Another week, another group of honors for Pac-12 people and things…

Team of the Week – Oregon

At first glance, the thought was that Arizona State’s 2-0 start, including a win over Colorado, would be enough to earn the Sun Devils this honor. But winning at home in conference play is just something you’re supposed to do. No, we needed to find a road warrior this week, and that left us looking at California, Washington and Oregon. We threw Cal out due to its loss at UCLA and, because we still aren’t really sure if beating USC is that much of an accomplishment, leaving us with a pair of teams that went on the road in-state and came away with 1-0 records in the conference. After briefly considering a tie, Oregon got the nod for its more impressive win against what may be a slightly better opponent and the panache with which they got it done. After trailing by six at the half, freshman guard Damyean Dotson took on the offensive load, while the entire Ducks team stepped it up defensively to take home the first basketball edition of the Civil War.

Damyean Dotson And The Ducks Earn Team Of The Week Honors With A Road Win Over In-State Rival Oregon State

Player of the Week – Jason Washburn, Utah

Despite coming away from the week with an 0-2 record, Washburn was our choice for the best player of the week in the conference. His numbers alone (18 PPG, 14.5 PPG, 3.0 BPG, 55 FG%) give some indication into just how good he was, but the fact of the matter is that in both games he played this weekend against some talented opponents, Washburn was the best player on the floor. Against Jordan Bachynski on Wednesday night, Washburn pulled down a career-high 18 boards, swatted four shots, and nearly willed his team to a win, infuriating the ASU crowd along the way. Then Saturday night, against Kaleb Tarczewski and the highly-regard Arizona bigs, Washburn backed up that effort by going for 17 points, 11 boards and a couple more blocks, again helping to keep his scrappy Utes in the game against more talented competition. While a measly little POTW award isn’t going to make up for his team’s 0-2 start in the conference, Washburn took on some formidable bigs and made tight games out of match-ups that weren’t expected to be too highly contested.

Read the rest of this entry »

1. All year long we have seen freshman Damyean Dotson make dazzling plays for Oregon, and last night at Oregon State, he had his best game yet. Dotson scored 15 of his 21 points in the second half, a stretch that saw the Ducks transform as a team in breaking a close game open and scoring 51 points. Taking advantage of Oregon State’s slow rotations and help defense, Dotson would drive and either get a layup or kick out for an open three all second half long. The Ducks’ star in the making has a chance to shine even brighter on Thursday when Oregon welcomes Arizona into Matthew Knight Arena.
2. Although this interview was conducted prior to the start of the 2012-13 season, California Golden Blogs had a great talk with head coach Mike Montgomery. Montgomery says the most challenging part of coaching at Cal is adjusting to the climate of recruiting in college hoops and how kids have changed what they are looking for in a school over the years. They were not able to avoid any NCAA Tournament talk, as he says he’s looking forward to playing in the first round the most, but he also adds towards the end of the discussion that “every game has value, and you should cherish that as a student-athlete.” If the Golden Bears are to go dancing, they will likely need a third or fourth place finish in the conference race to do so. And with the way everyone beat each other up in the initial weekend, that is certainly possible.
3. Remember back in early December, when UCLA had just posted embarrassing losses to Cal Poly and San Diego State? The once top-15 Bruins were 4-3, and rumors were swirling that coach Ben Howland could be fired before season’s end. Since the debacle in Anaheim, however, the Bruins have won seven straight games and have seen terrific play from freshmen Shabazz Muhammad and Jordan Adams. The Bruins are fun to watch again, not only on a regional scale but nationally. Now, we will get to see how Howland can do with his team on the road. UCLA’s first true road game of the season comes Thursday against a suddenly feisty Utah club.
4. Just like it did against Florida and Oral Roberts, and to some extent Long Beach State, Arizona struggled to close out on three-point shooters in the initial weekend of Pac-12 play. And once again, the Wildcats didn’t have to pay for their poor perimeter defense with a loss. Barely. Freshmen Grant Jerrett and Brandon Ashley struggled mightily as Colorado shot at a 47.6% clip from behind the arc, and Utah followed that with a fine 43.8% mark. Eventually, the sloppy defense will cost ‘Zona its undefeated record; the question is whether it will it happen this week on the Oregon road trip?
5. Being one of only four remaining undefeated teams, the Wildcats will have a target on their backs and face hostile crowds for the remainder of the season, as you might expect. The Arizona Daily Star has a cool look back at the team’s 1932 season, when the 16-0 Cats made their way through a snowstorm to meet New Mexico in The Pit. The run would end there, in front of one of the most intimidating environments in college basketball. This year’s version of the Wildcats has nine road games left before Championship Week arrives, including trips to The Inferno, the Dawg Pack, and the Coors Event Center. They will need some more luck, and toughness, to survive each of those battles.

