Pac 12 basketball talk
- Thread starter ThePhog08
- Start date
Colorado is long. I believe his name is Bey but he is a scorer.
They have a lot of wings and size but not size at the 5.
They could give you issues if you allow them to have space.
Ultimately they aren't great on the Defensive end.
Washington is a great defensive team and so is Oregon.
You can win a lot of games in the Pac 12 if they allow you to run your defense because for the most part that conference is wide open with a lot of space
They have a lot of wings and size but not size at the 5.
They could give you issues if you allow them to have space.
Ultimately they aren't great on the Defensive end.
Washington is a great defensive team and so is Oregon.
You can win a lot of games in the Pac 12 if they allow you to run your defense because for the most part that conference is wide open with a lot of space
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I remember hearing Oregon only has 7-8 scholarship players. Is this true?
Dallas Walton in healthy after missing last year. He is 7' 235lbs.
https://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/player/_/id/4066353/dallas-walton
Oregon looks like the strongest on paper. They'll be really tough once they get N'Faly Dante back. Payton came on really strong late last season. Shakur Juiston was a double-double guy at UNLV. Anthony Mathis is an elite shooter and averaged 14 a game at New Mexico. Richardson and Okoro have talent should see an upswing in minutes this year. Chris Duarte was the JUCO National POY. Good chance he'll make one of the All-Conference teams. Patterson and Walker are both top-50 recruits. A lot of good pieces there.
Arionza brings in two top-15 recruits + 3 valuable transfers. Not sure how they'll all mesh together, but they have a lot of promising players. I could see them making the second weekend. Mannion is a good candidate for Pac-12 POY.
Washington has a really strong frontcourt, but I'm not sold on the backcourt. Hard to advance in March without strong guard play. Also, a lot of new faces to a learn a fairly complex defensive system. I think they'll make the tournament, but I don't see them as a second weekend team.
Colorado returns essentially their whole team. And Dallas Walton (5.7 ppg, 3.4 reb, 1.1 blk) is back after missing last year. I expect to see them in the tournament.
The team that really intrigues me is USC. I know they have a reputation of bringing in top talent and not performing up to expectations. Believe it or not, USC has never had a top-15 class under Enfield. Looks like USC is going to go big with Mobley, Okongwu, and Rakocevic in the starting lineup. They should be pounding teams on the boards. Weaver and Mathews are likely to start in the backcourt. Two solid grad transfers in Utomi and Adlesh, who should both see valuable minutes off the bench. I have a hard time really gauging this team, but I think they could be dangerous.
Here are the Pac-12 teams that made my preseason top 50.
Other potential tourney teams:
UCLA
Arizona State
Oregon State
Arionza brings in two top-15 recruits + 3 valuable transfers. Not sure how they'll all mesh together, but they have a lot of promising players. I could see them making the second weekend. Mannion is a good candidate for Pac-12 POY.
Washington has a really strong frontcourt, but I'm not sold on the backcourt. Hard to advance in March without strong guard play. Also, a lot of new faces to a learn a fairly complex defensive system. I think they'll make the tournament, but I don't see them as a second weekend team.
Colorado returns essentially their whole team. And Dallas Walton (5.7 ppg, 3.4 reb, 1.1 blk) is back after missing last year. I expect to see them in the tournament.
The team that really intrigues me is USC. I know they have a reputation of bringing in top talent and not performing up to expectations. Believe it or not, USC has never had a top-15 class under Enfield. Looks like USC is going to go big with Mobley, Okongwu, and Rakocevic in the starting lineup. They should be pounding teams on the boards. Weaver and Mathews are likely to start in the backcourt. Two solid grad transfers in Utomi and Adlesh, who should both see valuable minutes off the bench. I have a hard time really gauging this team, but I think they could be dangerous.
Here are the Pac-12 teams that made my preseason top 50.
Other potential tourney teams:
UCLA
Arizona State
Oregon State
It looks like once again late night basketball will be fun to watch.
Bill Walton is back for another season of calling Pac-12 games. That's good enough reason for me to watch.
not true anymore. No Dante early in the year. I expect this team to struggle early with all the new pieces but be a tough out in March
They needed a big.
I think their perimeter defense needs to improve as well.
