COUGARS

Some interesting news about basketball transfers in the Pac-10 and it's not about Washington State. Well, in a way it is. Read on.
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• While the national championship game was getting ready to tip off, a story went up on the Oregonian's website concerning a Portland kid. Mike Moser, a highly recruited 6-foot-8 forward from Grant High, had decided to leave UCLA after just one year. The interesting part – a lot of scholarship players have left UCLA since the season ended, as many as have left WSU – of the story? A line about where Moser is contemplating heading to, attributed to his high school coach Tony Broadous. "Broadous said he believes Washington and Washington State are high on Moser's wish list," according to the piece. Could the Cougars use an athletic 6-8 player? Couldn't everyone? Let the speculation begin. ... Before it does, though, go ahead and read this short LA Times story and this one from the Tucson Citizen.com. The latter repeats a huge fallacy, however. "Forget about players like Moser or Thames transferring to Arizona because it is another Pac-10 school. If a player transfers to a conference foe, he must sit out a year as a transfer and lose another year of eligibility," the story states. The wrong word here is "must." Yes, the Pac-10 has a rule that intraconference transfers lose another year, unless the school waives the provision. And, according to the people at WSU's compliance office, no one can remember the last time a school did not waive the rule when asked by the player transferring. ... In other basketball news, former Oregon coach Ernie Kent is reportedly in pursuit of the job at Tulane. ... On to football. ... Oregon State's fourth spring practice was disrupted by one guy. In a good way. ... Washington needed to find a holder, so it turned to a receiver.

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• That's all for this morning. We'll be back after this afternoon's practice, which promises to be a cold one. Until then ...

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