1. Despite being a senior, Kevin Parrom doesn’t mind that he’s coming off the bench for Arizona. Even though Parrom isn’t starting, he’s still averaging over 21 minutes per game and has been a key contributor thus far for the Wildcats, most notably in his last game where he had 17 points in the Diamond Head Classic final against San Diego State. As long as the Wildcats keep winning, Parrom will continue to be happy coming off the bench.
2. For Utah, there are no more easy games. In the non-conference season, the Utes played teams like Wright State, Texas State, and Idaho State, but that won’t be happening in conference play. The Utes fell on the road to Arizona State last night in overtime, and it won’t get any easier going forward as they will take on a top five Arizona squad on Saturday. If Utah wants to have some success in conference play, they will have to continue to get impressive games out of Jordan Loveridge and Jason Washburn while continuing to play strong defense.
3. Now that non-conference play is over in the Pac-12, CBS Sports‘ Jeff Goodman believes that it’s clear that the Pac-12 has certainly improved from last year. Arizona is back to being nationally relevant and has a chance to earn a #1 seed come March, while UCLA, Colorado, and Oregon all look poised to receive at-large bids. Stanford and Cal have been inconsistent and will need to prove themselves more in the conference season in order to be in the discussion on Selection Sunday. There still are the disappointments such as Washington and USC, but overall, the conference as a whole has much more respect than it did at this time last year.
4. Kameron Rooks, a seven-foot center and the son of former Arizona player Sean Rooks, announced Tuesday via Twitter that he has committed to California. Besides the Golden Bears, Rooks had received offers from Arizona, Arizona State, Washington, and Connecticut. Cal could end up being the best fit for him, though, as they don’t have a trio of developing big men like Arizona and will most likely need Rooks’ play right away next year. He is listed as a three-star recruit according to Scout and Rivals, but like most seven-footers he is mostly potential at this point in his career. For Mike Montgomery, Rooks adds to a class already featuring top 25 prospect Jabari Bird and should help Montgomery continue his success at Cal.
5. Former UCLA center Josh Smith is transferring to Georgetown. It’s no secret that Smith had a troubled career at UCLA in battling weight issues and dealing with criticism from Ben Howland. He averaged 10.9 points and 6.3 rebounds per game his freshman year, but saw his numbers decline with 9.9 points and 4.9 rebounds per game during his sophomore year, followed by a 5.2 point, 4.2 rebounds per game stat line in six games this season. Smith decided to go with Georgetown over Kansas, but if the talented but troubled big man cannot control his weight, it won’t matter whose uniform he puts on next season.

We are six weeks into our Pac-12 Pick’Em and Adam continues to edge out the rest of us. And now that we are completely done with non-conference play, the amount of available points will drop significantly. Last week was rough on all of us, thanks to teams like Oregon State and California choking away what we thought were sure wins. Drew was the only one to gain any ground, as he was the only one to correctly pick New Mexico’s road upset of Cincinnati. In our other game of the week, Missouri-UCLA, I came the closest to correctly picking the Bruin win. While everyone else picked the Tigers to win by 12 or 16, I had the game going down to the wire with UM pulling out a five-point win. So now, we enter week six. Colorado’s visit to Arizona and Ohio State’s meeting with Illinois headline the list as our games of the week.

The biggest differences in opinion this week come in Colorado’s visit to Arizona State. Parker and I pick the road-weary Buffaloes to escape Tempe with the victory, while Drew and Adam took the Sun Devils. Save myslef, everyone else matches on the remainder of the picks. I took Illinois in our national game of the week and Oregon State for a Civil War victory, opting for home-court advantage, something that can be pivotal in conference play.

