Kevo's "Pac-10
Round-ball Round-up" [Week of November 16-22]
The recent
week that was
will be remembered as the first black eye for the Pacific-10 Conference in
its weekly non-conference slate, and there may well be more ahead based upon what we
witnessed. With a combined 10 losses for
all conference members already, only the Arizona and Washington schools are
perfect on the two-week-old 2009-10 season. Here’s a look at what happened for the
other nine teams in the conference and a look ahead into the immediate
future for each school:
ARIZONA: For the Pac-10 enthusiasts,
this article will start and end with positive notes because the four
remaining undefeated schools are at opposite ends of the alphabetical
spectrum. The Wildcats only
played one game this past week, and were successful against the Owls from
Rice University, a squad that has a big Pac-10 presence on its bench with former
Cal coach Ben Braun as the head coach and former Beaver assistant and interim
head coach Kevin Mouton as an assistant.
Sean Miller’s Wildcat bunch won this game pretty easily by a count of
66-49. Zona got out to an early
24-6 lead before allowing the Owls cut the lead to six with 12 minutes to
go in the game, but it was easy sailing from there on out. Nic Wise led a group of four
Wildcats who reached double figures with 15 points and also had 7 assists and 5
steals (5 TOs as well though). It
was the first loss of the season for Rice, which dropped to 3-1. Don’t read too much into their record
though, as they won their first three contests against Sacramento State
(we’ll get to them when this article becomes sponsored by the letter “O”), South Alabama (a shell of the '07-'08 team that received an NCAA at-large bid), and
Houston Baptist (former D-I-turned NAIA-turned D-I school that is in
its second year at the top level this time around. Stanford actually practiced at their
facilities when we were down in Houston for the Sweet 16 two years
ago).
Up next for the Wildcats: Maui
Invitational - vs. Wisconsin on 11/23, vs. Colorado/Gonzaga (they beat the
Zags last year in Phoenix) on 11/24, final game on 11/25 (either
Chaminade/Maryland/Vanderbilt/Cincinnati).
ARIZONA STATE: Luckily, these guys
were on ESPN and ESPNU last week, so I got a chance to check a bit of each of
their games out. Eric Boateng has
really stepped his game up. I know
the competition was weak against Texas State, TCU, and USF (of the WCC variety,
not the Bulls!) but he was skying for rebounds and utilizing some nifty moves in
the post to get some nice buckets. 8
points and 8 rebounds (4-4 FG) in the first half against TCU, and finished with
21 and 12 (both career-highs). They
have a couple of nice freshmen too - Trent Lockett caught my eye for his
athleticism even though he missed a wide open lay-up at the end of the first
half against the Horned Frogs. The
Sun Devils won that game against TCU by a score of 52-49 and had to come back
from an 8-point deficit in the final four minutes. TCU is a good team, but shouldn’t be
pushing Arizona State to the limit if the Sun Devils are to be a high-quality
BCS conference team. I still like
this team though and think they are a top-half squad in a much-maligned
Pac-10. An 84-62 win against Texas
State (Texas State kept it within shouting distance for about 30 minutes before
completely folding) and a 104-65 conquer of the Dons were their other two
results. Side note: I’m watching
the ASU-TCU game on tape right now, and the camera just focused on a
little four-year-old girl in a Sun Devil cheerleader outfit throwing up a
“shocker” (PM me if you need to know what that means). LOL.
Up next for the Sun Devils: Pre-season
NIT- vs. Duke on 11/25 (oooh!!!!), vs. LSU/UCONN on 11/27 (Geaux Tigers! Coach Johnson is doing one hell of a job
down in the bayou)
CAL:
The Pac-10 attempted to put its best foot forward at MSG last week for
the "Coaches vs. Cancer Classic", and it didn’t pan out well. At all. Not even remotely close. If it wasn’t for a Boykin and
Randle-inspired second-half charge against the Buckeyes to make the second-half
interesting, 95-73 loss to
the 'Cuse, 76-70 loss to Ohio State.
