Game Thread: UW @ AZ

[CatsTopPac]

Where are all of those UW fans from a couple/few years ago who were loading up on the bandwagon that Romar>Miller, Hec Ed>McKale, and UW>AZ???

Back to the basement!!!!!!!

 

[520GGATO]

Yup. But the ScumDevil fans were even worse. They even went as far as to say they had caught up to AZ in recruiting, which I can't imagine ever happening. Back to the basement with them to, which I approve of. Hahah

 

[The Derski]

The former UW bandwagon is just like the Colorado bandwagon of right now.

 

[520GGATO]

 

[JahiiCarson_SqodGeneral]

We "roughed" em up for you ermmmmmmmmmm sorry guys.............

 

[JahiiCarson_SqodGeneral]

Yup. But the ScumDevil fans were even worse. They even went as far as to say they had caught up to AZ in recruiting, which I can't imagine ever happening. Back to the basement with them to, which I approve of. Hahah

Haha when we got Harden and Sendek got lucky on some top 100 recruits. He will never get a 4-5 star recruit again and you can take that to the bank.

 

[CatsTopPac]

It rotates every few years. It's CU and Oregon right now. Before that it was UW, going backwards it was ASU, Oregon, UCLA, USC, Stanford, UCLA, OSU.... And AZ has been there the whole time. Now it's CU's turn. Probably until Boyle leaves. I could see Oregon around for a while, til Altman leaves. Maybe longer, they have Uncle Phil's $$$. And Utah could be the next one, until K leaves. I'd expect UCLA to not be gone long. And I think if UW can get someone better than Romar that they are sitting on a goldmine. Maybe ASU and USC can come back from some very brief success. Who knows. But they come and they go. It's just ridiculous that they are so unfamiliar with success that they come in droves when some good players come in. THey beat their chests like they are going to be around for decades. And then when the players leave, and the recruiting dries up, they sink back down into silent oblivion. A couple/few fans remain. And those are the diehards. It's commendable, but it only a concession.

I hope that the Pac can really sustain some success; get 7 or 8 teams in the dance for a good stretch, and get a few to the Elite Eight pretty regularly. The potential is there. Right now CU, Oregon, and AZ are all looking strong for the future. Maybe UCLA and Utah are on the cusp. That's about all I see though. It woulds be nice if UW could get someone to replace Romar. They have outgrown him. Perhaps Enfield can get something going, and ASU gets rid of Herb sooner than later. I don't know. WSU and OSU seem hopeless, and I'm just not sure that Stanford or Cal will ever really compete for Final Fours again unless they change the OAD rule.

Seriously though; ASU is bad because they are 100 miles away, and we are rivals (more in the other sports, rather than basketball). But UW? Man, they had an all-time hard-on for AZ there for a few years. Holy shit they were obnoxious. Their fans have made some truly ridiculous claims: UW is the next AZ...undefeated in the Pac, etc. No other fan base has ever said some stupid shit on that level.

 

[johnson]

Did ASU really ever leave the basement? Or, ever become relevant? If not, there's nothing to "go back" to.

Washington was legit in recent memory, but this should be a win (as they all should be). UW could put up a fight though. They have a few very good players and destroyed ASU. They are 50 times better than Washington State (who are the equivalent of a steaming pile of garbage) so Cats better not think all Washington teams are made equal and get too comfy.

 

[520GGATO]

they were even calling themselves the real point guard u also. I wonder if Colorado fans still think they have the PAC12 title when they won the PAC tournament 2 years ago.

 

[The Derski]

I dont think ASU has been in the basement as long as Oregon St. has.

 

[CatsTopPac]

Did ASU really ever leave the basement? Or, ever become relevant? If not, there's nothing to "go back" to.

In ASU's defense, in 2010, they finished 2nd in the Pac. It was a horrible year for the Pac, but they were out of the basement to breathe some fresh air. But that was all they needed to praise Herb, shit on Miller, and call that they were going to own the state in basketball. Then we all saw what happened after that.

 

[CatsTopPac]

I dont think ASU has been in the basement as long as Oregon St. has.

But you're correct. OSU hasn't been out of the Pac cellar since Gary Payton. And they still haven't made it out of the first round of the tourney, since 1982.

 

[GumbySquad]

Most of those fans you are talking about were bandwagon... Seattle sports fans are desperate for a championship, of any kind. At times over the years the teams have gotten close (Sonics, Mariners, etc), but the last championship of any kind was UW Football 25 years ago.... why do you think that the Seattle Sounders are the most popular soccer club in America? It's because they have been Seattle's closest thing to a contender in the last 3-4 years and won the Lamar Hunt US Open three years in a row.

When the Huskies showed signs of moving into title-contender-territory the bandwagon filled up with every hipster that the area has to offer... now that Romar's team has taken a step back they have all put their Roy jerseys in storage and are building shrines in their back yards to Pete Carroll.

 

[CatsTopPac]

Hahahahaha, hipsters.

True story though. It sucks that their loyalty for Romar is really the biggest thing holding UW basketball back, right now. I know that they didn't have to compete with Uncle Phil's Ducks for NW players, until recently, but Romar put them on the map. Now they just need to realize that they have outgrown him, and in oder to compete with the staples and cyclical risers, they need to take the next step in coaching. But they need to strike while the iron is hot, or the position won't garner that second or third tier of coaches out to Seattle. They can still go out and get a coach like Alford, etc. I think they should go for like Dunphy from Temple, Rose from BYU, Hoiberg from Iowa State; maybe they even have a shot at like a Buzz Williams, but that's a stretch.

