kimchicowboy

wow. UCLA's actually at the top of the Pac-10. i'm utterly stupified, but happy. go ben howland for turning the program around....but i'm kinda worried about the 2nd half of the season when things usually go downhill.

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tupacboy

Howland is awesome... great coach.... i'm not worried about our boys slacking... they all were at ucla working out all summer long... all the freshmen put on 15 lbs of muscle... howland believes in weights a lot... if not this year... we've got some mad talent developing right now...

ray

UCLA has one of the best recruiting classes for the west coast, if not the best. It's a shame I was personally on-hand to see UCLA blow their 18 point lead against Boston College earlier this season at the Wooden Classic

I have to be honest though, I am totally shocked that BC is one of the 4 remaining undefeated teams.

CornMonkey

2005...10 yrs since our last championship. this year could be it!

oguevarra

Saw the game last night and i'm impressed with the way UCLA played. Ben Howland has really come in and put toughness and discipline to this team. Which is way different from the Lavin years. UCLA is going to have a good year. For sure they make the tournament.

whitak24

ucla isn't even close to championship caliber. i think they will have a solid season in the pac10, especially with traditional powers like stanford and arizona being pretty weak. i mean, really, what good teams are there in the pac10 this year? oregon? arizona, to an extent, although like i said, they are extremely soft.

but all you have to do is look at a game like msu vs. ucla, where state just disassembled them and gave them a pounding. and msu, while a solid team, is still a good notch or two below the elite teams this year (wake, kansas, north carolina, illinois, etc.)

you also have to consider that ben howland is a pretty overrated coach. he got his reputation for being "good" at pitt because he always scheduled a bunch of non-conference cupcakes so that his team would start off the year with a really good record. then, they were playing in the big east, which isn't the greatest basketball conference in the country. so they would get a pretty good NCAA seed, beat some crappy low-seeded teams, and then wilt once they faced real competition. (kind of like the pitt football team, but that's another story.)

while i think he will get far more talented recruits, being at ucla and being able to work california, i don't think there's any evidence that he's really a great coach. he typically just slows the game down and hopes to pull it out at the end.

now he could prove me wrong at ucla, but at this point, i don't think he's anything special whatsoever.

BrewMaster

whitak24, aren't you forgetting number 14 Washington in that list of good pac-10 teams? and for the record Arizona is number 16 now while MSU is number 20. UCLA plays Arizona tomorrow.

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whitak24

i didn't realize washington was ranked so highly. out here on the east coast, we ignore the pac10 as much as possible

as for arizona, i know they are ranked decently high. my point wasn't to say that msu is better than arizona (or any of the top teams in the pac 10). instead, i was making two points:
1.) i think ucla will have a solid season because
a.) they had a good non-conference season
b.) they will do well in the pac 10 because there is not much competition there. arizona is not close to the elite team that they often are, and i think even at 16 they are overrated, as they are pretty soft in a lot of ways. i think they are on their way to an early exit in the NCAAs. so put a good non-conference season and a solid conference season together and i think at least 20, maybe 22 wins are well within reach for the bruins. that's a good season by any standard, especially compared to last season.
2.) however, they are not going to win a championship, as cornmonkey suggested. that's why i brought up their performance against msu. msu is a good team, but certainly not great (we'll see just how good when they travel to wisconsin on sunday). if they couldn't even stay close with state, which i think would do well to reach the elite 8, i don't think they stand a chance against the top 10 or 15 teams in the country.

BrewMaster

we agree that UCLA probably will not win a championship this year.

but since you said above that MSU is "solid" and in the same post called Arizona "extremely soft" I thought you were saying MSU is better than Arizona. no hard though.

whitak24

what it comes down to is that i'm comparing arizona to their preseason expectations, which i don't think they've lived up to.

tupacboy

ucla will make a championship run in 2 years...

BrewMaster

that's a pretty bold prediction condsidering colleges don't have farm teams. i will love it if you are right but we have no idea what the next 2 recruiting classes will look like.

DaFunkyUnit

a heartbreaker loss to Arizona on saturday.

freakin' Salim Stoudemire went ape**** nuts on us.

and Fey showed us that he really REALLY needs to improve his game. when you're 7 feet and you're standing next to the rim, and unable to "throw it down, big man" then you, in my mind, suck.

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BrewMaster

i think it is more in Fey's head than his body. he needs to be tougher. he is pretty soft a lot of the time and it often looks like he's afraid to throw his weight around.

kimchicowboy

yeah. 3 points. ARGG! bah. i wish i could watch the games.

ray

I actually agree with that prediction.

Jane83

USC!!
hahahah

DaFunkyUnit

you have your football team. now go away

BrewMaster

well said. hopefully we will completely own 'SC in basketball to make up for previous year's embarrassments.

BrewMaster

hrrmmm...

well, a complete flop against Cal today. that was some of the poorest basketball I've ever seen a UCLA team play. at one point in the second half we were 1/19 from 3-point land for the game. then there was t he horrible defense especially in transition. man, i was screaming at the TV but I don't think the boys could hear me all the way across town. i'll scream louder next time. that sucked.

shaggyucla

We didnt do so well against CAL... At least we get a week to practice to prepare for USC... Better let out our frustation on them and ..

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JaQnAbOx

GO BEARS!..CAL that is..hahaha...Ben Braun is a better coach =)

attgig

Go Terps! Duke Sucks!

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kimchicowboy

yeah. i'm forecasting a terrible 2nd half of the season.

DaFunkyUnit

au contraire

what an amazing comeback victory over 'SC at 'SC. had UCLA lost that game, the season wouldve been over.

there is still hope.

shaggyucla

Yea, not a bad game on sat. Except for the first two thirds of the game. Where they seemed to turn over the ball more than making baskets. At least they stayed close enough to come back at the end...

ray

The raw talent is definitely there with UCLA. They have a great young team and it's only a matter of time before they finally mesh and get their **** together.

kimchicowboy

sucka! hehehehe

tupacboy

had to dig this up... ucla is 8-1 vs ranked teams this year!!

kimchicowboy

whoop!

last week's game was depressing, though. i actually got to see UCLA play here on east coast tv and...so difficult to watch. glad they finishing stronger while still on the road.

and florida lost! hell to the yeah!