Is Pac-12 race over? Basketball history says so
TUCSON – The Washington Huskies are coming to Arizona this week with the Pac-12 regular-season trophy pretty much already in hand. Consider this history:
Washington is the ninth team to go 9-0 through the first half of league play since the Pac-10 began an 18-game schedule in 1978-79. All eight previous teams to go 9-0 went on to win at least a share of the conference title.
What’s more, the Huskies are only one of four teams to have earned a three-game lead with that 9-0 record, joining Stanford of 2003-04, Arizona of 199293 and Arizona of 1987-88. All of those three previous teams went 17-1 and won the title by five or more games.
(The 1988 Wildcats went on to reach the Final Four but the 1993 team was shocked by Steve Nash and Santa Clara in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.)
The teams who went 9-0 to start Pac-10/12 play: Oregon State 1980 and 1981, UCLA 1983, Arizona 1988, 1993 and 1998, Stanford 2004 and Arizona 2017.
The Wildcats of 2016-17, however, led Oregon (8-1) by only a game at the midway point, and went on to tie Oregon at 16-2 for the regular-season title, then beat the Ducks in the Pac-12 Tournament final but were upset in the Sweet 16 by Xavier.
The Huskies will be in Tucson on Thursday and then play at Arizona State on Saturday. Washington, however, will make the Arizona trip with a major question mark, after Noah Dickerson sprained his ankle against UCLA.
CBS’ updated bracket projections Monday had Washington a No. 7 in the West, Arizona State a No. 10 in the Midwest and UA one of the first four out. ESPN had UA one of the “next four out” teams, though that was updated last on Friday.
Washington is the highest-rated Pac-12 team in the NET(28), Sagarin (40) an Kenpom (34). UA is 65 in NET, 48 in Sagarin and 63 in Kenpom.
The Huskies didn’t make the AP Top 25 this week but finished with the 26th most overall votes, so a sweep in Arizona would almost certainly get them in.