 

[GumbySquad]

Romar is a good coach and Washington has very little national cred, so it's not as if they can just go out and hire an A-list guy to take over. They don't have too many options.

Romar's problem is simple; He put all of his eggs into certain recruting baskets the last few years and Miller took them and made them into an egg-salad-York-Chol-Gordon-Sandwhich. All three of those guys were Romar's top priority in their respective classes, and he put all of his efforts into getting them to play for the Huskies. Problem is, when they chose the UofA, it was already late in the recruting period and he had nothing to fall back on.

I don't see Romar's coaching as being the big problem (he is one of the top-5 coaches in the conference), IMO the big problem last year and this year is a lack of talent... and Sean Miller is "to blame" for that.

 

[CatsTopPac]

Eh, I think that UW's biggest problem is that he has largely been able to keep/get talent to Seattle, but has largely underachieved, despite having a solid string of players. Romar has had 12 players drafted in the last 8 years. And they can't even get to the Elite Eight??? That's on Romar. That's before Miller, and that's before Oregon challenged him for locking down the players in the NW. He had his shot to solidify success enough to get players to stay (from Miller or Altman). And bottom line is: he failed to do so when his competition in recruiting was minimal. Now he doesn't stand a chance. He has no track record of elite success to keep/get players there. That's where he fucked up, imo. Had he had an Elite Eight or two to speak of given all the talent that has rolled through campus, I think that he gets some of those players to stay/or go to UW. And I think that's on him.

He did a great job of getting the players that he did, because UW hasn't even sniffed players of that caliber since the 80s. But he dropped the ball with them. And that's what is holding UW back. I think that it shows that players want to go to (and more importantly, stay in) Seattle, but if there is not sign of a solid program, they aren't going to commit. And Romar proved that he couldn't make it happen, despite the talent he had.

But I don't know. The recruiting base (Washington/Oregon) is top ten in the country (barely). And if UW got a coach that could keep the talent there, I think that it would attract some of the more decent talent from the West, and maybe a couple from the other top recruiting bases in the country. They have the bandwagon ready to go and Hec Ed can be a really tough place to play as an opponent. And I think they have the resources to direct toward bball if they saw the potential. I think that UW is a better situation than BYU, ISU, Temple (maybe, because of the conference), and possibly Marquette (although again, that's probably a stretch), because of the recruiting base. Okay, Temple and Marq are both stretches. I just see a lot of potential in Seattle. UW came from nowhere and had a very very solid string of players go through there. A better coach would have gotten them at least a couple Elite Eights over that span, and then UW is perhaps a perennial top 25, with maybe some players like Bird, Artis, Moser, Lloyd, Cobbs, etc., choosing UW instead of other Pac schools. Maybe they don't get the AZ players (i.e, Gordon, because his connections with Romar, who wouldn't have been there), but maybe players from the NW or the West who decided to go to other schools that weren't competing with AZ for players.

I don't know. I just think that there is much more potential in Seattle than Romar will every actualize. They had 12 draft picks in 8 years...out of almost nothing when Romar showed up. There is something to be said about what can happen if the right coach can recruit, and produce.

 

[JahiiCarson_SqodGeneral]

08-09 ASU was the only fun year I had 09-10 was like watching a chess match such a boring team but they got Ws and then it fell apart like it usually does with Herb........

 

[GumbySquad]

CTP, you can't have it both ways. You point to all of the draft picks Romar has had (which is actually 10 in the 11 years he's been there, not 12 in the last 8) and his relative lack of success with those players but do not mention that the vast majority of those players were unknowns in HS and were "coached up" to become NBA level players.

...and the elite players he did get? Hawes and Wroten? they both left after one year. By no means am I trying to say that Romar is an elite coach. The point is, Washington has never been successful in basketball (I don't consider Elite Eights in the 50s to be anything to write home about considering there were only 22 teams involved). Washington had 9 trips to the dance in their first 100 years and have had 7 trips in the 11 years under Romar. Clearly he is the best coach they've ever had.

Could they be a perennial top-10 team if they had a coach like Sean Miller? Yeah, they could... but that's what I'm saying... it is because Romar has not had much tournament success that is their downfall. Had he made a few Elite Eights, or a Final Four then the job position would have more clout. As it stands now, it is not a destination job no matter what the market for players is. There are tons of jobs in HS basketball hotbeds that have never been successful (see: usc).

Me, I hope that UW gets back to where they were a few years ago, whether that is with Romar, or with someone else. With CU, Oregon, UCLA, Stanford, Cal and the UofA being teams that will challenge for an NCAA birth every season under their current regimes, it would be nice to add UW, and/or usc/Utah into that mix. Would love to see the day where 7-9 Pac12 teams were dancing.

 

[JahiiCarson_SqodGeneral]

Spencer Hawes has been a solid NBA player. Gumby Terrance Ross is actually playing really well to spreads the floor for Toronto there 10-3 with him in the starting lineup and since Gays departure.

 

[GumbySquad]

Yes Jahii they are... point was not which players are doing well in the NBA, but rather which players were highly regarded coming out of HS and which ones were not. Hawes was a top-10 ranked player coming out of HS, Wroten and Ross were top-25, but guys like Isaiah Thomas, Brandon Roy and Nate Robinson? They barely cracked the top-100 in most recruiting publications.

It's not like they were complete unknowns in HS, it's just that IMO you have to give credit to the coaching staff at UW for developing some of these guys from relatively unknown HS players into borderline NBA All-Stars. (and in Roy's case, one of the best SGs in the NBA when healthy)