If you’re searching for reasons why the Pac-10 basketball conference is bad this year, the Oklahoma City Thunder dressing room is as good a place to start looking as any.
That’s where you’ll find Russell Westbrook, the Thunder’s explosive second-year point guard, who is averaging 16.2 points, seven assists and five rebounds per game.
Sitting next to him is James Harden, the third pick in last June’s NBA draft.
Westbrook and Harden represent a big part of the Thunder’s future.
They should be part of the Pac-10’s present.
Had Westbrook stayed in school, he’d be a senior at UCLA and potentially starting alongside fellow NBA players Kevin Love at center and Jrue Holiday at guard.
In Westwood, they’d be talking about a legitimate run to the Final Four.
As it is, they’re suffering through a major rebuilding job.
The same could be said for Arizona State, where Harden would be a junior right now. Or USC, where O.J. Mayo, Daniel Hackett, Taj Gibson and DeMar DeRozan would form a Final Four-caliber nucleus had they remained in school.
Instead, both teams are trying to put the right pieces together for future success.
Everywhere you look in the Pac-10 – save for the Washington Huskies, the only ranked team in the conference – you find clubs undergoing major restoration projects after losing key players to the professional ranks.
The losses partially explain the embarrassing manner in which the Pac-10 stumbled through its nonconference schedule, and why it is ranked sixth in RealTimeRPI.com‘s latest conference rankings, ahead of the Big 10 but behind the Southeastern and Atlantic 10.
If that ranking holds up come March, the Pac-10 could send as few as two teams to the NCAA Tournament.
Can anyone say Big West Conference?
That’s what happens when you suffer nonconference losses to the likes of Montana (Oregon), Illinois-Chicago and Sacramento State (Oregon State), Portland (UCLA and Oregon) Long Beach State and Cal State Fullerton (UCLA) Oral Roberts (Stanford) and Loyola Marymount (USC).
Not that Washington coach Lorenzo Romar is buying any of it.
Romar scans the Pac-10 and sees a conference on the upswing, with teams getting healthy, players regaining eligibility, and clubs finally showing signs of life.
USC has won six straight games, including the Diamond Head Classic in Hawaii, thanks to the additions of Mike Gerrity and Leonard Washington to the lineup.
UCLA has won three of four, and Washington State is 10-2, albeit after playing a weak schedule.
Perhaps, but there is plenty of work to be done if the Pac-10 hopes to change its poor national perception.
The good news is, it has more than two months to do so.
There are legitimate reasons why the Pac-10 has played so poorly.
To be sure, every conference suffers personnel losses as seniors graduate and talented underclassmen leave for the NBA.
But it’s hard to imagine another conference losing as many top-quality players to the professional ranks in the past two years than the Pac-10, not to mention the turnover in coaching.
Last June, six Pac-10 players were drafted in the first round of the NBA draft, with three going in the top 10: Harden No. 3, Arizona’s Jordan Hill No. 8 and DeRozan at No. 9.
Going back a another year, Mayo (No. 3), Westbrook (No. 4), Love (No. 5), Stanford’s Brook and Robin Lopez (Nos. 10 and 15) and Arizona’s Jerryd Bayless (No. 11) all went high in the first round.
All of them could still be playing in the Pac-10.
UCLA coach Ben Howland knew Love was a possible one-and-done after his freshman year, but losing Westbrook after his sophomore season and Holiday after his freshman year were major surprises.
It’s much easier to plan for losses you see coming. Good luck doing it when you get blindsided by some kid’s decision to leave much earlier than you envisioned.
“The tough part is, you don’t know you’ll have to reload for sure until you actually lose guys,” Howland said.
O’Neill longs for the day the NBA passes legislation similar to baseball, in which high school players can go straight to professional ball, but if they opt for college they aren’t draft eligible again for three years.
That means a lot of rebuilding on the fly.
From last season alone, the Bruins had to replace four starters – including the shocking loss of Holiday. USC replaced its coach and four starters and Washington State and Arizona both lost their coach and two best players.
No wonder, then, that the league looked as sloppy as it did during the preseason.
Romar, though, cautions that looks can be deceiving. The teams we saw in early December aren’t the same we’ll see come January and February, he insists.
The rest of the Pac-10 can only hope Romar is right.
A Lomita man was arrested when he allegedly tossed fireworks under a Sheriff’s Department mounted posse working in Hermosa Beach on July 4, police said.