Pac 10 is losing chances to prove the doubters wrong

by johnnycougar on Nov 25, 2009 10:58 AM PST

Okay okay, we all knew the Pac 10 was going to be "down" this year. It seems like every day I'm hearing or reading about another non-conference loss. I wanted to examine just how bad it was. If you would like to know, read on. It isn't pretty.

I've sorted the key games thus far into Bad Losses, Bubblicious Losses, Bubblicious Wins, and Good Wins (hint, there aren't any). I was actually pretty generous about considering some teams on the potential bubble this early in the season, so some of these wins & losses will end up looking even worse than they do now. Of course, some may prove to be better, only time will tell.

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Bad losses:

Sacramento St. 65, Oregon St. 63 (@OSU)

Loyola Marymount 67, Southern Cal 59 (@USC)

Montana 68, Oregon 55 (@Oregon)

Oral Roberts 83, Stanford 81 (@Stanford)

Cal State Fullerton 68, UCLA 65 (@UCLA)

Texas A&,M-Corpus Christi 67, Oregon St. 43 (@Lubbock)

Bubblicious losses:

Wisconsin 65, Arizona 61 (@Maui)

Portland 88, Oregon 81 (@Portland)

(24) Syracuse 95, (12) California 73 (@MSG)

(18) Ohio State 76, (23) California 70 (@MSG)

Texas Tech 64, Oregon St. 60 (@Lubbock)

San Diego 77, Stanford 64 (@San Diego)

Bubblicious wins:

Stanford 57, Virginia 52 (@Cancun)

Arizona 91, Colorado 87 (@Maui)

Arizona St. 52, TCU 49 (@ASU)

(14) Washington 74, Wright State (@UW)

Good wins:

I’m not seeing any.

GAH!!! Half our conference already has a bad loss at home! Nobody, I repeat, nobody has a good road win, not even a road win that will likely matter on the bubble. Nobody has a great win period. At this point, it's looking like our best conference win is UW beating a solid Wright State team in Seattle. However, we will have plenty of chances to rectify this during the next month before conference play begins. We really need the conference to step up it’s game!

Here are some key matchups in the next month:

(14) UW

@ Texas Tech Dec. 3rd.

(19) Georgetown Dec. 12th.

Portland Dec. 19th.

Texas A&M Dec. 22nd.

(23) Cal

@ New Mexico Dec. 2nd. (no, seriously. I live here. UNM is actually pretty good)

@ (1) Kansas Dec 22nd.

ASU

@ (7) Duke tonight!

Baylor Dec. 3rd.

@ BYU Dec. 8th.

UCLA

Portland Nov. 26th.

(1) Kansas Dec. 6th.

Miss. State Dec. 12th.

@ Notre Dame Dec 19th.

Arizona

(24) Vanderbilt tonight!

UNLV Dec. 2nd.

@ Oklahoma Dec. 6th.

NC State Dec. 23rd.

BYU Dec. 28th.

WSU

vs. Oklahoma or San Diego or Houston Nov. 28th (we better get to the championship game at the Great Alaskan Shootout)

@ Gonzaga Dec. 2nd

@ Kansas St. Dec. 5th.

LSU Dec. 22nd.

Oregon

@ Missouri Dec. 5th.

St. Mary’s Dec. 12th.

Oregon State

Colorado Dec. 4th.

@ Nebraska Dec. 12th.

USC

Nebraska Nov. 29th.

@ (3) Texas Dec. 3rd.

@ (25) Georgia Tech Dec. 5th.

(11) Tennessee Dec. 19th.

Stanford

(5) Kentucky tonight!

Oklahoma St. Dec. 16th.

@ Northwestern Dec. 19th.

@ Texas Tech Dec. 22nd.

UW, Cal, ASU, and USC have the best chances to make some strong statements about the Pac 10 this year. Arizona, WSU and Stanford all have opportunities to beat multiple potential tournament teams. We need to start winning a lot of these games or the Pac 10 may not send more than 3 teams to the NCAA tournament come March.

This FanPost does not necessarily reflect the views of the site's writers or editors, who may not have verified its accuracy. It does, however, reflect the views of this particular fan, which is just as important as the views of our writers or editors.

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Comments

Yup, it definitely looks ugly

If nothing else, this is going to be a supremely entertaining conference slate, because I don’t think anyone is that good.

CougCenter

by Jeff Nusser on Nov 25, 2009 11:08 AM PST reply actions

By saturday, hopefully the cougs will have had something to say about this.

Was it last year the SEC was this bad? I’m not sure what year but it definitely has the same feel.

by J.J. FeKl on Nov 25, 2009 2:10 PM PST reply actions

The SEC was worse

They would’ve got 2, but MSU ran the table in the tourney, I think

by Brian Floyd on Nov 25, 2009 2:41 PM PST up reply actions

Yup

It was funny how concerned UW fans were with MSU. I kept trying to tell them that we killed them and that they weren’t any better than they were then, but they wouldn’t listen.

Silly Huskies.

CougCenter

by Jeff Nusser on Nov 25, 2009 3:31 PM PST up reply actions

You can lead a Husky to a sheep

but you can’t make him…. heck, you don’t need to make ’em!

Go Cougs!

by DCinSEA on Nov 25, 2009 6:14 PM PST up reply actions

Well, Arizona is hanging with Vandy so far

The Kentucky-Stanford game later, on the other hand, is gonna be a bloodbath.

by Brian Floyd on Nov 25, 2009 4:48 PM PST reply actions

Man, they were actually within an inch of winning that game

2 free throws with a 2-point lead and 9 seconds left. Missed both, and Kentucky scored to send it to OT where they pulled away at the very end.

I think they’re a little better than I’ve given them credit for. Their walk-on front line isn’t going to put up points, but they’ve been well schooled on defense so you can’t expect easy points every time you get the ball inside. And Dawkins made a couple of pretty astute coaching calls, including something I wish a lot more coaches would do: call a timeout when there are under 10 seconds on the shot clock and your offense is disorganized.

Good trip for Stanford, very respectable showing.

Linda's in the cold ground, won't see her anymore
Somewhere out on the highway tonight, the drunken engines roar
It's just one of those things, one of those things
-- Al Stewart, "Accident on 3rd St."
In memory of Nick Adenhart and all victims of drunk driving

by PaulThomas on Nov 25, 2009 9:03 PM PST up reply actions

Stanford really surprised me

That was a pretty good showing for the team projected to finish last in the conference.

Arizona didn’t look great, and ASU just looked worse than Duke, not surprising.

by johnnycougar on Nov 25, 2009 9:15 PM PST up reply actions

Yup, Johnny Dawkins gets a lot of credit right now

He sure appears to have them playing above their heads at the moment. If that team can finish anything better than 9th in the conference, he should be Pac-10 coach of the year.

CougCenter

by Jeff Nusser on Nov 26, 2009 9:43 AM PST up reply actions

Another faceplant tonight (0 for 3 in significant games)

The only unbeaten team left in the conference is the one that hasn’t played anyone… Washington…

Hard to believe how poor this performance is.

by PaulThomas on Dec 2, 2009 9:20 PM PST reply actions

Epically bad

Don’t feel bad about losing to a good UNM team in a true road game. They’re going to challenge for the mountain west title this year. That said, it does hurt the image of the conference.

Now if UW loses on the road… With all the good teams from other deep conferences (ACC, Big East, even the Big 10 has a few good ones) we may be fortunate to get three bids this year.

by johnnycougar on Dec 3, 2009 12:10 PM PST up reply actions