Pretty exciting to have four Pac-12 teams in the Sweet Sixteen. Mostly we are rolling over clearly inferior teams. No more basketball though for a couple of days.
Clearly inferior teams, many of which were seeded higher. The Pac-12 should have been dominating more, but the committee disrespected us even more by putting two of our best teams in the same side of the same bracket (USC, Oregon) which wouldn't have happened to any other P5 conference.
It happened the last time we made the Sweet 16...1997 saw Cal, Stanford, UCLA & eventual champion Arizona in the final 16...incidentally, Utah was also in, but was a member of a diff conference.
Pretty sure it’s happened again since but not sure when. Either way, a nice feather in the P12 cap.
What possible clue did we have that the PAC-12 (or PAC-10 as TBS announcer Kevin Harlan kept saying during the OSU*2 game last night) was improved this year? Maybe we weren't at the start, but got coached up? There was next to nothing non-conference-wise to use as a basis of comparison:
Best opportunities: ASU at Villanova (L), CU @ Kansas St (W) Tenn (L), UO vs Seton Hall (W) Missouri (L), Stan vs Alabama (W), North Carolina (L) Indiana (L), UW vs Baylor (L), Utah @ BYU (L), UCLA: Ohio St (L), San Diego St (L), USC vs BYU (W) vs UCONN (L)
UA: Best non-conf win: E Wash Worst non-conf loss: None
This article gets at exactly what I was thinking: this year, with the smaller number of non-conference games, ranking the conferences by strength was going to be much harder. The Pac-12 was undervalued going in to the tournament (though probably still had the right number of teams selected).
What's been impressive about the Pac-12 in this tourney so far, is that most of these games haven't even been particularly close in what has otherwise been a pretty tightly contested tourney. On the opposite side, I'm interested in what the takeaway should be with the Big-10 mostly wetting the bed. We had been told that the Big-10 this year was one of the best conferences ever. I expect at least one of Iowa and Michigan will be done after tonight. Side note: The Beavers are playing Loyola-Chicago, not LMU.
Yup, the only game that's been close was UCLA going to overtime against Michigan St. in the first four. Otherwise they've all been double-digits (and one forfeit, though I would have strongly favored Oregon to beat VCU anyway).
What's been impressive about the Pac-12 in this tourney so far, is that most of these games haven't even been particularly close in what has otherwise been a pretty tightly contested tourney. On the opposite side, I'm interested in what the takeaway should be with the Big-10 mostly wetting the bed. We had been told that the Big-10 this year was one of the best conferences ever. I expect at least one of Iowa and Michigan will be done after tonight. Side note: The Beavers are playing Loyola-Chicago, not LMU.
Quick note: the guy playing for ASU is Josh Christopher, not Patrick. (I'm sure that was on accident, and not to rub in our recruiting woes, right? Right?)
Absolutely. One thing that has stood out watching the Tourney so far is how athletic these teams are. The good teams have tall and long guys that look like Kuany size-wise, move and defend like Joel, and shoot it like Grant...the Bears could really use an infusion of athleticism. With that in mind, keep your eye on incoming FR Sam Alajiki. More athleticism across the board should help Cal close the gap...eventually.
I dunno...the PAC-12 was better than the National media says, but West Coast fans kinda already knew that. Good to see the numbers catch up. However, it doesn’t change the fact that Cal was by far the worst team in the Conference for the third time in four years. Next year’s pretty big...another last place finish is on the table, but signs of improvement could portend good things are coming.
The reverberating effect of the Wyking debacle cannot be understated. After two seasons of amateur-hour coaching, a promising player could be forgiven bailing out of the program after the best-we-could-do-at-the-time hire of Fox. He's competent, but not exciting. So a few of our top players are gone. That's a big hit to the program, nothing to build on. Recruits looking at the program, and comparing to other choices they have, see no supporting cast plus a total rebuild, so they go elsewhere. Being light on talent, Cal struggles in the early Fox years. 18 and 20 loss seasons aren't a big draw to talented high school recruits, so they go elsewhere. Less talented, less recruited kids see an opportunity to play against the best, and that's who Cal can get. Digging out of this hole will take probably 6 years, short of hiring a Pitino or a Krzyzewski looking for a new challenge. It was a miracle we landed Monty and even he was only getting 3*s to commit. And in his 5th year he was 3-12 vs the top 25. Fox might just be the man for the job. He knows the type of player he needs to recruit to be successful, and looks like we're getting at least one next year. I saw improved team play from last year, even if the w-l doesn't agree. We were in games this year that would have been blowouts last season. Cal is a 3* school. We will have to rely on good coaching + time to be successful. In other words, the Wyking hire screwed us for years to come.