However, one must remember that neither Theo Robertson nor Harper Kamp
played in those two games, and considering that Cal plays about eight
or so guys in their rotation, that’s ¼ of their lineup. And to be fair, Jerome Randle went
beast-mode on both the Orange and Buckeyes with a combined 51 points and 12
three-pointers. The little dude is
the second-coming of Nate Robinson, minus the hops and plus the outside jumper
(I’m a big fan of the Chi-city native, if you couldn’t tell already). Freshman Omondi Amoke looked more than
solid with 11 points and 15 rebounds off the bench against Ohio State; he brings
a lot of energy and hustle - a Boykin with more talent, if you will. Still, a 22-point loss never looks good,
even if it was against the eventual winners of the tournament after beating
UNC. What is most disconcerting for
me about the Coaches vs. Cancer results is that Cal only has two more
meaningful non-conference games - at The Pit to face New Mexico and at
Kansas. If the Pac-10 wants to
regain some credibility, then the supposed best team in the conference has to
get a win against another "Power 6" conference team, and Cal has only one of
those left. A win at New Mexico
will look nice, but it won’t carry as much weight as it should because of the
Lobos’ conference affiliation.
Up next for the Golden Bears:
Jacksonville at home on 11/24, Princeton at home on 11/29
OREGON: Over the past few years, the
Ducks have become the masters of losing to up-and-coming mid-major schools and
big conference schools that are NIT-bound at best. They continued this streak last night
with an 88-81 loss at the hands of Coach Rev’s Portland Pilots in Portland. I’m not saying this is a bad loss by any
means considering that the Ducks were a 20-loss team last year and the Pilots
are picked to finish second in a very strong WCC, but the Ducks needed this
one. Their last remaining
non-conference games against RPI-boosting opponents are Missouri on the road as
part of the Big 12/Pac-10 Hardwood Challenge and Saint Mary’s (who they lost to
a couple of years ago). Otherwise,
they face the likes of Mississippi Valley State, Arkansas Pine-Bluff, and
Oakland (a team they’ve lost to two straight years). They weren’t at full strength though, as
Michael Dunigan sat the game out with a leg injury. Hopefully it’s a day-to-day thing, as
the Ducks can have a serious advantage down low in conference if the talented
sophomore post player is healthy.
Another sophomore Malcolm Armstead was sharp, as he scored 21 against the
Pilots off the bench. Portland is
the real deal and will give the Bruins a lot of trouble on Thanksgiving (I still
say UCLA wins this game because I can’t imagine Coach Howland dropping another
this soon after a harrowing loss on Monday night - we’ll talk more about that
later).
Up next for the Ducks: Montana at home
on 11/23, Montana State at home on 11/28.
OREGON STATE: The Beavers continue
to befuddle everyone in college basketball, dropping their home opener 65-63 to
the Sacramento State Hornets (Oregon State trailed 44-22 at the half). Their 2009-2010 season is starting off a
lot like last season did with questionable losses to low-major schools. First it was Texas A&M
Corpus-Christi, now Sacramento State.
In case you didn’t know, Sacramento State is a historically-bad program -
really, really bad. In 18 seasons
at the D-I level, they have had one season at .500 (15-15), 0 seasons above
.500, and 11 seasons with 20 or more losses. The Hornets were a combined 6-51 over
the last two seasons and hadn’t beaten a D-I conference-affiliated opponent
this year until they faced the Beavers at Gill Coliseum. Also, they hadn’t beaten a power
conference ever before in their latest stint at the D-I level. Their last win against a Pac-10 team was
against the Washington State Cougars in 1953! The win against the Beavers on Saturday
put them at 2-30 all-time against Pac-10 opponents. And this was a team that lost the
school’s all-time leading scorer at the D-I level in Loren Leath. Yeah, this was a bad loss. There is no way around it. The Beavers let the Hornets go on a 27-4
run to end the first half.
Ouchmeisters. Oregon State
needs to right the ship quickly, or the only way they get into the tournament is
if they finish first in the Pac-10.
