Washington at Arizona

The ghost of Wildcat teams past showed up at McKale this week, with Arizona delivering two similar performances, with a parade of threes, and Jordan Hill staying out of foul trouble and being very effective on both ends of the court. That was almost unfair to the Washington Huskies who got derailed by the three blind mice referees who got Hansbro-West two fouls in the first five minutes of the game.

The arrival of Jerryd Bayless was a gift from the heavens for Kevin "0-to-Red in 5 seconds" O'Neill. Because let's face it, if O'Neill was coaching a team of Moody Blues (Shakur, Chris Rodgers, Salim Stoudamire), there would have been a lot of fireworks and transfers and suspensions. But Bayless has a mentality and personality that is very compatible with Kevin O'Neill, and having the point guard of the team buy-in what the new coach is preaching is very crucial!

Despite the final score, and the foul situation, this was a very well played game, which is why we gave it the "game of the year nominee" - which should read "well played game".

One positive thing for the Huskies was the way Joe The Wolf played, and he played because Hansbro-West was in foul trouble. So where does Romar go from here? A split in Arizona was not a bad result. They certainly would have wanted to have a better showing at McKale, and if Brockman was not tagged with those two fouls, it would have been a closer game for sure! Can they make a "Nate Robinson"-like run like they did a few years ago? We blog you decide!

Why we need six fouls or more
We don't play with peach baskets. We have three pointers. We are moving the three point line. So why are we stuck with five fouls? The players are getting stronger, bigger, wider, and faster. The court has remained the same. The paint has remained the same. The players are bound to foul more. And on top of that, we have some incompetent or overly anxious zebras that dictate who plays because of the way they call the games.

This game was a classic example of the zebras derailing a team's game plan, by giving Brockman two quick fouls in the first five minutes of the game. The first foul was certainly iffy at best, I'm not sure about the second. To add insult to injury, they gave him a quick 3rd foul at the start of the second half.