Editor's Note: The following blog/commentary offers the
writer's views of the on-court performances and decisions
of our
men's basketball team. In no way should constructively-intended
criticism be
deemed as a lack of respect or admiration for our team's obvious desire
and
commitment.
For starters, why not an open letter to Darren Collison?
Dear Darren,
I’m sorry. There, I said it. I am sorry. I know. I should have
included you in my All Pac-10 team. I thought that mentioning that you were
my preseason pick for Pac-10 player of year, and that I had only expected the
best from you, would be enough. Apparently, it was not. You decided to
take it out on Stanford. I understand. Just in case Stanford and UCLA
meet in the Final Four, can we call it even? Thanks.
There. Now that I’ve got that off my chest, I feel better…
Post-Pac-10 Thoughts
Can’t say I’m too angry about how things sorted out. If you would have told me
last week that Stanford would have finished a close second in the Pac-10s to
UCLA, I would not have been overly upset. Yes, some breaks here and there
could have meant a different result, and a possible tournament title for the
Cardinal. It would have been nice to see Stanford get a good shot at the
end – instead they went to Lawrence Hill for a two when they were down by
three with three seconds left. In any case, Stanford won the games it
needed to, and lost a close match against one of the best teams in the
nation. Can’t say I’m too unhappy about that.
What I am unhappy about is…
USC 59, Arizona State 55
Arizona State was the latest victim of the Pac-10 referees’ SoCal bias with a
terrible call in the last minute. Jeff Pendergraph had a put-back dunk to tie
the game that was ruled as an over the back foul, leading to two USC free throws
on the other end. I only have my eyes to judge the nature of this call, because
for some reason they don’t show any instant replays in the Staples Center during
the Pac-10 tournament. The league must really know its refs are
awful. Conference of Champions! Woot!
In any case, we will never know if ASU could have pulled it off in
overtime. Given the partisan crowd (USC was just down the street), I have
my doubts. But now, considering that ASU was one of the last teams not to
make the NCAA tournament, you just have to wonder…
Speaking of the crowd, the USC-UCLA match up Friday night was particularly
interesting. I asked one of my friends, a USC water polo player, how he
thought the fan support would be distributed. No question, he
said. All UCLA.
He was right. Whether it’s the more storied history of Bruin basketball, or the
fact that USC had just gone on spring break, but the Bruin faithful seemed to
outnumber the Trojan fans three-to-one. It was even worse, of course, for
the Stanford-UCLA final – essentially a home game for the
Bruins. Again, I don’t want to sound like I’m complaining too much, and I
love Staples, but is there some more neutral venue out there? Fresno’s Save
Mart center, perhaps? Then again, I would much rather spend a weekend in
Los Angeles, however smoggy, than Fresno, home court advantage be damned.
Overheard in the 6th man
“Love is fat! Love can’t shoot!” This actually came courtesy of the Band
Saturday afternoon. And Love actually missed the free throws, to boot.
Overheard in the press room
Now, I won’t claim to be an expert in all things college basketball (which is
why this post will largely be devoid of NCAA tournament picks and projections),
but I’ve followed Stanford enough in recent years to know BS when I hear
it. And what I overheard from a conversation between a couple of UCLA
student journalists made me cringe: “Wow, that Mitch Johnson guy had four
turnovers. He’s terrible!” [Yes, Collison killed Stanford, but Mitch also had
seven points, seven rebounds and five assists]. “And that Goods guy, seven out
of his eight shot attempts were three pointers – what’s up with
that?” [Please note: Anthony hit four of those seven three-point
attempts, which may have happened to be all his makes from the field. But
getting Goods going from outside will be crucial for the Cardinal in the
Tournament. Oh yeah, and one of those attempts was the heave with the clock
running out, so really he was basically 4-for-6. Also note, two of Kevin Love’s four made field goals were 3-pointers. Thank you. Move
along.]
Of course, you can’t get too worked up about what everyone else
thinks. And fans, sometimes even beat writers, of other teams are bound to
be homers. But these guys took it to a whole new level. I saw one of
their ballots for the all-Pac-10 Tournament Team from a distance, and the guy
had the gall to put Brook Lopez and four members of UCLA on his
ballot! Yes, UCLA won and everything, but four?