Here’s a look at the power rankings that Drew, Parker, Adam, and I have compiled after the seventh week of Pac-12 games (delta in parentheses):

1. Arizona, 12-0 (-): Technically, the undefeated Wildcats played in week seven, getting that thrilling, 68-67 win over San Diego State over in Honolulu. But due to my Christmas-inspired laziness, last week’s power rankings were delayed, and we already covered that stuff. The #3 Cats haven’t taken the floor since, giving them extra time to prepare for a visit from Colorado on Thursday. With that game in Tucson, and the Buffaloes starting off the season with a 1-2 mark on the road, the Wildcats should be able to shine on national television with their 13th victory of the year. Senior guard Mark Lyons led Arizona through non-conference play with 13.4 PPG. Up Next: 1/3 vs. Colorado.
2. Colorado, 10-2 (^1): After taking an eight-day break, Colorado returned to action without missing a beat, dispatching 7-6 Hartford, 80-52. Led by Josh Scott, the Buffs jumped out to a 26-6 lead and never looked back. Blowout wins are beginning to become a trend under head coach Tad Boyle, who has seen his team win half of its games this season by double digits. As we discussed above, the Buffaloes will venture into the McKale Center on Thursday night, and while they certainly are capable of pulling the upset, the last time they took on a top 10 team on the road, it didn’t go very well. Who can forget last month’s trip to Lawrence, where Kansas jumped out to a 27-8 lead en route to a 90-54 thrashing of CU. Getting a good start against the Wildcats will be key for an upset. Up Next: 1/3 @ Arizona.
   

   In Addition To Pulling Down 10 Rebounds, Josh Scott Led Colorado With 21 Points In A Win Over Hartford On Saturday. (credit: US Presswire)

3. Oregon, 11-2 (٧1): The Ducks and Buffaloes traded places this week, despite UO getting what is largely considered the better win over Nevada. The Wolf Pack were able to hang with Oregon for 30 minutes on New Year’s Eve before the Ducks went on a 14-6 run to lead by 16. Dana Altman‘s squad would cruise from there en route to a 56-43 win. Up Next: 1/6 @ Oregon State.
4. UCLA, 10-3 (^1): Forget Arizona over San Diego State, the conference’s marquee win in week seven came via UCLA, who outlasted Missouri in an overtime thriller, 97-94. In the extra period, Travis Wear drained a jumper to put the Bruins up three with 15 seconds remaining before grabbing the game’s final rebound to seal the upset. Up Next: 1/3 vs. California.
5. Arizona State, 11-2 (^3): It was a pretty simple week for Herb Sendek and the Sun Devils. After dominating Coppin State on Saturday, ASU sat back and watched three teams in front of them either drop games to lesser opponents or nearly escape them. As a result, they enter league play at number five in our power rankings. Up Next: 1/2 vs. Utah.
6. Stanford, 9-4 (^1): Stanford was the other team to take advantage of Oregon State and California’s misfortunes, jumping up one spot with a closer-than-expected victory over Lafayette. Stanford opens Pac-12 play with a trip to Los Angeles, where they’ll need a split to stay in the upper half of our rankings. Up Next: 1/3 @ USC. Read the rest of this entry »

Chris Johnson is an RTC Columnist. He can be reached @ChrisDJohnsonn. 

College basketball gave us plenty of memorable moments and stories in 2012. After sorting through the main headlines, we’ve come up with the 10 most consequential items and, for the sake of maintaining publishing sequence symmetry, releasing two per-day over the next five days to lead into the New Year. It was an excellent year for the sport, though I can’t promise you won’t regret reliving at least one or two of the choices. In any case, here’s to summing up a great year and to hoping that 2013 is better than the 365 days that preceded it.

The outpouring of nostalgic literature produced in the immediate aftermath of Rick Majerus’ passing bore a common theme. Everyone had a personal anecdote to relate, a unique encounter that spoke louder than general platitudes and standard obituary prose. For some, the stories dealt with Majerus’ shameless discussion of personal toils with health issues. Others described his astounding disregard for normative comportment – Majerus would often receive guests in his hotel residence with nothing but a towel cloaking his massive figure – or the wacky recruiting tactics, or the borderline obsessive eagerness to talk hoops at all times. The post-mortem compendium of Majerus remembrances painted a picture of a basketball coach, teacher of the game and man whose underlying trait was an adherence to the obscure and the outlandish, and a resistance to the conventional.

