Pac-12

 

In Part I of this article, we looked at the lottery players selected in the last 10 years from the ACC, Big East, and Big Ten. Today, we’ll look at the rest of the lottery picks in that same time frame.

Nat'l Coach of the Year: Tony Bennett

 

In his first season as Washington State head coach, the Cougars improved from 11 wins to 26 and advanced to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 1994.

High-Major Coach of the Year: Todd Lickliter

We're only a week through the 2007 Big Dance.. but its never too early to start thinking about next year's Tournament. Here's an early projection of the 2008 NCAA Tournament field:

Big East (8) - Louisville - (DePaul, Marquette, Notre Dame, Pittsburgh, Providence, UCONN, West Virginia)**
Pac-10 (6) - UCLA - (Arizona, Stanford, USC, Washington, Washington State)
SEC (6) - Kentucky - (Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, LSU, Tennessee)
ACC - UNC (5) - (Clemson, Duke, Georgia Tech, NC State)
Big 12 (4) - Kansas - (Kansas State, Oklahoma State, Texas)

The PAC-10 Tournament starts on Wednesday with the winner getting the automatic bid into the NCAA Tournament. I’ll preview each team’s chances as well as potential matchups throughout.

#3 USC TROJANS
Record: Conference (11-7) Overall (21-10)
VS
#6 STANFORD CARDINAL
Record: Conference (10-8) Overall (18-11)

The following four candidates are the frontrunners for PAC-10 Player of the Year.

 

Arron Afflalo (6’5 Junior Guard, UCLA Bruins, 17.4 ppg, 2.3 rpg, 2.1 apg)

Thanks to those who emailed comments about Wednesday's historical Conference RPI Daily Dribble. Particularly to a guy by the name of Tom Stephenson, who sent over some expanded stats going back to 1994 that I hope to put in an upcoming Dribble.

But for now, back to the regularly scheduled show.. which apparently is about a) how surprising Washington State is, and b) how the Pac-10's greatness is overrated:

Coming off a surprising loss at Stanford, and having lost to Oregon earlier in the year, you knew UCLA was going to come out and own the Ducks last night. They did, getting up 22 to 9 start and never looking back.