Pac-10 Conference Notebook
by Scott Allen
A glance at the other half of the Pac-10, with Washington State and USC off to fast starts, while Oregon, Oregon State and Arizona State are still looking to get things going.
Beavers Seeking Consistency
The Beavers’ first conference win, last Saturday at Cal, coincided with the return of Nick DeWitz’s outside shot.
The senior forward, who fired at a 50 percent clip (34-for-68) from beyond the arc last season while averaging 14 points per game, has struggled with his outside shot this season. He entered Saturday’s game mired in a 2-for-15 slump and his 3-for-3 performance against the Bears improved his season average to 25 percent. Oregon State needs the DeWitz who showed up Saturday (18 points) and not the one who struggled Thursday (four points) throughout the conference season or it will be a long winter in Corvallis.
Senior guard Chris Stephens leads the team with 14.4 points per game and sophomores Sasa Cuic and Marcel Jones have also played well for head coach Jay John. The Beavers, who have already suffered ugly losses at Tennessee Tech and Portland and at home to Northwestern State, will likely suffer a few more during conference play. But as they showed Cal on Saturday, they have enough talent to pull a few upsets as well.
Ducks Down
This was supposed to be the year that sophomores Malik Hairston and Bryce Taylor made the Ducks a Pac-10 contender once again, but thus far Oregon hasn’t been anything more than mediocre.
Taylor is averaging two points less per game than he did as a freshman and while Hairston’s numbers are slightly up, Ernie Kent’s squad has stumbled to a 7-8 record after being swept in the Bay Area last week. Aaron Brooks has played well at point guard, including a 10 assist, no turnover game against Howard earlier this season, but his scoring and shooting percentage are both down. Oregon entered Pac-10 play coming off back-to-back losses to Portland State and Portland and has yet to right the ship.
Cougars Get Offensive
The Cougars’ 78-71 win at Washington last weekend was the most impressive by any school in the early Pac-10 season. Washington State’s defense has been solid every year under head coach Dick Bennett, but the offense was the key to Saturday’s victory, the Cougars’ first ever win over a top 10 team on the road. Granted, the Husky defense is one of the weakest in the league, but Washington State was without point guard and leading scorer Derrick Low, who was out with a broken foot.
Josh Akognon had 27 points, including the game-winning three-pointer, and Kyle Weaver added a career-high 19 for the Cougars, whose three losses this season have come to Arizona, Gonzaga and BYU. In addition to Saturday’s win, Washington State has also beaten Utah by 17 this season. It will be tough to keep up their current pace without Low, but if Weaver continues to play at a high level the Cougars might find themselves in an unfamiliar place come March, the top half of the Pac-10 standings. Washington State faces a tough test this Thursday at UCLA.
Sun Devils Winless in Pac-10 Play
Arizona State made strides during their first two weeks of conference play, but in some ways dropping two games to the L.A. schools by a combined two points is a harder pill to swallow than being blown out by a combined 39 points against the Washington schools one week earlier.
It’s been a tough year in the desert for head coach Rob Evans’ squad without Ike Diogu. Junior guard Kevin Kruger has stepped up to lead the team with 15.2 points per game while Bryson Krueger has averaged 13.2. Outside of those two, offense has been hard to come by for the Sun Devils, whose third leading scorer is freshman Jeff Pendergraph (9.0 points per game). Junior forward Serge Angounou, who was expected to help fill the void left by Diogu, struggled offensively early on, but scored 42 points against USC and UCLA last weekend.
Things don’t figure to get much easier for the Sun Devils, but if Angounou and Pendergraph continue to develop into solid offensive weapons inside, this team will win a handful of games. Arizona State hits the road for a pair of games at Oregon and Oregon State this week.
USC on the Way Up
Thanks in part to a sterling pair of sophomores, Tim Floyd’s first season at USC has been a success. Nick Young and Gabe Pruitt are both averaging over 16 points per game and the Trojans enter Thursday’s game against Washington with just two fewer wins (11) than they had all of last season. USC has already beaten UNC this season and can add another good win to its resume against the Huskies. For that to happen, Young and Pruitt will need more help from freshmen Ryan Francis and RouSean Cromwell.
Junior Lodrick Stewart has been solid, averaging over 13 points per game and shooting 41 percent from beyond the arc. USC still looks like it’s a year away from potentially being very good, but, as the Tar Heels can attest, this young team is plenty capable this season.