Up next for the Beavers: on the road at
George Washington on 11/28
UCLA: This has been a week from hell
for the Bruins. First, a horrific
loss to the Fullerton Titans, then a comeback victory against CAL STATE
BAKERSFIELD, then Nikola Dragovic gets arrested for some incident at a concert a
month ago or so. I’m not going to
speculate on the Dragovic situation, as I don’t want to add fuel to the fire and
he deserves to have his privacy as respected as possible in something like
this. However, I WILL speculate on
what happened on the court. Look, I
know that this time has barely had a chance to practice as a complete unit, they
lost four starters from a years ago, and that Coach Howland is going to
need some time to mold this team as a result. But I watched that game on Monday night
against Fullerton, and it was perhaps the sloppiest game I have seen in a
while. No disrespect to the Titans,
but they didn’t look all that hot as a team. They missed anywhere from 8-10 layups in
that game and turned the ball over 17 times in the first 40 minutes and STILL
won at Pauley Pavilion. On the
bright side for the Bruins, Malcolm Lee is the truth and I LOVE freshman Reeves
Nelson- he is an "energy guy" who gets a lot of offensive rebounds and finishes
very well at the hoop (his touch from the free throw line isn’t bad
either). Michael Roll is also a
very solid player, and will provide much-needed veteran leadership to a young
group in 2009-2010. On the dark
side, no one else had a good game. Jerime Anderson so far has not lived up
to his billing and went 1-11 against Fullerton on Monday night. He is still a good athlete and gives a
good defensive effort (just like any Howland-coached kid), but he really needs
to step it up. And I love Drew Gordon as a person and as a top-notch defender, but he needs to develop an
offensive game (being a San Jose kid myself, I played against Gordon at a couple
of parks in pick-up action, and he dunked on me TWICE). He doesn’t have much touch around the
basket, and if he is not in a position to dunk the ball, chances are he is not
going to make his shot. Anderson
(4-7 FG), Gordon (8-10 FG, 19 pts) and company seemingly proved all of my above
statements wrong against Bakersfield in a 75-64 win, but the Roadrunners are not
a team you brag about beating by 11, especially when you were trailing to them
by 11 more than halfway through the first half (they would eventually build an
18-point lead before losing a chunk of it). I’m completely confident that Coach
Howland will have his kids in good form come Pac-10 season, but until then, it’s
going to be a tough road to hoe, and the upcoming 76 Classic is going to be a
great test for them.
Up next for the Bruins: "76 Classic" in
Anaheim: vs Portland on 11/26, vs Butler/Minnesota on 11/27, vs West Virginia/Long Beach State/Clemson/Texas A&M
USC:
If Oregon State’s loss to Sacramento State was the worst of the week for
the Pac, then USC’s defeat at the hands of Loyola Marymount was a very close
second. Depth is a serious concern
for the Trojans, as they only used six players against the Lions on
Saturday night, and only five of them scored (led by Nikola Vucevic’s
19-point, 11-rebound effort). And
unlike the OSU-Sac State game, this wasn’t one where the opponent went on one
crazy run that ended up providing just enough cushion. Actually, the Trojans had an eight-point
halftime lead over LMU and increased it to 12 three minutes into the final
period. Remember that LMU is coming
off two seasons in which they lost more than 25 games (3-28 in 2008-09,
5-26 in 2007-08). Maybe not nearly
as bad historically as Sacramento State, but about just as bad in the recent
past. Seven players saw action in a 77-67 win over UC Riverside earlier in
the week, and Dwight Lewis dropped 22 points to lead all scorers. Outside of Lewis and Coach O’Neill,
there’s not a whole lot that jumps out at you. This was a team that would not have made
the NCAA tournament last year had they not won the Pac-10 tournament, and they
lost three starters from that team in Demar DeRozan, Taj Gibson and Daniel Hackett. There will be plenty of
growing pains for Coach O’Neill and company.
