WSU already springing into football

Let’s get right to it today. There’s basketball news, from WSU and around the Pac-10. And there’s football news, also from WSU and around the Pac-10. Read on.

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• We’ll start with football and get that out of the way. Monday was the first day of spring semester – spring, now doesn’t that have a nice ring to it? – and the Cougars had five players enroll. All will be eligible for spring practice the end of March and all will count against this year’s 25 possible initial letter of intent signees. The five are: Peter Tuitupou, a tight end from Snow College in Utah, Johnny Forzani, a wide receiver with an interesting history (you can read more here), and three players who originally signed letters of intent last February, JC transfer Josh Luapo, a defensive lineman, and offensive linemen Alex Reitnouer and Tim Hodgdon, both high school athletes. The latter three, all of whom originally were part of last year’s class, highlight the practice of over-signing. Though WSU has 25 initials for this season (and, with these five and the 16 other committed players, the Cougars are close to that number, considering they will give a handful of current players scholarships), WSU will probably use more than that and then have a few players grayshirt, entering next spring.

• UPDATE: Another high school football player has committed to WSU. Safety Asi Hosea told the Salt Lake Tribune today he’s going to sign with the Cougars.

In other Pac-10 football news, USC safety Taylor Mays surprised just about everybody and announced yesterday he was staying at USC. Now the question is, what will quarterback Mark Sanchez do?

• OK, let’s turn back to basketball. On the WSU front, we have our feature on Taylor Rochestie and his leadership today along with Dave Trimmer’s story about another Cougar senior guard, Katie Appleton. … In news from Oregon State, the Gazette Times’ Cliff Kirkpatrick has a feature on Lathen Wallace, as does the Oregonian’s Paul Buker. Bud Withers’ column in the Seattle Times is about OSU coach Craig Robinson. … And, as a final note, UW’s Jon Brockman is a few rebounds away from setting a school record.

• That’s it for this morning. We’ll be back. Till then …