As dire as it seems, It's fixable and could be done more quickly than six years imo. But it would require a quick Fox exit and an astute hire (not holding my breath on either). Despite the trainwreck of the past four years, the brand, school and region have a lot to offer. Players have shown they will come here, but we can't continue to give them every reason not to.
Yeah, but we're competing in a conference where it looks like 4/12 teams are actually top 16 teams. And we're in a full rebuild. Any progress we make is going to be overshadowed by playing against some of the best teams in the nation.
Well, both of those things are likely true. My "good things are coming" reference needs to be taken in context, PawlOski, as the bar is so much lower than at any time in my fandom, which dates back to Harmon and the mid-80's. We've said a number of times that Mike Williams set this program back a decade with the Wyking Jones hire, and I firmly stand by this...incidentally, we promoted Jones on Mar 24, 2017 after we whiffed initially on Musselman, which makes this Wednesday the 4-year anniversary of arguably the worst day in the past 50 years for the MBB program...and that includes the Bozeman/Jelani Gardner scandal. Get excited, Cal fans ;-) !! Questionable at best at the time, it has proven to be devastating.
By all evidence, we're still a good 4-5 years from even competing for an at-large Tournament bid, and Mark Fox is absolutely not the guy that is going to get us there. Fox is the guy that is going to re-build the foundation of the program, basically from scratch, and get them on the path to respectability, and not necessarily on the basketball court. But unlike talented coaches with dynamic offensive &/or defensive styles, Fox doesn't have either the recruiting or player development chops to really get us there any quicker than that. Hopefully Bradley returns next year rather than seeking out greener pastures as a grad transfer...if so, and if Fox can finally get this team to play the defense he wants (paging Lars Thiemann!!), they can start incrementally progressing up the standings, even if slowly.
So, the good things are coming in that Fox will probably eventually get us back to "respectability", and the inevitable being that his ceiling will be just that..respectable, but not NCAA Tournament. Hopefully Knowlton doesn't re-sign him at the end of his 5, tho. Then we're in trouble.
Problem is, respectable is better than good enough for this athletic department. They'd like nothing more than to hand Fox an affordable extension in 1-2 years, which would takes us even further from becoming nationally relevant again. And then they'll wait it out until we're not respectable to be forced to move on, which undermine the purpose of any foundation-building. The only thing that's going fix Cal basketball is being bold, not half measures.
Oh, absolutely true. Hopefully the major hoops donors make enough of a stink that Knowlton will not extend Fox. Get out from having to pay Wyking Jones his buyout $, which I believe lasts another year, take a breath, and then move on from Fox.
The WORST thing possible is for Cal to show JUST enough incremental improvement for Knowlton to extend...
Thiemann is not a Pac-12 caliber player at this point two years into his career. To belabor the obvious, he can't shoot, can't defend, has terrible footwork, and can't score at the basket. In contrast look at Garza of Iowa, a seven footer who can do all of these things.
I agree - I am not expecting anything. Unfortunately, Lars is probably not a Division 1 player, let alone P12. He has absolutely zero basketball skills or instincts...none. It's basically the same as dragging a random 7-footer out of Sproul Plaza and giving him a scholarship. But he's not going anywhere so maybe he can work hard and develop something...anything....
According to SI...Jason Kidd earned his degree. Just sayin'...
https://www.si.com/college/cal/basketball/kidd-interests-unlv
I'd watch!
Pretty exciting to have four Pac-12 teams in the Sweet Sixteen. Mostly we are rolling over clearly inferior teams. No more basketball though for a couple of days.
Clearly inferior teams, many of which were seeded higher. The Pac-12 should have been dominating more, but the committee disrespected us even more by putting two of our best teams in the same side of the same bracket (USC, Oregon) which wouldn't have happened to any other P5 conference.
Oh, well. The Pac-12's undefeated run was nice while it lasted. Colorado is losing to FSU. 65-48, under 3 minutes left.
Pac-10 is still undefeated tho!
4th time. 97, 98, 2001 and this season.
It happened the last time we made the Sweet 16...1997 saw Cal, Stanford, UCLA & eventual champion Arizona in the final 16...incidentally, Utah was also in, but was a member of a diff conference.
Pretty sure it’s happened again since but not sure when. Either way, a nice feather in the P12 cap.
#BRING BACK LARRY SCOTT!!! Hahaha
'97 was such a great tournament, both for Cal and for the conference.
