Saturday, January 09, 2010

This Is Becoming A Nightmare For The Pac-10

UCLA 76, California 75
Things are going from bad-to-worse in the Pac-10. First you had USC, after Michael Gerrity turned them into potentially the third best team in the conference, imposing sanctions on itself for the OJ Mayo situation and disqualifying themselves from postseason basketball. And now you have a UCLA team that lost to Long Beach State, Cal State Fullerton and Portland out of conference suddenly playing improved ball in conference play, knocking off Arizona State and now California. And don't be fooled by UCLA's bad losses and 7-8 overall record, because they actually are a pretty good team. Ben Howland is one of the best coaches in the nation, and it's just taken him this long to find a rotation and he can live with. James Keefe has been a disaster this season and is now only the second or third player off the bench, and Howland has made up for him with the emergence of Reeves Nelson. With as bad as the Pac-10 is this year, don't be shocked to see the Bruins actually finish .500 or better in conference play. As for Cal, I still don't understand why the whole has been less than the sum of the parts. They have a trio in Jerome Randle, Patrick Christopher and Theo Robertson that is as good as any trio in the conference, Sagarin's PREDICTOR has them ranked the 13th best team in the nation and Pomeroy ranks them 11th. They should be better than 9-5, particularly against a schedule that hasn't even been all that tough (their only quality win is over Iowa State). They are still very much in contention for the Pac-10 title, of course, but we'll know more about their chances next week when they head to Washington State and Washington.

Arizona State 68, #22 Washington 51
One of the reasons Cal is still in the Pac-10 title race is because Washington has gotten off to an awful start as well: they're 1-2 in conference play and clearly on their way out of the Top 25 (which is a big deal since they entered this week as the only ranked team in the Pac-10). What was shocking in this game was the total lack of anything productive from any Washington player other than Isaiah Thomas. Thomas had 20 of the team's 51 points, and almost more importantly had 11 of their 21 free throw attempts. He was trying to do it all on his own, and that just won't work against a pretty good Arizona State team. Quincy Pondexter played poorly, but the real disappointment was Abdul Gaddy, who managed to play 16 minutes with a single shot attempt or rebound, and only two assists. Remember only a few months ago when some experts thought he was a better prospect than John Wall? But a lot of credit has to go to Arizona State. They have players and a playing style that allows them to produce even when not playing well. Derek Glasser in particular overcame touch defense and cold shooting (zero made field goals for the game) by getting to the line ten times and hitting nine of them. Other than Washington and Cal, I give Arizona State the best chance at getting to the NCAA Tournament out of the Pac-10. They are only 1-2 in the Pac-10, but have an easier schedule over the next couple of weeks. Considering how badly Washington and Cal have been playing, don't sleep on Arizona State as a potential Pac-10 champion this season.

Michigan 64, Penn State 55

Michigan is a team that seems to finally be finding itself after a very poor out-of-conference performance. Their RPI is still only 132nd, but that will improve as the season goes along. Sagarin's ELO_CHESS agrees with their bad results, putting them 134th, but his PREDICTOR has them 87th, which means they're potentially good enough to still make a run at an at-large bid. They get another chance for a quality out-of-conference win on January 17th when UConn comes to Ann Arbor, but without a win there they will have to go at least 11-7 in the Big Ten to have a realistic at-large scenario entering the Big Ten tournament. As for Penn State, they just took their food off the pedal after opening up a 16 point lead early in the second half, and are really running out of time to make a run at an at-large bid for themselves. Their RPI has actually fallen out of the Top 200, and they're 0-3 in the Big Ten. This early in the conference season it's always possible for a team like Penn State to win four or five games in a row to start making some noise, but it's unlikely. A lot of Penn State fans are already counting the days until November 2010, when Taran Buie will make his debut for the Nittany Lions.

No comments: