Yes, coach, your team is #1.
Photo by Chris Morrison-US PRESSWIRE

The Arizona Wildcats are Pac-10 champions!

Sean Miller and his team do not have to feel ashamed about the league being down. Conference RPIs aren’t listed on championship banners. A coach’s bio never says, “He won his conference 12 times (but a couple of them were against some really crummy teams).” There is absolutely no reason to apologize.

The Cats will, however, have to apologize if they think their work is done.

A Pac-10 co-championship would be a solid accomplishment just two years removed from the Old Lute/KO/ASU Radio Guy era. But why settle for solid? Get as much density as you can.

You want the outright championship. Nine of Lute Olson’s 11 Pac-10 championships were of the solo variety. They taste better.

You want the 14-4 record. The UA has never won this league with a record worse than that. 13-5 has only been good enough to win the Pac-10 twice: 1985 (Lute’s second year) and last season.

You want the undefeated home season. You can’t get back to being elite unless you dominate at home. Send the message that the days of coming into McKale and walking out with easy wins are over.

You want the momentum to build. The time to start playing your best basketball is right now and the Cats are not. The Oregon State contest made it three straight games with subpar outside shooting. A strong performance against Oregon would be a boost heading into tournament season.

You want to build the resume. If it’s true that Arizona’s seed range for the NCAA tournament is 6-7-8 then go out and earn that 6-seed. The Wildcats have been seeded 8, 9 or 10 seven times. Those seven tournament appearances produced one total win.

There is still a lot to play for on Saturday. Even for the Pac-10 champions.

(I mean, the Pac-10 champions!)

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The Arizona baseball team got its first taste of real competition with mixed results. Top-25 Rice came to town and knocked around UA pitching for 19 runs in splitting the two-game series.

As in the previous six games starting pitching wasn’t the problem. The lead was 3-0 when Kurt Heyer left the game on Tuesday and 3-1 when Kyle Simon exited on Wednesday.

All told the bullpen yielded 17 earned runs in 12.1 innings for an unpleasant ERA of 12.41. Take out Bryce Bandilla’s 2.2 innings without being charged with a run and it jumps up to 15.82.

So the Wildcat relievers need some work. The good news is work is available.

None of the three remaining nonconference weekend opponents will scare anyone so the real tests will be the midweek games. The UA travels to play 8-2 UNLV next week and 7-1 Wichita State the following week.

It would be a good idea to get the pen some innings this weekend against Utah Valley so they have more confidence heading to Vegas.

The start of the Pac-10 season (and the ASU series) is only three weeks away.

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Scott Terrell is a big fan of conference championships! Flash the #1 sign on Twitter and Facebook!

This shot did not go in. It was not alone.
Photo by Gary A. Vasquez-US PRESSWIRE

On behalf of the Wildcat Universe I have a request:

Could you please stop ranking our athletic teams in the top 10?

It was not a pretty game. Arizona shot 36% from the field. USC shot 10% on 3-pointers. The Wildcats’ leading scorer had 12 points. Half of the Trojans’ six-man rotation combined to score seven points. If you’re a fan of good offense it was a great night not to have access to Fox Sports Arizona Plus.

Was it Kevin O’Neill’s mind tricks? Last week he called the Cats a sleeper pick to win the national championship but against his team the UA didn’t make a field goal in the final six minutes.

KO compared Derrick Williams to Michael Jordan and the result was the Arizona star attempting just two free throws and scoring a season-low eight points.

After the Wildcats’ ugly loss to Oregon State on their first Pac-10 road trip we figured we’d see another one down the road. The good news is it didn’t happen again until the last road trip of the season. The bad news is it ups the ante quite a bit for the second game of that last road trip.

Saturday’s showdown at UCLA just got a lot more interesting. Win and you clinch a share of the Pac-10 title. Lose and the league is all tied up going into the final weekend.

Championship teams aren’t just hatched like Lady Gaga. They’re forged when the pressure is greatest. Starting now, the pressure is greatest.

After an uninspiring debut for the new red uniforms I’m guessing we’ll see the blue ones return on Saturday.

(Yes, I spent too much time looking up the numbers. Yes, I’m going to put them in an html table.)

The Wildcats are still in 1st place and can still win the Pac-10 against UCLA.