I only saw them play 2 games last year. 1 against USC and 1 against Texas
No bad losses for the PAC on opening night. Utah went on the road and beat Nevada
Cal beating Pepperdine is a decent win, too. Pepperdine returns their starting 5 and was #4 in the WCC preseason poll.
Arizona should definitely return to the elite of the conference this year. While young, they have a nice mix of depth, size and shooters. When the defense finally comes around, they'll be tough. Freshman big man Zeke Nnaji is better than advertised. There were practice reports saying he was consistently the best player on the floor and he put up 20 last night in Arizona's first game.
Baylor did torch Syracuse's zone last year in the NCAA tournament.
Don't watch much of Washington but I know their coach came from Syracuse.
This is supposedly Scott Drew's most talented team.
Should be a decent game.
Don't watch much of Washington but I know their coach came from Syracuse.
This is supposedly Scott Drew's most talented team.
Should be a decent game.
not surprised. UW is a top 20 team but the voters are still holding last year against the pac 12
he’s playing. But he’s not getting a ton of minutes. Bench guy trying to expand his role
Even before the health scare, I don't think O'Neill was expected to be an immediate impact guy. He has a lot of potential and could become a very good player but when he was coming to Arizona, we were told he wouldn't be a big contributor / force his freshman year.
Oregon, Arizona, Washington and CU should be in easy. USC has the talent but we'll see if they put it together. UCLA, ASU, and Utah are borderline NCAA teams in my view.
I think Oregon State has a decent shot at the NCAAs, too. They defeated Iowa State - and lost to Oklahoma. Rest of their OOC is kind of fluffy outside of a road game against Texas A&M. They'll need to finish above .500 in the Pac-12 most likely to earn an at-large. I think that's feasible.
So Cal found out how tough Prairie View A&M is to play tonight.
Their depth and intensity on defense isn't common.
With Mike Davis leaving Texas Southern they became the program in the SWAC.
PAC 12 looking decent this year. First time in awhile.
They improved their coaching at a lot of schools recently.
Their depth and intensity on defense isn't common.
With Mike Davis leaving Texas Southern they became the program in the SWAC.
PAC 12 looking decent this year. First time in awhile.
They improved their coaching at a lot of schools recently.
To be fair, it was California and not USC. I think USC would win by 20+ points. I will concede that Cal has been better than I was anticipating. Maybe Mark Fox was the change this program needed.
Should have worded differently.
I agree about Mark Fox.
I think it was the 2016-2017 Cal team but in terms of just talent they had it.
Don't know what has happened the last few years.
They got a decent test last night.
Are they ready for Duke? I don't know.
I don't think they have the talent anywhere close to where they were a few years ago.
Regarding PVAMU. .
They can get that program going enough to get off that 16 line.
Smith has a lot of respect in the Houston basketball community. He was an AAU coach for awhile here in Houston
Losing Cuonzo Martin to Missouri was big. Rabb went pro, and then Charlie Moore transferred to KU. Since then, they haven't really had time to develop their guys. They've won 5 Pac-12 games the last two years. The guys that show promise get tired of losing and they leave. Don Coleman, Justice Sueing, Darius McNeil, and Connor Vanover have all transferred in the last 18 months. Similar fate for Washington State. They need to win a decent number of games to avoid more transfers.
Duke is talented on the defensive end. Offense remains suspect. I think it's feasible for most half-way competent teams to stay relatively close to Duke. I could see this being 7-8 points at half - and maybe that balloons past 15 in the second half.
Don't really know anything about PVAMU. It seems encouraging, at least, that they're remaining competitive with big-name programs.
For me the UNLV game says a lot about Cal.
I have paid attention to them because of the coach from South Dakota St and because Eli Mitrou Long transferred there.
Cal ended up winning that game.
UNLV is a very well coached team and has a few players.
PVAMU is a team that wants to get into the tournament as a 13 or 14 and have a chance to win a game that isn't in the First 4.
Mike Davis couldn't at Texas Southern and I don't remember the last SWAC program that played on a Saturday or Sunday.
I think their best win was against Pepperdine, who I see as the 4th best team in the WCC - fringe top 100 team. UNLV might be around 150 and PVAMU maybe around 200 or so. At any rate, Cal appears to be much improved. Watched them beat UW last year. They closed the season nicely, at least. I'd say it's fair to label them as a potential top 100 team.
