A Grip on Sports: If you didn’t spring out of bed this morning blame it on college hoops and the time change
A GRIP ON SPORTS • Anyone awake out there? Not us. This whole daylight saving thing has us on our heels. We’re downing hi-caf coffee has fast as we can but staying up late last night and having to get up early today is not a good recipe for baking a decent column on this fine Sunday morning.
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• For those of us who get up early, we know the truth. There is no daylight saved. Not a minute. It just gets shifted. Shifted to after work – or school – instead of before. Seems like a big waste of time. Of course, we didn’t feel that way 50 years ago when we were in school. Or 40 when we were working hard. Or 30, when we were working less hard – we had morphed into a pointy-haired manager.
Now, though? We’re a truth-teller and the narrative around DST isn’t the truth.
Neither is the narrative built round bracketology. School A is a one seed Friday, today is a two seed. School B is headed to Timbuktu. Schools C just missed the cut.
But it doesn’t matter what Joe Lunardi nor Charlie Creme nor any other “bracketologist” has been saying for the past couple months. Today we find out the truth. In broad daylight.
What will be Washington State’s seed?
(Before we go any further, however, we have to admire Bill Walton’s contrarian nature, at least as it pertains to the Cougars. We all know the women are headed to the NCAA Tournament. They earned that right on the court in Las Vegas, winning the Pac-12’s automatic berth. But Walton went off last night during Arizona’s 61-59 win over UCLA more than once about the men. How the Cougars should also be part of the NCAA tourney. We’re pretty sure not even Kyle Smith agrees with Walton, though he certainly appreciates the enthusiasm.)
Back to our original question. What will be the women’s seed?
As of this morning, ESPN’s Creme has them as a six and headed to Durham, N.C. to face a Purdue/St. John’s play-in winner. Of course, not too long ago the bracket prognosticator had them closer to the play-in game then wearing their home jerseys in the first round.
Times change. So does the fake bracket. It’s still fun. Unless you are member of the Gonzaga women’s team. After their loss to Portland in the West Coast Conference final, the Zags’ chances of moving into a decent seed, a la the Cougars, seems to have disappeared. Though the latest Creme projection – GU as a ninth seed in Iowa’s pod – facing Mississippi, with a shot at Caitlin Clark and Big Ten champion Iowa, seems better than the past week’s guess they were headed to South Carolina, where the nation’s best team resides.
As for the men?
We head back to where Walton was last night, courtside in Las Vegas watching his beloved – and Big Ten-bound – UCLA Bruins fall in the Pac-12 finals. That defeat probably was the last nail in the Zags’ second-seed hopes. They might have passed the Wildcats and picked up that spot. Instead, Lunardi expects them to get the third seed in the Midwest, matching up, possibly, in the Sweet Sixteen with, yes, you guessed it, Tommy Lloyd’s team.
Lunardi has the second-seeded Wildcats facing UCSB in the opening round – our son, a Santa Barbara alum, called that last night after the Gauchos earned the Big West’s bid – and then matching up with either Michigan State or Providence. Gonzaga would have to get past Grand Canyon and then either San Diego State or Rutgers to make the Sweet Sixteen anything but sweet for Lloyd and Mark Few.
None of it is real, however. Real doesn’t happen until 3 p.m. with the men and 5 p.m. with the women.
Pacific Daylight Time, of course.
• As for the Cougar men? They find out if they are going to play in the NIT again this evening. Eastern Washington, by virtue of its Big Sky regular-season title, will be in the NIT. All the Eagles will find out tonight is who and where they play.
• We will be digging through the closet long before then. Trying to find all our 30-degree gear we usually wear for spring golf outings. Those days are still down the road – maybe next week? – but sitting out in the cold isn’t. We’re headed out to Gonzaga this afternoon to be a baseball fan. And root for our alma mater, UC Irvine, as the Anteaters make a rare Inland Northwest appearance.
Our former teammate, Alan, attended yesterday’s 11-6 Irvine victory – it took 11 innings, which seems like bad planning on UCI’s part – and we’re meeting up today for the series finale.
What does one wear for such an occasion, other than long underwear, of course? We have an old baseball jersey from back in those days, but the zipper is broken. No problem. It doesn’t fit our “robust” build anyway. We also have a UCI baseball polo somewhere in the closet, which seems like the way to go. It may be buried under three or four other layers, however, which won’t be a bad thing. Don’t want any of those Gonzaga ruffians to have an excuse to hurl invectives at us.
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WSU: The women’s NCAA destination is all the rage right now, so we pass along a couple of stories. One on how Kamie Ethridge built this roster and another, by our friend Jim Allen, on the guesses of their destination. … We can also pass along this from the Seattle Times. … The baseball team bounced back to earn a 6-3 Pac-12 win at Oregon State to tie the series at a game apiece. It’s part of this roundup. And, because it was in Corvallis, we have more to pass along. … Elsewhere in the Pac-12 and college basketball, not only can we pass along projected brackets from ESPN and USA Today for the men, we also pass along ESPN’s bracket for the women. … Jon Wilner has his thoughts in the Mercury News concerning the conference’s bids. He sees four but thinks the fourth – either USC or Arizona State – is tenuous. … Washington has some work to do in the offseason. … In football news, Deion Sanders’ presence in Boulder has Colorado feeling on top of the world. … Arizona State is ready for spring football. … Jacob Cowing was great last year for Arizona.
Gonzaga: This has been a season, according to Drew Timme, in which the Zags have gone through “the dirt and the mud.” But will that result in a longer NCAA run than most would expect? Theo Lawson examines both in this story. … Jim Meehan writes the preview piece on today’s bracket selection. … As for the women’s Jim Allen tries to explain why the metrics aren’t kind to the 28-4 Bulldogs. And we try to explain how the school built – and maintains – one of the more consistent programs on the West Coast. … This year’s NCAA Tournament will feel different for the women.
EWU and Idaho: Around the Big Sky, Sacramento State’s women are headed to their first NCAA Tournament.
Preps: Dave Nichols has the third of his four previews of Tuesday’s Spokesman-Review High School Basketball Showcase in today’s paper. It’s a great story on Ron Cox and his son, who will be coaching the boys’ regional team. … Dave also has a roundup of Saturday’s action.
Seahawks: Free agency looms. What might the Hawks do? … We never really liked Bud Grant when he coached the Minnesota Vikings. After all, his teams always seemed to stand in the way of our Rams when we were young. But we respected Grant’s perfect-for-Minnesota nature and his teams. He died Saturday at 95.
Mariners: Andres Munoz has added a sinker. Will it make him unhittable? … We’re not at all surprised by this. It’s why we thought the M’s were right not to break the bank signing Mitch Haniger.
Sounders: Despite scoring the tying goal late … sorry, we wrote that before VAR got involved. Seattle went down to a 1-0 defeat in Cincinnati after its equalizer was taken off the board for a foul that had nothing to do with the goal. Pac-12 basketball coaches understand.
Kraken: As Seattle moves toward the playoffs, they have been really good in overtime and not as good at home.
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• If you missed it, don’t. We’re talking about the horrendous strike three call in a college baseball game Friday. Watch it here. It will either drive you mad or make you laugh. The news? The umpire has been suspended. He probably would have been better served to eject the hitter after the childish response to the strike two call. Until later …