...but SC is butchering Kansas
UCLA over Abilene Christian 31-19 with 0:20 remaining in the 1st half.
And, an easy 20-point win for the Bruins.
ACU would be pretty tough to beat if they could actually score the basketball. That said, they'd turn us over 30 times. THIRTY!
Oregon absolutely smoked Iowa. Pretty darn impressive.
Yikes...Altman knows how to get them ready in the Dance, esp after a mid-season COVID issue.
What possible clue did we have that the PAC-12 (or PAC-10 as TBS announcer Kevin Harlan kept saying during the OSU*2 game last night) was improved this year? Maybe we weren't at the start, but got coached up? There was next to nothing non-conference-wise to use as a basis of comparison:
Best opportunities: ASU at Villanova (L), CU @ Kansas St (W) Tenn (L), UO vs Seton Hall (W) Missouri (L), Stan vs Alabama (W), North Carolina (L) Indiana (L), UW vs Baylor (L), Utah @ BYU (L), UCLA: Ohio St (L), San Diego St (L), USC vs BYU (W) vs UCONN (L)
UA: Best non-conf win: E Wash Worst non-conf loss: None
ASU: Win: Rhode Island Loss: UTEP
Cal: Win: USF Loss: Pepperdine
Stan: Win: Alabama Loss: North Carolina
CU: Win: Kansas St Loss: Tennessee
Utah: Win: Idaho St Loss: BYU
UO: Win: Seton Hall Loss: Missouri
OSU: Win: Cal* Loss: Portland *yes, non-conf
UCLA: Win: Marquette Loss: San Diego St
USC: Win: BYU Loss: UConn
UW: Win: Seattle Loss: Montana
WSU: Win: E Wash Loss: None
This article gets at exactly what I was thinking: this year, with the smaller number of non-conference games, ranking the conferences by strength was going to be much harder. The Pac-12 was undervalued going in to the tournament (though probably still had the right number of teams selected).
Would have been 6 if Arizona weren't self-sanctioned. Seems about right considering the...bottom half of our conference.
Yes, Zona would have had a good shot if they had been eligible.
What's been impressive about the Pac-12 in this tourney so far, is that most of these games haven't even been particularly close in what has otherwise been a pretty tightly contested tourney. On the opposite side, I'm interested in what the takeaway should be with the Big-10 mostly wetting the bed. We had been told that the Big-10 this year was one of the best conferences ever. I expect at least one of Iowa and Michigan will be done after tonight. Side note: The Beavers are playing Loyola-Chicago, not LMU.
It's going to be hilarious when they have 0 in the Elite Eight.
If USC beats Kansas then we are guaranteed at least one in the Elite Eight.
. . . and so it has come to pass.
Yup, the only game that's been close was UCLA going to overtime against Michigan St. in the first four. Otherwise they've all been double-digits (and one forfeit, though I would have strongly favored Oregon to beat VCU anyway).
What's been impressive about the Pac-12 in this tourney so far, is that most of these games haven't even been particularly close in what has otherwise been a pretty tightly contested tourney. On the opposite side, I'm interested in what the takeaway should be with the Big-10 mostly wetting the bed. We had been told that the Big-10 this year was one of the best conferences ever. I expect at least one of Iowa and Michigan will be done after tonight. Side note: The Beavers are playing Loyola-Chicago, not LMU.
Loyola Chicago, not LMU
Great, thoughtful take, as always.
Quick note: the guy playing for ASU is Josh Christopher, not Patrick. (I'm sure that was on accident, and not to rub in our recruiting woes, right? Right?)
Absolutely. One thing that has stood out watching the Tourney so far is how athletic these teams are. The good teams have tall and long guys that look like Kuany size-wise, move and defend like Joel, and shoot it like Grant...the Bears could really use an infusion of athleticism. With that in mind, keep your eye on incoming FR Sam Alajiki. More athleticism across the board should help Cal close the gap...eventually.
So we were not as bad as we thought given the upswing. Still in rebuilding mode however and waiting to get some impact recruits.
I dunno...the PAC-12 was better than the National media says, but West Coast fans kinda already knew that. Good to see the numbers catch up. However, it doesn’t change the fact that Cal was by far the worst team in the Conference for the third time in four years. Next year’s pretty big...another last place finish is on the table, but signs of improvement could portend good things are coming.
Someone's gotta be last, and we're coming off Wyking.
It's been two seasons already, we've looked worse than we did Fox's first season AND recruiting looks pretty bad too.
