Huskies Go In Opposite Direction
So robust was the collective sigh of relief here Saturday that the walls of Beasley Coliseum surely must have bowed outward with the breeze.
Hardly a good sign, you think?
Not for the structural health of the building or the basketball program. It is one thing for the Washington Huskies to escape with their worst fears allayed. Many a visitor to Friel Court has shared the feeling over the years, and in thrashing rival Washington State 70-51 on Saturday, the Huskies confirmed their worth to NCAA Tournament selectors, assuming that hadn’t been done already.
But it is something quite different for the home team and its fans to beat the Dawgs to the exits. So they settled the issue of which team was better Saturday, but not which was happier to have the whole exercise over.
Of course, the Huskies do have to sweat out the NCAA selection show today on the off-chance the committeeman from Middle Tennessee State produces a computer printout suggesting that Washington didn’t beat enough teams in the top 150 of the Ratings Percentage Index on full-moon Tuesdays in arenas larger than 10,000 seats in cities beginning with the letter C.
“I don’t know,” said Washington coach Bob Bender. “I know we deserve to be in. We finished in fourth place, two games up (actually three). We have a win over a ranked opponent in the last week of the season. We win three in a row, five of our last seven. I believe that should be a spot in the tournament.”
OK, so the ranked team was that collection of slackers at UCLA, and the Huskies beat just one other top-50 team (Arizona State). They are, categorically, fourth-best in a conference that put four teams in the Sweet 16 a year ago, and surely that should be worth an 11th seed and a date in Boise, no?
“If they can play like this, they can advance as well,” said WSU coach Kevin Eastman. “They’re talented. I don’t know how it got to where some people don’t think they’re talented, but one through eight I think they’re the third-most talented team in our league, no question.”
Not to be nasty, but in the context of the last two seasons buying the Eastman version of what constitutes talent is like building your dream house on a Superfund site. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Insert mitigating circumstance here.
For all the abominably bad luck that infested Wazzu’s program this year, the sad truth is that the Cougs’ opener was their highest-scoring game of the season and their finale was the lowest - a rather twisted definition of progress.
Given one last chance to muster up their best game against their biggest rival, the Cougars couldn’t catch or shoot at all, nor pass, rebound or defend effectively - the one tragic exception being, as he has been all season, Carlos Daniel.
Tragic, that is, in the same sense Isaac Fontaine was tragic - special players sentenced to play their final seasons with teammates who tried hard but couldn’t hope to overcome their relative deficiencies.
No greater tribute could there be to Daniel’s spirit than the ovation Bender and the Huskies gave him upon his removal from the game with 14 seconds left.
“He’s the kind of kid,” Bender said, “who makes it a special league.”
Daniel - who finished with a trademark double-double of 15 points and 13 rebounds - was suitably appreciative. And disheartened.
“It’s been a tough season,” he said. “This year’s team - we just never reached our potential, for whatever reason. We just never got there.”
Not only a warrior to the end, but a diplomat, too.
No, these Cougars did fulfill all their promise, which was limited to begin with and ratcheted down accordingly with each player defection.
And for the most part, so did the Huskies, excluding an unfortunate hiccup in the Bay Area.
Given the state of the program when Bender inherited it, you can make the argument that Washington’s arrival as a tournament team has been achieved at warp speed. In truth, the miles were traveled inch by inch, and one of the more impressive aspects has been the way Bender has nursed the Huskies’ in-state recruiting back to life. The best players he has in the program are from the Northwest, and there are more on the way.
By the same token, one of the most discouraging aspects of the Cougar program is the absence of Washington talent. Not that Eastman’s predecessor, Kelvin Sampson, lived on the locals, but certainly Mark Hendrickson and Tony Harris were better than any the Huskies suited up during the same time. Whatever edge may have been established there is now long gone.
As is the momentum the program had four years ago. The biggest victory the Cougs could manage this season was over Gonzaga, and on Saturday Eastman - when pressed - couldn’t come up with a positive to take from this wreckage.
“I’d probably want to put more thought to that one,” he said.
He may be the only one.
“I just don’t want to do anything right now,” said sophomore guard Blake Pengelly. “I just want to go home and sleep, go somewhere else, not really think about it.”
Sometimes, pulling the covers up over your head is the only comfort to be had.
You can contact John Blanchette by voice mail at 459-5577, extension 5509.
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