We know the Pac-10 is down. Okay, old story.
The conference lost many good players to the NBA. Another old story and yet, the coaches and the league office has shouted this refrain for the past two years. They need to get over it.
The league has just 17 seniors, which is something I didn't realize until USC coach Kevin O'Neill brought it up last week. UCLA, Washington State and Stanford don't have a senior and California and Arizona have just one. Still I'm not exactly sure how significant that is.
What's more alarming is the absence of impact freshmen. There's top notch first-year players all over the country, including Duke's Kyrie Irving, Ohio State's Jared Sullinger, Kansas' Josh Selby and Kentucky's Terrence Jones. With the exception of UCLA's Joshua Smith, the Pac-10 rookie class is bare.
But enough of the bashing and take a look at what happened this weekend.
UCLA beat No. 16 BYU. USC nearly upset No. 3 Kansas. Arizona won at North Carolina State. Washington State won at Santa Clara.
When it seemed as if the Pac-10 would send two teams to the NCAA tournament for the second straight year, six teams have positioned themselves for a tournament berth with a little over a week remaining before conference play begins Dec. 29.
No one is suggesting the Pac-10 will send six teams. Heck, the conference may not have a ranked team for the second straight week when the polls are released today.
Still, I wouldn't be surprised if 3-5 teams made it to the Big Dance. Yes. Five teams. I've been critical of the conference recently for good reason, but even a Pac-10 pessimist has got to admit six teams have a great chance to make the NCAA tournament.
Here's the blueprint.
Read more...NCAA Basketball Recruiting NCAA College baseball ESPN College Football
No comments:
Post a Comment