Read the rest of this entry »

1. After a quiet period surrounding Christmas, things pick back up again beginning tonight with a pair of games involving Pac-12 teams. The most high profile game is UCLA hosting Missouri in a chance to see whether the Bruins’ recent improvements on the offensive end are enough to have them ready to compete with very good teams. Missouri is coming off its most high profile win of the season, a nine-point win over Illinois in the Braggin’ Rights game, but they have also handled Stanford and Virginia Commonwealth in a pair of quality wins in the Bahamas. The Tigers will be playing a bit shorthanded, though, as reserve forward Tony Criswell – he of 18 minutes, six points and five rebounds per game – will miss the game with a broken finger.
2. Utah is the other Pac-12 team to break its Christmas fast and return to the court tonight, as they will host the College of Idaho, an NAIA school. While the Utes already have more wins this year than they earned all of last season, they still left quite a few on the table. Despite a 7-4 record, if the Utes had simply been able to hang on to three different second-half double-figure advantages, they could be 10-1 at this point. But with a young team that is still getting used to the idea of winning games, closing out victories is still a work in progress.
3. Oregon State gets back in the swing of things on Saturday when they host Towson at Gill Coliseum. And in a cool bit of marketing for the program, the first 1,000 fans into the venue will get a free Alamo Bowl t-shirt and everyone is invited to stick around after the game and watch the football game (vs. Texas) as well as participate in an autograph session with OSU players and coaches. Way to take a simple, relatively unappealing basketball game for which the students will be out of town and turn it into a blockbuster day for Beaver fans to spend enjoying both of their big-time sports programs.
4. Oregon got back from its Christmas break and resumed practice yesterday in advance of a meeting with Nevada on New Year’s Eve, and they are hoping to repeat last year’s improvement following their time off. Last year the Ducks got run over by Virginia then coasted through three uninspired wins over bad teams prior to Christmas break, before coming back and tearing through Washington State to kick off a strong conference run. Dana Altman recognizes that the parts are in place for the Ducks to again compete for a conference title, but he’ll have his team spending the next few practices working on offensive execution and defensive communication.
5. It seems like all week we have had a little something about the big Arizona win over San Diego State on Christmas night, but for the most part we have focused on Nick Johnson’s highlight-reel blocked shot in the waning moments. Head coach Sean Miller notes that, while Johnson’s play was great, senior Kevin Parrom put a bow on the game by running down the loose ball after the block and making sure that the Aztecs were unable to get a second-shot opportunity. That, coupled with Parrom’s offensive contributions, made him a underrated key to Arizona’s Diamond Head Classic title, even though teammates like Johnson, Solomon Hill, and Mark Lyons may normally get more publicity.

We are five weeks into our Pac-12 Pick’Em and Adam is slowly running away with the thing. Sure, he’s only one game up on Parker, but with a week with so many similar picks like this one, and with those shorter conference weeks coming up, making up ground will be hard to do. Last week was rough on all of us, thanks to teams like USC and Utah choking away what we thought were sure wins. I was the only one to miss Stanford’s road win at Northwestern; I did come pretty close on the score, however. I had the Wildcats winning 71-69, but they fell 70-68. So now, we enter week five. New Mexico’s visit to Cincinnati and Missouri’s meeting with UCLA headline the list as our games of the week.

There’s only a single difference in opinion this week, as Drew is taking the visiting Lobos over host Cincinnati. I am the only one picking the Tigers-Bruins match-up to be a close ballgame, with Missouri pulling out a five-point victory in Los Angeles.