For the record, here were my picks: Kevin Love, UCLA. Darren Collison, UCLA
(also my pick for tournament MVP, which apparently is not also a member of the
all-Tournament team in the current arrangement? Strange.) Brook Lopez,
Stanford (who would have been my MVP pick had Stanford pulled off the
upset). Kyle Weaver, Washington State. O.J. Mayo, USC.
Let me add, for the record, that I was shocked to be the recipient of an
official Pac-10 tournament team ballot. As I returned from a halftime stint
chatting it up with Daniel over on KZSU, I was stunned to find the
salmon-colored sheet of paper awaiting me at my spot behind the south
basket. My reaction: You really care what I think? My vote actually
has an official sway in the matter?
Don’t get me wrong. I like picking these teams, and had a lot of fun
putting together my column the other week picking my All-Pac 10 team. But that
was always for fun, to liven up the conversation and to spark a debate around
these parts. But, lo and behold, as a part of the Pac-10 Tournament media
brigade, my voice actually mattered. Scary, isn’t it? (but really now,
my picks were essentially the same as the ones selected, so I can’t beat myself
too much, right?)
Overheard in the Staples Center
Well, now that the “overheard in” section has taken on a
life of its own, here are a couple observations about how other teams’ fans like
to get their cheering sections riled up. There may be some lessons for
the 6th Man here.
First off, I’m a big fan of Arizona’s routine for tipoff and the start of the
second half. The band plays this cool little march, and everyone stands until
the Wildcats score. While that means these days they may get tired standing up
for so long, the tradition is still pretty cool and gets everyone, not just the
students, involved. As for what Stanford could learn, I’m not really
sure. Could our old people handle it? Do we really want to blatantly copy
Arizona? Doubtful.
“U. C. LLLLLLL A! UCLA fight fight fight!”
You either love this or hate this. Yes, it becomes annoying after a
while, but not nearly as bad as the constant drone of the USC fight song during
football games (luckily these are mostly absent during basketball
games). Stanford clearly lacks something like this, a well known, easy to
do cheer that can get everyone loud and going all at once. The “Go! Stanford!”
call and response is too generic, and can easily be hijacked by fans of other
teams. There’s real room for improvement here, but I’m not sure what exactly we
can do. The “L-E-L-A-N-D S-T-A-N-F-O-R-D … etc” spell out that the Band
does before “All Right Now” is great, but too long and unwieldy to become a
rousing cheer employed throughout games. Maybe something with a slow
clap? I’m always a fan of a slow clap.
The “5-6-7-8-whoooo!” during “All Right Now” is the only thing I can really
approximate to what we do, but we only play “All Right Now” occasionally (which
is a good thing; I don’t think the fight songs should be overused) and its not
something that really gets the crowd rallying mid-game. I’m really at a
loss here. I’m going to cop out for now and claim that finals have drained
my creative juices, but someone needs to come up with something.
WSU’s shark thing
Not really sure what this is about, considering there’s
little that sharks and cougars have in common, other perhaps than encounters
between young pool sharks and urban cougars in San Francisco bars. If you
don’t know what I’m talking about (the cheer, that is), Cal does this with “Iron
Man” for sacks in football. (You know I would never advocate copying Cal,
but…) We actually tried to get this started at Maples, when they blare the
“Jaws” theme before the team takes the floor for pregame warm-ups. For some
reason it never caught on, even though I thought it would be cool for
the 6th man to be involved
with something unique there, not just clapping or whatever. Guess you can’t
win them all.
Pat’s Picks
Speaking of winning it all, I’m not going to spend a lot of space on my
Tournament projections. But I will stand by my preseason projection of
Stanford making it to the Sweet Sixteen this year. Cornell struggled
against Harvard, who Stanford blew out minus Brook earlier this season, and
Marquette is talented but should have no answer for the Lopez twins. Texas,
however, could be trouble. D.J. Augustin could put on a similar display as
Collison did last weekend, and the Houston crowd wouldn’t be especially
favorable for the Card. If I learned anything from this week’s Collison
experience, it’s that I should stick with my preseason picks.
Patrick Fitzgerald covers men's basketball as well as the occasional news
story for The Stanford Daily. Have some dirt on an opposing player or a
good idea for a 6th Man chant? Email him at patfitz@stanford.edu.
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