Up next for the Trojans: Coppin State at
home on 11/27, Nebraska at home on 11/29
WASHINGTON: Just one game for the
Huskies this week - an 80-70 win over San Jose State. That might not sound like much, but the
Spartans are a much-improved team that has a good chance of finishing above .500
and finding themselves in some sort of postseason tournament come March. "Ex-Husky-turned-Sparty" Adrian Oliver
went for 32 against his former side, but it wasn’t enough to match the 30 points
of Quincy Pondexter and 16 of Isaiah Thomas. I’m telling you, get your popcorn ready
for Stanford-UW later in the season and a Fields-Pondexter match-up- it will be
a serious barn-burner. The Huskies
are 4-0, and the win over the Spartans was their best of the young season (a
56-point win over Portland State doesn’t count), but the fact that San Jose
State has been their highest-quality opponent also tells you that UW hasn’t had
any kind of a true test yet- Texas Tech in Lubbock on 12.03 will be a better
barometer.
Up next for the Huskies: Montana at home
on 11/29
WASHINGTON STATE: The Cougs faced two opponents
this week- the Eastern Washington Eagles and the IPFW Mastodons. They started off with a 67-61 win over
EWU, which might sound bad at first because the Eagles went 12-18 last year and
play in the Big Sky. However, EWU
only lost to Portland by 6 as well, so by the transitive property, the Cougs are
just as good as Portland (okay, so maybe the transitive property doesn’t exactly
work in just about any case, but still, it’s not as bad of a close win as it
might appear). As far as the IPFW
game, here’s the good, the bad, and the ugly. The good: Klay Thompson scored 37
points. The bad: no one else
reached double figures. The ugly:
no ugly really, but your second-leading scorer (Reggie Moore in this case)
cannot have nine points in a game in which you drop 89. Come Pac-10 season, that will not fly,
even if the conference is considerably down. The Cougars are 3-0 now, but really
haven’t faced anyone this year. The
Great Alaskan Shootout that is coming up can potentially tell us a little bit
more about Coach Bone and the Cougars.
Up next for the Cougars: Great Alaskan
Shootout- Alaska-Anchorage on 11/25, Nicholls State on 11/27,
Houston/Oklahoma/USD on 11/28
Kevo’s Week 2 Bootleg Power
Rankings:
1.
Washington (16 pts)
2.
Arizona State (14 pts)
3.
Arizona (12 pts)
4.
Washington State (10 pts)
5.
Oregon (8 pts)
6.
Cal (6 pts)
7.
UCLA (4 pts)
8.
USC (2 pts)
9.
Oregon State (0 pts)
Kevo’s Overall Bootleg Power
Rankings:
1.
Washington (32 pts)
2.
Arizona State (26 pts)
3.
Arizona (20 pts)
4.
Cal (20 pts)
5.
Oregon (18 pts)
6.
Washington State (16 pts)
7.
UCLA (5 pts)
8.
USC (3 pts)
9.
Oregon State (3 pts)
Keep refreshing thebootleg.com
for more updates on Stanford Basketball and the rest of the Pacific 10
Conference!
About the Author:
Kevin Danna, Stanford ’09, started out as a student
manager-in-training for the Men's Basketball Team on October 14, 2005, and has
lived and breathed Stanford Basketball ever since. From doing laundry to filming
practice to working summer camps, he has been involved with many facets of the
Men's Basketball program. Upon
retirement from his manager position on March 25, 2009 at the conclusion of the
2008-09 season, Kevin took an undeservedly prolonged break from any kind of work
and eventually got his degree from The Farm in Spanish. Shaking off the cobwebs of five months
of laziness, Kevin has started working as a play-by-play and color broadcaster
for gostanford.com, calling home contests (in English) for several
Stanford sports. He also hosts a
sports talk show on 90.1 FM KZSU from 9-10pm every Tuesday entitled “The Sports
Zoo”, as well as a music show called “408's Finest” immediately following sports
talk from 10pm-Midnight. An alumnus
of San Jose's Bellarmine Prep, Kevin proudly admits that he currently lives at
home in San Jose with his parents and cat.
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