1. Ever since the Pac-12 announced that it was moving its conference tournament from the regularly church-quiet Staples Center in Los Angeles to Las Vegas beginning this season, fans from around the conference have been marking their calendars. But the fact that the host venue — the MGM Grand Hotel — had never before hosted a basketball event, was somewhat concerning. However, never let it be said that Larry Scott and company do things without putting in the proper diligence. This weekend the MGM Grand held the first dry run for a basketball game, as Oregon State and San Diego broke the seal on that place. And it was a real dry run, in part because the final announced attendance for the game was a whopping 840 people in a building with a capacity of 16,800. Even after seeing a boatload of empty seats at the Staples Center in recent years, I would bet the farm on the fact that there will be significantly more people in the venue when the conference tourney rolls around (although such a bet is probably less impressive when you consider that I don’t own a farm). But, there weren’t many complaints about the arena, which is good considering there were only 840 people there to possibly complain. Oh, and OSU won but they looked terrible.
2. Speaking of terrible, USC fell at Georgia on Saturday, slipping back to 4-8 on the year and any “yeah, buts” about their tough schedule need to get put on the back burner until the Trojans beat somebody of importance. Evan Barnes of Rant Sports is more or less on the same page as me. Both of us, apparently, have just been waiting for this talented bunch to turn the corner and play up to their ability, but we’ve both sort of given up on that. And, we’ve both come to the conclusion that Kevin O’Neill bears the full brunt of the blame. At some point, as rosters get completely remade and the team continues to run much of the same stuff to largely the same effect, you’ve got to come to the conclusion that this issue isn’t entirely with the players on the court but may partially be tied back to the guy in the lead chair on the sideline. I’m a fan of O’Neill’s blunt, honest-to-a-fault style off the court, but I no longer have any faith in his ability to get his team, no matter who is out there, to run anything approaching a good offense. While Trojan athletic director Pat Haden has kicked the task of replacing head football coach Lane Kiffin down the line a year, odds are very good that, barring a drastic turnaround, there will be another coaching search in South L.A. this spring.
3. Meanwhile, up the road a stretch, there may be another, slightly more attractive job opening in Los Angeles come spring. Last week Tracy Pierson of Bruin Report Online referenced anonymous sources who claimed that UCLA head coach Ben Howland’s job may be in jeopardy prior to the end of the season. Howland shrugged off such claims, noting “I can’t help you with substantiating anything that’s written on the boards.” Given that Howland’s got his team starting to click, at least on one end of the floor, and the fact that finding a prime replacement while the season is still in full swing, would be next to impossible, I’m in the camp that thinks it would be safe to just ignore this report. Sure, if UCLA’s season ends at any point prior to Atlanta on the weekend of April 6, you can start tracking the movements of your friendly neighborhood hatchet man, but there’s not a chance this side of Phil Jackson that Howland’s UCLA career ends at any point prior to the end of the season.
4. Last week, just before we all headed off to wrap up our Christmas shopping, a couple of my colleagues pointed to Utah as the conference’s biggest pleasant surprise. Well, sorry Connor and Adam, but I’ll be passing along your information to Larry Krystkowiak and he’ll be getting in touch with you to personally thank you both for jinxing his team. Because Friday night, after playing a sparklingly good first half, the Utes were outscored by 26 points in laying an egg in the second half, losing to Cal State Northridge and seemingly going out of their way to make sure that they snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. Still, you gotta remind yourself that this is a Utah team that has already won more games this season than they did all of last year and is still getting used to the idea of actually winning games. But man, that had to put a serious hurting on the beginning of a holiday break. One other note tangentially related to the Pac-12: One of the chief architects in putting that hurting into the Utah basketball program was CSUN freshman point guard Landon Drew, who had a career-high 19 points, including 14 in the second. Landon’s brother is Larry Drew II, the UCLA senior point guard.
5. As a fan and follower of both the Pac-12 and Mountain West, I’ve had Decembr 25 circled on my calendar for months, not for silly things like Santa Claus and eggnog and jingle bells, but for the possibility of an Arizona vs. San Diego State match-up in the finals of the Diamond Head Classic. And, after both teams have more or less cruised through the opening rounds of that tournament, that game is finally set in stone. While teams like Gonzaga, UNLV and New Mexico will have something to say about it, this may be a match-up to determine the best team west of the Rockies. Merry Christmas, hoops fans.

Chris Johnson is an RTC columnist. He can be reached @ChrisDJohnsonn. 

