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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

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Notes, a first look and links

COUGARS

FROM PULLMAN -- Before jumping on the Pac-12 coaches call and heading out to practice later this afternoon, we pause in this late evening hour to pass along some links. We hope you pause in your early-morning hours to read them.

...

A couple newspaper items to pass along -- our weekly first look at WSU's next opponent (Oregon State), and a notebook leading with Mike Leach's comments about Connor Halliday needing to take what defenses are giving him. On the blog, we passed along a partial transcription of Leach's press conference, some player video, and a blog post about the commitment of men's basketball player Ikenna Iroegbu to WSU. We also had a short item in the paper about it. ... OK, so we were going to transcribe the second half of Leach's press conference, too, but CougCenter went ahead and took care of most of it, so we'll just link to them. ... From Oregon State: the Beavers say they haven't proven anything yet. The Cougars will be facing the reigning Pac-12 offensive Player of the Week.

There is, however, one rather entertaining quote about facing Oregon State's defensive ends that we'll pass along here:

"Do the best we can. They play really hard, they're talented. I don't know ... basically have a bunch of people go to Corvallis sometime this week. Take em out, make sure they stay out too late, Shanghai 'em and leave em in a foreign country. That's what we have in mind. There's some flaws to that and some bugs to that idea that we're working through right now as I speak. ... Well, the quick answer is block 'em."

Continuing with the links, CougCenter has a rundown of the designs for the football operations building, a PDF of which is posted on the Board of Regents' website. The next meeting is scheduled for this weekend, during which those designs will be presented to the board as a future action item. Bill Moos has said the designs will be presented for final approval at the regents' meeting in November. Note the total budget of the project is capped at $61 million, though if you read the details of the financing, it appears a lower total is expected when all is finished.

Around the Pac-12 ... Arizona is gearing up for a big size differential against Stanford. ... What was learned in Arizona State's win over California. ... Stanford graded out poorly last week, but not as poorly as California. ... Is it time to stop taking Oregon for granted? The Ducks' running game is apparently improving, because it was so bad before. ... Jim Mora isn't overlooking California this week, especially the Bears' running game. ... USC's defense has been playing well recently, and could continue that trend against a struggling Utah team. ... Speaking of the Utes, their offensive line continues to introduce new faces. Utah needs to stop Matt Barkley to have a chance of beating the Trojans. ... Looking at some positives in Colorado's 1-4 start. ... Washington is benefiting from an emphasis on tackling.

Christian Caple can be reached at christianc@spokesman.com. Twitter: @ChristianCaple



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