Enfield, officiating and links
COUGARS
FROM PULLMAN -- Monday was a busy day in terms of Pac-12 news. Some of it was good. And some of it involved Ed Rush. Read on for links and such.
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There is good news in the WSU department, too -- former coach George Raveling is among this year's inductees into the College Basketball Hall of Fame (toward the bottom of the linked story). ... CougCenter recaps the WSU baseball team's weekend, which featured two losses and one win at home against No. 23 Stanford.
Around the Pac-12 ... The other Los Angeles school finally filled its coaching vacancy, plucking overnight celebrity Andy Enfield from Florida Gulf Coast. ... Steve Alford hasn't even been formally introduced by UCLA yet -- that will happen today at noon, and you can watch it on the Pac-12 Networks -- and he's already getting raked over the coals. The Los Angeles Times wonders if Alford will honor his UCLA contract longer than the 10-year extension he signed with New Mexico before bailing. And here's an interesting column from a day ago labeling Alford a "scumbag" for what went down when he was Iowa's coach. ... Stop me if you've heard this before: there are serious problems with the Pac-12's basketball officiating (football is its own animal and worthy of a similar discussion). Well, now there's a more tangible issue: Ed Rush, the Pac-12's director of officiating, was apparently the subject of investigation by the conference after making some inappropriate remarks about a potential bounty for a technical foul called against Arizona coach Sean Miller (to be fair: I was at that game, and Miller spent the better part of it screaming at the officials. Was any of it T-worthy on its own? Maybe not. And maybe the technical itself wasn't warranted. But Miller certainly didn't do himself any favors prior to that whistle). Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott told the Seattle Times that Rush's remarks were determined to have been made in jest (which, you know, is still entirely inappropriate and seems well within the grounds for termination). Here's the report from Bud Withers, who also notes that veteran official Dick Cartmell has filed resignation papers. ... Oregon State began spring football practices yesterday. ... Oregon expects a smooth transition to its new coach as it begins its super secret, private spring practices. ... Utah's former star defensive tackle received some good news from recent heart tests. ... Here's a story about Colorado's punter. ... Interesting story here about former Stanford football player Kwame Harris, a homosexual man who said he didn't think he could have come out during his NFL career. ... Arizona State guard Jahii Carson is awating feedback from the NBA about his draft stock. ... A coveted basketball recruit will announce his college decision today, and three Pac-12 teams are thought to be in the running.
WSU returns to the practice field for its sixth workout of the spring this afternoon.
Christian Caple can be reached at christianc@spokesman.com. Twitter: @ChristianCaple