WSU, UW have long wait until tonight’s game
COUGARS
The Internet connection at the motel was about as fast as my 40 time, so what usually takes an hour or so took twice that this morning. Though I got about 11 naps in while pages were loading. Anyway, it's done now on this first day of the Pac-10 tournament – the final Pac-10 tournament – for Washington State. Read on.
••••••••••
• Washington State: We posted a link to our advance last night, but here it is again. ... We also had coverage of the women's loss to USC, ending their season, a better one in many regards. But until the Cougars can defeat Washington and win a Pac-10 tournament game, there is no way it can be said June Daugherty has turned the program completely around. ... Honest to god, I was moving faster on the 405 at 5:30 the other night. ... A WSU student wrote this piece on social networking. If the interweb worked like this everywhere, there would be no social networking. Everyone would be asleep. ... Couldn't be in two places at once, so no spring football coverage today. Though I bet the comments would have been about how great the day was. It's too early for the "we-didn't-have-any-energy" practice. WSU dons pads for today's practice, then is off until after spring break. ... And that's it, except for the links below on tonight's opponent, Washington.
•••
• Around the Pac-10: The Huskies are 5.5-point favorites tonight in the third meeting of the teams (WSU has won both the previous ones), which Isaiah Thomas seemingly thinks is about right. "They're not like the best team in the country to where we're like, 'Man, playing Wazzu, this is going to be tough,' " Thomas said. ... On the suspension front, Jerry Brewer weighs in again as does Dave Boling of the News Tribune. ... Venoy Overton should have been suspended for as long as it took for the San Francisco Chronicle sports page to open. No, that would have gotten Amnesty International involved. ... The tournament opened last night, with the Oregon schools knocking out Stanford and Arizona State. ... The Beavers won in the tourney for the first time in five years, holding on for a 69-67 win over Stanford. The Cardinal had a shot at the end. ... The Ducks built a big lead and held off ASU, 76-69, a team it lost to twice in the regular season, behind E.J. Singler's big night. He had a big first night against WSU last season. The Sun Devils routed Oregon last week in Tempe. ... UCLA, and its coach Ben Howland, knows focus is crucial in tonight's game vs. the Ducks, or the Bruins' NCAA path will be a lot tougher. ... USC needs to win, starting today with Cal, to earn an NCAA berth. Maybe twice, maybe three times. ... Arizona didn't like its last trip to LA much. The Wildcats lost twice. That can't happen this time. ... This is the final Pac-10 tournament, so the Seattle Times looked back at the previous 33 years and at 33 top-notch moments. ... A football piece from SI on the biggest questions for each Pac-12 team in the fall.
•••
• That's it for this morning. We're headed to the Staples Center early because we want to catch at least some of each game. That will also give us time to prepare for what will be a deadline-breaking 8:30 p.m. game tonight. Until then ...
