Arizona 20 - ASU 17 final

The Territorial Cup week started sometime late monday night or early tuesday morning,
as the Arizona State Universities' "A" mountain received a fresh coat of red paint,
courtesy of some anonymous University of Arizona fans.
Thanks to Fox Sports, I have had the chance to watch a few ASU games this year,
so i have seen how great the Sundevils defense plays, including a recent loss to UCLA.
On offense, the have a good running back, but seemingly only one great receiver.
Consequently, they have been 'close' in some low scoring games.
The Arizona Wildcats, on the other hand, have been flying high on the shoulders of
talented Nick Foles since an incredible (upset) win in Corvallis over Oregon State back in
October. The Cats also have a great defense, which has been troubled by spending too
much time on the field this year, and a few games have been lost in the final few minutes.
So it was great to hear (no tv, i listened in on the KCUB radio broadcast) they finally
caught a break. an ASU punt returner fumbled the ball, and Arizona recovered the fumble
deep in ASU s end of the field. The game was won by Zendejas', kicking a field goal as time
expired.
Later, I watched the UCLA USC game on Fox. The USC defense was impressive;
they filled every gap on nearly every play. Zona is going to have to be perfect to
win next weeks game versus SC, in LA. Let's hope they can stay healthy for
any bowl game they may be invited to. And keep the score close...
=====================
After hearing about the UNLV Runnin' Rebels men's basketball win over Louisville on
Saturday night, I realized how challenging their December schedule is going to be.
The trip to Maui must have been stressful, playing 3 games in 3 days.
I just hope they can keep the score close, while the defense improves, and the home
crowd learns their part of the game.
In all my years of being an Arizona fan, we have always had the 'fatherly' Lute O
to look up to. I am slowly getting used to having a younger coach. He reminds me of
a teacher i had in high school, but of course that teacher didn't have near the salary
of today's college coaches. Probably his biggest challenge will be to 'aclimate'
from the 'Rust Belt' to the southern Arizona desert. While this young team gains experience.

Day One: Maui Invitational

Last night was my first look at the 2009-10 team. The Sean Miller coached Arizona
Wildcats mens Basketball team appears to have several play makers .
Judging from the early games, I was most interested in viewing the play of
Solomon Hill and Derek Williams. Naturally i expected Nic Wise to continue his
great free throw shooting and occasional 3 point baskets. One of my favorite
freshmen from last year, Garland Judkins saw limited action. 2 minutes worth.
I was on the computer, winning a game of Scrabble, so the first 5 minutes of the
game is a blur in my memory. After that time, I watched on my 'big screen'
and the energy of the Arizona players was impressive. Especially on defense.
Un fortunatley, Nic had some early foul trouble, and frankly he at times is a sloppy
ball handler. So the trade-offs of his great vision and leadership is offset .
I would not trade him for anyone in the world. Nic wise is a keeper.
The biggest positive i saw in the game, was defensive rebounding by arizona.
Granted, Wisconsin was playing a small line up, due to foul troubles of their own.
Impressive was MoMo Jones slashing to the basket, throu out the game.
Unfortunatley, the shots were not falling for him, he finished 2 out of 10 .
Kyle Fogg seemed to work his tail off on defense. No points, and fouled out.
Derrick Williams was a huge presence for the Cats. No arguments about it.
Kyryl Nat surprised me with his defensive energy and experience.
I was expecting a "George Zydek" type of player; a large and lumbering
presence with no real offensive value(as a freshman).
Kyryl was much better than expected, but still only 2 points. and 4 fouls.
Jamelle Horne was impressive, both rebounding and defending.
a late 3 pointer brought arizona within 1 basket of tying the game. Top notch talent.
Lavender played 19 minutes but missed all his shots. Not much stats to show for the effort.
I was surprised to see Alex Jacobsen play, but his time on court was so brief
that i can;t say anything about his play, yet.
Solomon Hill seems very intelligent, and he grabbed rebounds and scored well.
At least once, his defense was lacking under the basket.

All in all, the young Wildcats played a senior oriented wisconsin team for
the full 40 minutes. the defense was good, the shooting was horrible.
As for an Zona fan, the team rates about like the early teams of
Sean Rooks and Ed Stokes of the early 1990s.
Maybe a middle of the PAC-10 finish this year.
Time to watch the second days action. Ciao!

The PAC-10 heats up, 2009

I knew this would happen..living in Big-12 territory is predictalbe, at least. Here i was, stuck with
Kansas at Texas ,, when Oregon at Arizona should have been on my TV.
The saturday 'football day' started with of course ESPNs gameday from Tucson. Nothing more heart
warming than to hear all those U of A chants ; something so distant that at times there is nothing in
my life to bear witness to my faithful support of Arizona athletics.
Next up came Iowa vs Minnesota , standard Big-10 fare. Iowa is my homeland, after all.
Next up, we had ASU at UCLA , and the SunDevils proceeded to be inept on offense..
i am left wondering why they started a different quarterback against the Bruins stout defense.
The show started with a great look at coaches Dennis Erickson (ASU) in his nice shades,
and chatting (posing more like it) with UCLAs Rick Neuheisel (spelling?) .
The downfall of ASU has been painful, and i pretty much hate those guys.But no pity.
Once again, they failed to score more than 17 points, losing 13-23.
UCLA, on the other hand, has pulled together 6 wins, and are 'bowl eligible' . WTG!

The Stanford vs Cal game was on Versus , and I watched while keeping an eye on the
Oregon Arizona game stats on Yahoo! sports..
Even when Texas had a big lead, ABC did not change games.
What was weird was, the 'Cats held the lead over Oregon all through the Cal Stanford game I was watching.
No sooner was the game over, and Oregon started coming back. Laughably i thought to myself,
'what can i do to appease the PAC-10 gods, and have 'Zona win ? I turned to Fox Sports, and yes.
The Cats answered the Oregon score with one of their own. It happened so fast, the 'Play by Play'
didn't even register the 71 yard Criner TD reception.
And then,, the all too familiar happened:
Arizona could NOT run out the clock. Faced with a third and long, Foles threw an interception
with 3 minutes to play. And Oregon marched down the field and tied the score at 31-31 .
To overtime, and the first period went well for Arizona,after Oregon had scored.
Second overtime, I knew it was over when the first play was a rush for 1 yard(seems it was first play).
Possibly one of the greatest Arizona Wildcat football games was on the line, the game on
National television, and some vindication for the loss at Cal lst week when Cal won its game with Stanford.
Alas, the 'Cats were one play short on D .
The Cats have lost 2 games in a row, with ASU and USC left to play . The Cats are down to their
third, fourth, and fifth string runningbacks. And these next two defenses are going to be ready.
But I am thankful that the Wilcats had a 'great game' against Oregon. No UofO blow outs.
No major upsets. The Cats hung tough.
Good luck, and beat the SunDevils next week.