The Pac-12 could put SEVEN teams in the round of eight.
In Albany 1, it’s #1 South Carolina vs. #3 Oregon State (who beat #2 Notre Dame)
In Portland 4, it’s #5 Utah (who beat #1 Texas, and host team #4 Gonzaga) vs. #2 Stanford.
In Albany 2, it’s #5 Colorado (who beat #4 Kansas State, and #1 Iowa) vs. #2 UCLA (who beat defending champ #3 LSU).
In Portland 3, it’s #1 Southern Cal vs. #11 Arizona (who won the play-in game vs. Auburn, then #6 Syracuse, #3 Connecticut, and #2 Duke) .
From that round of 8:
Oregon State beats South Carolina. It’s OSU freshman guard Dominica Paurov who comes up big.
Here’s my question to you: Which Pac-12 freshmen guard combo do you prefer, Oregon State’s Paurova plus Donovyn Hunter, or Southern Cal’s JuJu Watkins plus Malia Samuels?
Hunter is steady in a way that belies her experience, and she has bursts of fireworks.
Here’s what gets me about the Czech player Paurova, the WBB equivalent of Corliss Williamson.
Corliss Williamson won an NBA championship in 2004 with Detroit, and an NCAA championship in 1994 with Arkansas. Williamson had the nickname “Big Nasty” as an overwhelming 4 forward in college, and as an undersized 4 forward in the NBA.
Corliss’ opponents grew six inches to a foot in the transition from 1994 Arkansas to 1995 NBA Sacramento. Suddenly, he’s undersized, but it doesn’t change a thing — Corliss is still knocking the shit out of people.
The difference is Paurova’s a guard, shorter-height-than-listed, driving the ball, shooting from distance. Which makes her an amusing player to watch, using physical play to create space at 3-point range.
Von Oelhoffen and, especially, Hansford seem to use Star Trek technology to appear out of nowhere, open for a three. It’s a hint of Coach Rueck engineering this beam-me-open-for-a-three science.
Van Oelhoffen’s game-winner in the overtime vs. UCLA was, as we say, just like drawn up. That was a high point of my season, personally: Replaying the inbounds play image-by-image to see how Talia got such a good look at that three.
The Oregon State first-year guards Hunter and Paurova contrast: Hunter rarely makes the mistakes of first-years, while Paurova looks on the brink of a mishap all the time, for either team.
Juju Watkins is like Hunter and Paurova combined: Hunter’s control plus Paurova’s double-edged fireworks, at a different level. Watkins does an unheard-of thing in seemingly every game.
About USC, I said early in the conference schedule that they were monster-scary.
Later, I said the Trojans lost some scary.
I imagine that was a sign of growing pain, or other form of team evolution,
because they came out of it with scary on another level.
After the Pac-12 championship tournament bracket was set, I said about Utah’s likeliest path to the title Arizona State -> UCLA -> USC -> Stanford that South Carolina couldn’t run that gauntlet.
The basketball gods and the NCAA selection committee conspired to (almost) give Utah another shot at it.
The basketball gods’ peculiar sense of humor is evidently immediately. The Utes’ first-round opponent in Spokane is South Dakota State — whose side is Dru Gylten taking? The brilliant four-year starter at Utah moved home to SDSU for her last season.
If the #5 Utes get past the #12 Jackrabbits, then it’s host #4 Gonzaga, and another Utah transfer, Brynna Maxwell.
Gonzaga is undefeated at home, but say that streak ends. Utah’s round-of-16 opponent would be Portland region 4 #1 Texas. The Utes knocked the Longhorns out last year, but top-seed Texas is better (the first team in the nation to scare me long ago in November), while the injuries to Utah starters affected the team about as much as we feared in December.
Get by #1 Texas, run into #2 Stanford.
Albany region 1 #3 seed Oregon State knocks out #2 Notre Dame and #1 South Carolina to be Utah’s round-of-4 opponent.
The winner of the USC (#1 in the Portland 3 region) vs. UCLA (#2 in Albany 2, though I wouldn’t hate it if Iowa advanced past the Bruins) semifinal is the championship round opponent.
Again, I don’t think South Carolina would survive Gonzaga (in Spokane), Texas, Stanford, Oregon State, USC/UCLA.
Who are the Gamecocks likely to face? #16 play-in -> North Carolina -> Indiana -> Oregon State, after the Beavers knock out Notre Dame -> Utah, because we’re knocking out Gonzaga, Texas, and Stanford, of course.
If South Carolina does reach the championship game, I don’t think they’d beat Southern Cal (a final four in Cleveland are sort of home games for Cavaliers AC Gottlieb).
If Southern Cal wins the national championship, maybe Coach Gottlieb will take my calls.