2018-19 #WCChoops Schedule | Crumpacker 2018-19 Archives | Profiling the 90-Percenters
By John Crumpacker
#WCChoops Columnist
Who wants the silver medal?
In most every respect, it’s as good as gold, at least when applied to West Coast Conference men’s basketball.
In going to a 16-game schedule in 2018-19, the conference also instituted a double-bye format for the WCC Tournament March 7-12 in Las Vegas. The two top teams at the end of the regular season earn byes into the semifinals on the 11
th, meaning if the eventual champion emerges from this pair, it will have played, and won, only two games. Everyone else must play at least three.
This is designed to protect the NET rankings of the top two teams, thus giving No. 2 a better chance of securing an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament. As the WCC nears the halfway point of the conference schedule, it looks like a solid Vegas-bet that Gonzaga will skate through the rest of the regular season like the great Olympian speed skater Eric Heiden circling an icy track, well ahead of the rest of the field.
The Zags, ranked No. 4 nationally, are 19-2 overall and 6-0 in conference. Looking at their remaining schedule, the only possible speed bumps along the way include playing BYU twice, hosting San Francisco and finishing up at Saint Mary’s on March 2.
By then, Gonzaga could well have wrapped up the regular season title and top seed going into the WCC Tournament, making the outcome of its concluding game vs. the Gaels meaningless in terms of the standings. Time to give the starters some well-earned rest, perhaps?
As always, the drama is to be found below Gonzaga. San Francisco and BYU are tied for second at 5-2 after the Gaels lost in Provo on Thursday night. The Dons have the better overall mark, 17-4 to 13-9, and are carrying a higher NET ranking, 47, to BYU’s 108. USF could have moved into second place all by its lonesome, but it dropped a 67-63 decision to San Diego on Saturday night.
The Cougars seem likely to take a couple of more defeats since they play Gonzaga on Thursday at the Marriott Center and again on Feb. 23 in Spokane. The Dons, meanwhile, have a pair of challenging road games coming up in Saint Mary’s on Saturday and Gonzaga the following Thursday.
One thing is certain: whoever does finish in second will have multiple defeats in conference play as the quest for the top half of the standings intensifies. San Diego and Saint Mary’s are both 4-3 and Pepperdine (3-4) is playing well of late while Loyola Marymount (3-4) is no easy out, either.
So, if Gonzaga makes like Heiden and leaves the field far behind, the real interest lies in who gets to the finish line next. Who wants to win the silver medal?
What We Learned
- It seems every season there is a logjam of teams in the middle of the standings, and this year is no different. After Gonzaga, USF and BYU, there are five teams within a game of each other, from 4-3 to 3-5 – San Diego, Saint Mary’s, LMU, Pepperdine and Santa Clara. What that means is within this tight bunching, anyone can beat anyone else to throw the standings into a metaphorical blender and mix it up. It will be interesting to see how it all plays out as some of these teams strive for post-season tournaments other than the NCAA.
- Nearing the midpoint of the WCC schedule, it’s a tossup as to who is more valuable to their teams. We chronicled Gonzaga’s Brandon Clarke last week, so we’ll put him on the shelf and consider other worthies around the conference, mainly Yoeli Childs of BYU, Josh Perkins of Gonzaga, Frankie Ferrari of USF and Jordan Ford of Saint Mary’s. Take any of these players away and their teams would suffer greatly, although that team in Spokane not as much.
- In Pepperdine’s overtime win vs. Saint Mary’s at Firestone Fieldhouse on Saturday, it was nice to see brothers Kameron and Kessler Edwards in the starting lineup together contributing to an upset win. Kameron has been beset with injuries since he came to Malibu and indeed missed games earlier in the season. Healthy now, the elder Edwards put up 24 points for the Waves. Kessler, thinner and taller than his older brother, is contributing 9.9 points per game as a freshman.
Stat Line of the Week
Here at WCC Sports, we were all set to give the latest SLOTW to Portland’s
Marcus Shaver Jr. for his tremendous game in a 74-70 loss to Pacific in the Game of the Week. The sophomore guard nearly willed the Pilots to victory with 30 points on 9-of-14 shooting, 9 of 13 from the free throw line, 5 rebounds, 2 assists, 1 block and 2 steals.
All set … until Pepperdine defeated Saint Mary’s 84-77 in overtime behind the exploits of another sophomore guard,
Colbey Ross, who had a career-high 29 points on 6-of-12 shooting to go with 15 of 16 from the free throw line, 3 rebounds, 9 assists and 1 block. Ross scored 12 of Pep’s final 17 points in regulation. The SLOTW goes to Ross.
The home office in San Bruno agrees. Ross was named the WCC’s Player of the Week.
Quote of the Week | DIABATE FEATURE ON THEW.TV
“Go, Pilots!’’
Not exactly an inspiring quote, you say? Consider this: It was the last thing Portland’s well-traveled
Tahirou Diabate said after saying the same exhortation in Bambara (national dialect of Mali), French, Spanish and Japanese in a halftime feature of Saturday’s Portland-Pacific game.
TheW.tv’s Sammy O’Brien spent some time with Diabate in Portland as they strolled along a street featuring a variety of food trucks. He was impressive in ordering food multi-linguistically from truck to truck.
Diabate, a 6-foot-9 forward, is from the northwest African nation of Mali, where the official languages are Bambara and French. His basketball skills took him to Spain for a stint where he picked up that language and to Japan for high school competition, in which he scored 101 points in one game; take that, Wilt! Along the way he learned English as well.
“Japanese is different than all other languages,’’ said the young man who should know.
*Note: Watch the Diabate feature
HERE.
Tweet of the Week
That’s Pepperdine hoops reacting to a late 3-point shot by Ross that put the Waves up 82-77 in overtime vs. Saint Mary’s.
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You can count on most Pacific games being close. The Tigers average 71.2 points per game while allowing 71.4. … Oh, no! Josh McSwiggan’s free throw percentage has “dropped’’ to .896, putting the Portland Pilot behind the .905 of Pacific’s Lafayette Dorsey. … The WCC has four teams in the top 100 in this week’s NET rankings – Gonzaga 2, USF 47, Saint Mary’s 55 and San Diego 100.