The Weekend’s Lede. The Holidays Are Here. The Holiday season closes the curtain on the nonconference portion of the college basketball season. At the turn of the New Year, most teams will have played their final out of league games. Some will have commenced conference play. Between now and January 1, players and coaches will enjoy breaks of various duration, but every team will set aside part of its hectic five-month schedule for some family bonding and holiday cheer. We will miss the hardwood action that made our weeknights bearable and our weekends excitable. Not to worry: the end of the winter festivities brings a new chapter of the season. Conference play is a significant turning point, a temporal marker, but most of all, it heralds a new level of competitiveness and intensity. Why am I talking about this so far in advance? Well, why not? League play is much more fun than the low-cut mix of competition observed in November and December. It’s non-stop high-stakes competition. Anyway, endure the next few hoop-less days as joyfully as possible and take your favorite teams’ scheduling gap as a cue to follow suit and spend time with those closest to you. In short, enjoy the Holiday Season! I’ll be back with more nightly recaps before you know it.

Your Watercooler Moment. An Ode To One Of College Hoops’ Great Lost Rivalries. 

Kansas vs. Ohio State Was Great, But It’s No Border War

Arguably the biggest realignment-related hoops casualty was the Border War, a decades-old feud between Missouri and Kansas played with venomous spite, healthy antagonism and competitive fire unlike any other game in the sport. Last year’s renditions were nothing short of excellent, with the Tigers taking the first meeting and the Jayhawks exacting revenge three weeks later. Losing that game is a huge blow to the sport’s traditional appeal, and make no mistake, it would have hurt at any point in the rivalry’s historical progression. That it finally came to expire this season, when both teams feature national contending outfits, is doubly painful. Saturday gave us yet another reason to lament the loss of the old Big 12 rivalry. Both Kansas and Missouri knocked off top-10 opponents (Missouri beat Illinois; Kansas beat Ohio State), each stating its claim for conference superiority. With Florida falling to Kansas State, and Kansas looking far and away like the class of the Big 12, it is no huge stretch to crown Missouri and Kansas temporary lordship of their respective leagues. Kansas’ grip on the Big 12 probably has more staying power, if only because the top of the Big 12 has yet to produce an equal competitor. The SEC, meanwhile, has two teams – Florida and Kentucky – who, provided they round into form over the course of conference play, may well test Missouri’s top-dog stature. Plus, Kansas is Kansas. Conference championships are nothing new for the Jayhawks. This is foreign territory for the Tigers; not only because it’s their first year in a new league. It’s also the first time in years where they’ve truly separated themselves amongst from other conference challengers – aside from Florida, no one’s touching the Tigers; at least not now – and certainly the first time they’ve done as much under second-year coach Frank Haith. 

Weekend Quick Hits…

• Temple Gets Quality Nonleague Result It Needed. Two weeks ago, Temple took on Duke at the IZOD center. The Blue Devils destroyed Fran Dunphy’s team. But, hey, that was Duke, the undisputed king of November and December. When the Owls lost to Temple, all bets were off. This team had major issues to sort out. Which is why Saturday’s upset of No. 3 Syracuse, previous owners of a 52-game nonconference winning streak, was so very unexpected. Temple cracked open the unrelenting puzzle that is Jim Boeheim’s trademark 2-3 zone, primarily thanks to Khalif Wyatt’s 33 points and Anthony Lee’s 21, both career-highs. Butler and VCU have proven themselves more than capable of handling the jump to a more prominent league. In fact, one can make the argument that Stevens and Smart’s squads have been the A-10’s most impressive squads to date. Temple proved Saturday it won’t cede conference bragging rights to the newcomers without putting up a real fight.
• Excellent Championship Showdown In Diamond Head Classic. The bulk of specialized exempted Tournament had come and gone during the first few months of the season. The Diamond Head Classic is An annual rite of Christmas Cheer, held in late December each and every year. After Arizona\’s Monday morning romp over Miami — whom many had crowned the ACC\’s second best team after recent wins over Michigan State, Charlotte, UCF and UMass — an excellent championship tilt between the Wildcats and San Diego State (who topped Indiana State en route to the final) has come into clear view. Want some high-quality hoop to light up your Christmas Night?  Tuesday\’s Final can\’t come soon enough. Read the rest of this entry »