Mahatma Gandhi once said, “Pac-10 basketball is good. Damn good.”
Now Bapu might not have put it in those exact words, or even said anything even remotely close to that, but he may as well have.
Pac-10 basketball, which has long been thought of as inferior to the East and Midwest, has come back with a vengeance this season, putting six in the top-25 poll for the first time.
The Pac-10 has the highest RPI out of any conference and with six solid teams, you can expect the West Coast to be well-represented in postseason play.
Starting at the top, No. 2 UCLA has proven itself to be one of the nation’s elite teams with consistent guard play and a suffocating defense more typical of East Coast schools. Coach Ben Howland has the brains to lead this team very deep into March, if not early April.
No. 14 and second in the conference Washington State has revitalized its program and is a dangerous team. Its style of play most closely resembles a blind, three-legged dog playing fetch ““ horribly slow and painful to watch. The Cougars came close to knocking off the Bruins in Pauley with a 55-52 loss, in one of their lowest scoring games of the year.
They’re a dark horse to put together a string of victories in the tourney simply because of their unique playing tempo.
As UCLA knows well, the No. 25 Stanford Cardinal are a legitimate squad this season. They’re the only team in the country that starts two 7-footers and are dangerous in the way they can beat you just relying on blocks. As a predicted five seed by ESPN.com, the Cardinal are no longer a bubble team and would not surprise anyone with a few wins in March.
As the No. 4 team in the Pac-10, No. 19 USC has proven itself to be a top-15 team, battling the Bruins evenly for most of their two matchups. With Nick Young and Taj Gibson inside, the Trojans present two of the most athletic big men in the conference and a matchup problem for any team.
ESPN.com predicted the Trojans to snag a four seed in March, a surprise for a team that was absent in any preseason polls.
As the No. 5 team in the conference, the No. 15 Oregon Ducks have the potential to out-gun anyone on any given night. With Aaron Brooks in the backcourt, a player who has proven he can make shots from anywhere on the court, Oregon is talented, with enough offensive potential to scare any team.
If the Ducks can get consistent play from their big men inside, this team could be as good as anyone.
The No. 24 Arizona Wildcats are the sixth-ranked team in the Pac-10 and have much more talent than they have shown so far this season. With Chase Budinger providing a scoring presence who can create his own shot, the Wildcats have largely underachieved this year, in part due to a lack of defensive intensity.
Their 92-64 blowout loss at home against North Carolina will hurt their seed, if in fact they pull it together and make the tournament.
The rest of the Pac-10 teams will need to put some serious wins together if they are to get an opportunity for a postseason run. Washington seems to have given up on the season after getting demolished by rival Washington State, and California is really the only serious threat for a seventh Pac-10 bid, with rumors swirling of a possible early return by center DeVon Hardin.
For Arizona State and Oregon State, well, let’s hope they’ve got some good recruits coming in because they are just awful.
Whatever the case, the Pac-10 conference has separated itself from the rest of the country in stunning fashion. If at least six teams do not make The Big Dance, there will be riots on the West Coast.
E-mail Feder at jfeder@media.ucla.edu if you think the 8-year-olds who played during halftime of the Oregon game would finish third in the Big Ten.