The best way to do that is to play like they’re not in the top 10.

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Scott Terrell will not be acquiring a Kevin O’Neill bobblehead any time soon. Join in the head-shaking on Twitter and Facebook.

Now we can talk about the streak.

Twenty-five glorious years. The second-longest NCAA basketball tournament run of all time. And the Arizona Wildcats have a chance to make it 26.

All season long the message has been to let go of the streak and prepare for it to end. I still maintain that was the proper mindset…for the first 30 games of the season.

Now it’s time to give in to four months of built-up anxiety. Arizona’s beloved March Madness streak ends if the Cats lose this week! Dwell on it, obsess about it, and hope our team plays like it.

This week isn’t about foundation-building and long-term thinking. This week Sean Miller needs to do all he can to win three games and get into the Dance.

Whatever it takes. Gimmicks. Tricks. Junk defenses. Hack-a-Boateng. You name it, it should be in play.

The best players get all the minutes they can handle this week. You can develop other players next week. Just win. No excuses. No distractions.

The streak is on life support. But it’s not dead yet.

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Nic Wise. Dominique “Niq” Wise. How often do you get four chances at a storybook ending on your senior day after playing for four coaches in four years?

Dribble it off your foot down one at the end of regulation. Miss two free throws up four with 49 seconds left (then your coach draws up the next in-bounds play to get someone else to the line). Miss a jumper at the end of the first overtime. But Niq got his rewrite and the fourth time was the charm for #13.

How does Kyle Fogg go from 0-for-9 against Oregon (and 28% from the field over a five game streatch) to raining seven threes on UCLA and making the most intense three free throws possible against USC? Let’s hope Kyle hasn’t used up his cool guy points.

Note to the McKale Center technical staff: Before next season you may want to adjust the scoreboard closed captioning so it no longer credits the occasional basket to “Bobo Jones.”

You have to bench Jamelle Horne for the UCLA game, don’t you? After floating around for nine rebounds in three games Horne sat for the opening tip last Thursday and responded with 16 boards over the weekend. Mind games should certainly be in play this week.

It took Kevin O’Neill 31 seconds to call his first timeout on Saturday. Ah, the memories.

"And don't get me started on the Gem Show!"
Photo from TucsonCitizen.com

So how much does KO hate the University of Arizona right now? He gets run out of town after being named Lute’s successor, then he takes over at USC after the UA has pillaged his recruiting class. In this game you had the shot clock violation (no way Fogg got that shot off), the three-point foul (hardly ever called), and the game-winner where Wise may or may not have travelled (I don’t think he did). The Tucson Visitors Bureau should probably cross O’Neill off the list of potential spokespeople.

The longest regular season in the past 25 years didn’t want to end but the postseason is finally here. How on earth are the Cats going to win the Pac-10 tournament? I’m glad you asked.

Start stronger.
Arizona has been trailing at the half in each of its last six games (and the margin has been at least five every time).

Attack.
If someone is Fogg-like from beyond the arc, so be it. But don’t launch up three after three while you wait for someone to get hot. Get into the lane and make things happen. Niq and MoMo – a.k.a. Wise and Otherwise – need to keep the pedal down.

Feed the big man.
Derrick Williams is our best offensive player. Give him the ball. I don’t care if they’re playing a zone. Move the ball, dribble-penetrate, and create lanes for #23 to get clean touches.

Big man, feed yourself.
Williams made 63% of his free throws in his first 12 games. It then jumped to 80% over his next 12 games, but now he’s back down to 57% over his past six games. I’ve never heard of a streak free-throw shooter, but it would help a lot to have the good streak come back.

Win on Thursday.
Just don’t lose to UCLA in the first round. Please? If Cal’s big three all hit their shots and you exit in round two, so be it. But don’t kill the 25-year tournament streak by losing to the worst UCLA team since Steve Lavin and his exercise bike were involved.

Bottom line, is it possible? In a word, yes. If you could hand-pick a year to try and steal the Pac-10’s automatic bid this is it. Six of the nine teams in the tournament are 16-14 or worse. This is the time to be thankful for conference mediocrity.

The Wildcats could have quit any number of times this year. But they didn’t. They could have been defeated in each of the past three games. But they weren’t. Now they might end the most impressive achievement in the history of UA athletics.

Might.