Romar returning to Pepperdine
Lorenzo Romar is heading back to Southern California for a second stint as men’s basketball coach at Pepperdine.
Athletic director Steve Potts said Monday that Romar will be back in Malibu as soon as Arizona’s season ends. Romar is in his first season as associate head coach at Arizona, and the Wildcats are in the NCAA Tournament.
Romar guided the Waves from 1996-99, going 42- 44 in his first head job. He left to become head coach at Saint Louis and then spent 15 years in the same position at Washington, where he was a three-time Pac-12 coach of the year.
Romar, who also was an assistant at UCLA under Jim Harrick when the Bruins won the 1995 national championship, has a career head coaching record of 391-284.
VIRGINIA TOPS FINAL AP POLL >> Virginia went from unranked to the unanimous No. 1 in the final AP Top 25 of the season.
The Cavaliers (31- 2) earned all 65 first-place votes in Monday’s poll to remain on top for the fifth straight week. Virginia is also the No. 1 overall seed in the NCAA Tournament.
“Each year presents different opportunities and challenges,” coach Tony Bennett said. “You prepare well, you try to improve and then you play to win.”
Virginia was picked in the preseason to finish sixth in the ACC, but climbed to No. 1 one month ago for the first time since the Ralph Sampson era.
Villanova, which won the Big East Tournament, stayed at No. 2, while Xavier was third and Kansas fourth after winning the Big 12 Tournament.
Michigan State slid a spot to fifth, though the Spartans had last week off after the earlier-thanusual Big Ten Tournament. Rounding out the top 10 are Cincinnati, Michigan, Gonzaga, Duke and North Carolina.
Saint Mary’s (28- 5), which did not receive one of the 68 spots in the NCAA Tournament and is a top seed in the NIT, fell five spots to No. 25 in the
final poll.
PADGETT STILL IN HOLDING PATTERN>> David Padgett’s audition to become the permanent men’s basketball coach at Louisville continues as the Cardinals prepare for the NIT.
Louisville’s interim athletic director Vince Tyra reiterated his plan to wait until after the season before making a decision.
“We’ve been clear all along we’re going to wait until the season wraps up, and then we’ll talk about it,” Tyra said Monday. “You try to think about at any position you fill, what are the key factors you want
out of that. I don’t want to create anymore distraction than what he has.”
Padgett, 33, was elevated to interim coach last fall to replace Hall of Famer Rick Pitino in the wake of the school’s involvement in a federal corruption investigation of college basketball. The former Louisville player’s season-long approach has been maintaining continuity and success for Cardinal players and the program rather than worry about his future.
“If I focus on something that concerns me, that’s taking away from effort and energy I need to
put into this team,” said Padgett, whose one-year contract for $800,000 plus incentives runs through September. “I haven’t done it all year and I’m certainly not going to start now.”
Women
HUSKIES AGAIN A UNANIMOUS NO. 1 >> UConn finishes No. 1 in The Associated Press women’s poll for the fifth consecutive year.
The Huskies (32- 0) enter the NCAA Tournament as the lone unbeaten team and went wire-to-wire as the unanimous top team. They received all 32 votes from the national media
panel Monday.
It’s the 15th time in school history that UConn is No. 1 in the final poll of the season. The Huskies remained perfect, winning the American Athletic Conference championship Tuesday night.
Nine times they ended as the top-ranked team, the Huskies went on to win the national championship, including 2013-16.
Baylor, Louisville, Mississippi State, Notre Dame, Oregon, South Carolina, Texas, UCLA and Ohio State round out the top 10.
Stanford finished 15th in the final rankings.