Mike Slive, chairman of the NCAA Division I basketball committee, did the routine February teleconference Tuesday on the early read for the big tournament in March. He wasn't far into it when he advised media folks that the committee doesn't dwell on conferences when assessing teams.
This is a time-honored tradition. It's believed to have started in the late 18th century, when the wig-wearing chairman, an athletic director from William and Mary, got word from a messenger on horseback from Washington that the Patriot League was having a monster year, but nonetheless, Lehigh was going to be judged on its own merits.
We introduce this as backdrop for an argument that might seem as preposterous as an NCAA tournament 225 years ago:
The Pac-10 could get six teams in the big dance.
You snicker. But hear us out.
The number of teams a league sends to the NCAA tournament is sometimes seen as the sole judge and jury of that league's strength. It's not. If the Pac-10 gets six, that would equal last year's output, and the league is only a shadow of 2007-08.
Two points are worth making: If six make it this year, that would mean Nos. 5 and 6, for instance, are lesser teams than Nos. 5-6 of a year ago — but still good enough.
Second, the strength of the non-qualifiers also speaks to a league's strength. Last year, Arizona State went 19-12, 9-9 in the conference and had five wins over the RPI computer's top 31. Famously, it was left out of the tournament, and surely it was a more worthy team than the league's seventh-best this year, either Stanford or WSU.
So last year, the league was stronger and deeper. Yet today, it's hard to make a case that all the current top four won't get in — UCLA (19-4, 8-2), Washington (17-6, 8-3), Arizona State (18-5, 7-4) and Cal (18-6, 7-4).
The next two are pricklier propositions: USC is 15-7 and 6-4. It doesn't have a lot of nonleague chops, but finishes with the Oregon schools at home, and it's not hard to see the Trojans getting to 11-7 in the league.
Then, Arizona. The Wildcats (16-8, 6-5) are the iffiest of the top six. But they've got two of the best nonleague wins in Gonzaga and Kansas. The schedule ahead is testy, but if the 'Cats get to, say, 10-8, and win a game in the league tournament, can you deny them at 21 wins a 25th straight NCAA appearance?
"It's taken awhile to find our chemistry,"
said Russ Pennell, the late-arriving Arizona coach after the October resignation of Lute Olson. "I just think we've finally gotten to the point where we're comfortable with everything."
The league's albatross — what argues against five or six — is its lousy pre-conference performance. It went 1-9 against ranked teams, far worse than any other BCS league. As Pennell says, "The league was pronounced dead and gone back in December."
Will six happen? Probably not, although Joe Lunardi, the ESPN.com bracketologist, is on board. The guess here is that USC plays its way in and Arizona out. They begin settling the argument with an important game Thursday night in Tucson.
Rim shots
• Cal hosts Stanford Saturday night amid a big weekend when it will mark the 100th season of basketball at the school, celebrate the 1959 national-title team, retire Darrall Imhoff's jersey and stage an alumni game. "I think it's healthy for everybody,"
says coach Mike Montgomery of the alumni game. "I just felt there was a disconnect. We're not asking them for anything, we just want to get them back together and make basketball a focal point for them."
• Forget the overheated story of Washington's consecutive losses at Stanford. The Cardinal (14-7, 4-7) is about to break a string of 10-win-or-better conference seasons that dates back through 1994.
• Oregon's defense is one of the major causes of its 0-11 league record. Arizona scored on 13 straight possessions last week at Mac Court.
• Don't tell Luke Harangody that the Pac-10 is a weak league. The last two teams from this conference to face the Notre Dame star — WSU in last year's NCAA, UCLA last weekend — combined to hold him to 5-of-29 shooting, double-teaming him with big guys.
• The infamous facial applied to Chase Budinger by Houston guard Aubrey Coleman's sneaker last month doesn't seem to have slowed either player. Budinger has averaged 21.5 points since the Jan. 24 incident, and Coleman averaged 28 points and 11 rebounds in two games and was named Conference USA player of the week.