The reverberating effect of the Wyking debacle cannot be understated. After two seasons of amateur-hour coaching, a promising player could be forgiven bailing out of the program after the best-we-could-do-at-the-time hire of Fox. He's competent, but not exciting. So a few of our top players are gone. That's a big hit to the program, nothing to build on. Recruits looking at the program, and comparing to other choices they have, see no supporting cast plus a total rebuild, so they go elsewhere. Being light on talent, Cal struggles in the early Fox years. 18 and 20 loss seasons aren't a big draw to talented high school recruits, so they go elsewhere. Less talented, less recruited kids see an opportunity to play against the best, and that's who Cal can get. Digging out of this hole will take probably 6 years, short of hiring a Pitino or a Krzyzewski looking for a new challenge. It was a miracle we landed Monty and even he was only getting 3*s to commit. And in his 5th year he was 3-12 vs the top 25. Fox might just be the man for the job. He knows the type of player he needs to recruit to be successful, and looks like we're getting at least one next year. I saw improved team play from last year, even if the w-l doesn't agree. We were in games this year that would have been blowouts last season. Cal is a 3* school. We will have to rely on good coaching + time to be successful. In other words, the Wyking hire screwed us for years to come.
As dire as it seems, It's fixable and could be done more quickly than six years imo. But it would require a quick Fox exit and an astute hire (not holding my breath on either). Despite the trainwreck of the past four years, the brand, school and region have a lot to offer. Players have shown they will come here, but we can't continue to give them every reason not to.
Yeah, but we're competing in a conference where it looks like 4/12 teams are actually top 16 teams. And we're in a full rebuild. Any progress we make is going to be overshadowed by playing against some of the best teams in the nation.
Could portend good things are coming or just delay the inevitable.
Well, both of those things are likely true. My "good things are coming" reference needs to be taken in context, PawlOski, as the bar is so much lower than at any time in my fandom, which dates back to Harmon and the mid-80's. We've said a number of times that Mike Williams set this program back a decade with the Wyking Jones hire, and I firmly stand by this...incidentally, we promoted Jones on Mar 24, 2017 after we whiffed initially on Musselman, which makes this Wednesday the 4-year anniversary of arguably the worst day in the past 50 years for the MBB program...and that includes the Bozeman/Jelani Gardner scandal. Get excited, Cal fans ;-) !! Questionable at best at the time, it has proven to be devastating.
By all evidence, we're still a good 4-5 years from even competing for an at-large Tournament bid, and Mark Fox is absolutely not the guy that is going to get us there. Fox is the guy that is going to re-build the foundation of the program, basically from scratch, and get them on the path to respectability, and not necessarily on the basketball court. But unlike talented coaches with dynamic offensive &/or defensive styles, Fox doesn't have either the recruiting or player development chops to really get us there any quicker than that. Hopefully Bradley returns next year rather than seeking out greener pastures as a grad transfer...if so, and if Fox can finally get this team to play the defense he wants (paging Lars Thiemann!!), they can start incrementally progressing up the standings, even if slowly.
So, the good things are coming in that Fox will probably eventually get us back to "respectability", and the inevitable being that his ceiling will be just that..respectable, but not NCAA Tournament. Hopefully Knowlton doesn't re-sign him at the end of his 5, tho. Then we're in trouble.
Problem is, respectable is better than good enough for this athletic department. They'd like nothing more than to hand Fox an affordable extension in 1-2 years, which would takes us even further from becoming nationally relevant again. And then they'll wait it out until we're not respectable to be forced to move on, which undermine the purpose of any foundation-building. The only thing that's going fix Cal basketball is being bold, not half measures.
Oh, absolutely true. Hopefully the major hoops donors make enough of a stink that Knowlton will not extend Fox. Get out from having to pay Wyking Jones his buyout $, which I believe lasts another year, take a breath, and then move on from Fox.
The WORST thing possible is for Cal to show JUST enough incremental improvement for Knowlton to extend...
Thiemann is not a Pac-12 caliber player at this point two years into his career. To belabor the obvious, he can't shoot, can't defend, has terrible footwork, and can't score at the basket. In contrast look at Garza of Iowa, a seven footer who can do all of these things.
I agree - I am not expecting anything. Unfortunately, Lars is probably not a Division 1 player, let alone P12. He has absolutely zero basketball skills or instincts...none. It's basically the same as dragging a random 7-footer out of Sproul Plaza and giving him a scholarship. But he's not going anywhere so maybe he can work hard and develop something...anything....