Sean Dickey – Georgia Tech – 6’9 senior starting forward (8.1 ppg; 5.3 rpg) will also miss the first semester due to grades

Isn’t it odd how so many players become ineligible for the fall semester but seemingly always make the grades for the spring semester? We suppose that has something to do with the tutorial services available to athletes that may not be as comprehensive during the summer months. Consider how the Purdue women’s basketball team does it (h/t to Lion in Oil):

Former Purdue assistant Katrina Merriweather has admitted to typing and revising a paper for guard Cherelle George during the 2005-2006 season. Sociology 220 must have been harder for George than she’d expected. Witness the following email exchange between the two:

10/26/05, 4:45 PM Merriweather to George: Here are some thoughts that should help. Make sure you read it and add your own info from class notes or any textbooks you use. All of my info is from the internet and what I remember…

10/26/05, 10:16 PM Merriweather to George: Throw away the other one. This one is better and more organized….

11/29/05, 2:43 AM Merriweather to George: Hey, you still have to do the title page and the reference page. I have attached everything you need to do those (two) things. Make sure you reread the paper and make it sound like you.

Ahh yes, nothing like a little academic fraud to whisk in the fall semester. Happy studying, folks!