Monday, March 4, Hour 1

This is I on the Ball with Steve Rivera and Jag and Salad Sound Fox Sports fourteen fifty powered by Nova Insurance Services and Sure Your Most Prized Possessions katz R two SA at iHeart Radio Station. Yet Hey, welcome back, Good afternoon everybody to Eye on the Ball. I'm Steve Rivera. You're Jigginsauce got a guy? What the hell is your name? I don't even know what is my name? Do you have to sing them today? No, let's not sing. We'll screw there. Is your birthday? How old are you

about? Forty twenty three? Twenty three? Oh? Man, you're too old for the NFL, because that's why they don't want to That's why they don't want to draft Michael Pennix because he's twenty four years old. Twenty three. Man, Oh the things I didn't do with twenty three twenty three? Were you married? You got it, Jimmy, I got to come came here. I was twenty three when I first arrived in duc. Yeah, skinny little kid, hoping to Michael Jordan. Well, and then you'll sell

them this is all funny, you share. I'll be here three years and then go to a bigger market right exactly then, but it's it's a great place to live, you raise kids, and and why why you cover one of the best programs in the country basketball wise specifically, and then football we'll see, but welcome everybody to a great show. We think on Monday, a lot of hoops today, right, a lot of hoops, a lot

of hoops. Michael De Corsi from The Sporting News put out a call in this morning that, uh, you know, Steve's on one side of it. I'm on the other talking about not having a lot of trust in Arizona or just you know, having some with Arizona as with purdueing some others based on their recent history. And so we thought would give him a call, and he's going to join us at uh at uh at the in the first segment, our first hour, and we'll just talk to him, you know

what he thinks. And he explained to it pretty well. But I think we've got some more questions about why he's why he suggested and I get it, I mean I understand, yeah, I mean, I understand why you have trust iss I'm just saying that what I you know, I'm starting to see and what I think I saw on Saturday certainly was if that team that played on Saturday can win a National champions Well you've heard this that you were at the game, maybe so, so you hear this all the time.

Okay, they play, they play out of their minds. I played very well. This is well, and I'm sure you heard this about ten times. If they play like this, no one's gonna beat them. And then okay, conversely, if they don't play like this, right, if they play one game not like that, I'm not wishing they're not winning the next. So it's as easy as that. No, not as easy as that. Well, yeah, it's the team that does that six times in a row. Sure, right, sure, and and and look, you know

again, let's not forget that. You know, Arizona went into the went into the NCAA Tournament ninety seven on two game losing streak. Right, they've just been swept. So Stanford in the Bay Area went in on two game losing streak and put together well even their first game, they don't be around game wasn't a great game, but after that they played really well. I swear to whomever I need to swear to that first game is when they won

the title. Yea. They were down by nine with about a few minutes think it was just like four minutes, and then mc miles in Jason Terry saved them. And then of course the the Kansas game and then the overtime games, the time game. So they just I mean, they obliterated North Carolina in the in the final four. Okay, so you use as an example, let's go to ninety eight. They're playing right along, kicking the crop out of everybody, and then boom and boom they laid an egg and

then what egg? And they were bounced by by a team that took advantage of Utah saw them and said, let's come on, guys, I mean yeah, and you can lead it from the other side, you know. You look at that that twenty eleven team, and Duke goes into the sweet sixteen, the number one seed. Everybody thought they were your natural champion. Kyrie Irving's their point guard. Arizona comes out of nowhere, you know, and and and beats them and beat a handley that day. So it's it's

again, it's matchups. It's you know, where's your head when you get into get into the situation, and and that's how that's how you figured out and some team we keep saying it, I keep saying it, some team is going to get hot and win it. Sure, sure, just like last year. I mean last year, nobody going in. I don't know who thought Yukon was the national champion. No, no, we'll see, we'll see. Uh. So we look forward to talking to Michael uh And

then in the second hour more poops. I found a dude who who talks to bracketology, does his own bracket has pretty good with it, pretty consistent. I know this because he was with Camp Bob Kemp on his show and I think, oh, maybe we can get him on. And he's he's fine. He's on the East coast. What's it called. He's got a bracketwag dot com. His name is Shall Shelby Mass. He's like anything like that. He's another guy that Melkyle. But he but he's the you know,

he's the official bracketologist for us A Today. So he's got some he's got some cred. So he's not you know, he's not just a guy who came up with a bracket website and and we and we called him. He actually, you know, his his bracket is what USA Today uses, so so will you know, he's got some knowledge and so we'll talk to him and cool and you can go to his website bracketwag dot com. Today he had Arizona on the two line too, but he's got him as the

top two seed. They're they're teetering right there. They are the four or five six right in that line because of North Carolina Tennis, North Carolina and Tennessee. You know, I watched North Carolina the other night, and you know the Tennessee Saturday, they look pretty, they look good, damn good. Yeah, you know I watched Auburn. Auburn looked really good and and so you know it's there's a there's a bunch of teams in there. Once you get once you get pass I think even you might even start to say

that, you know, Houston barely won the other night. You might even start to say they're showing a little bit of a well. Once you get past u Kond of Purdue, there are about six teams that fit in there. I don't know if if you have shows like this, you know, all the respective sites that you just said that they have trust issues too with their teams teams, because we don't know what they know about their team. I think we do about you know, with the trust issues we know w

Purdue because because we've seen them fade, we've seen them fade. They flamed out the last two years. Well with Zach just what some showing Purdue was thinking Arizona the same thing. Yeah, you don't say it's the same. It's the same resume. Arizona doesn't have Zach ed right, which is you know, how did fairly Dickinson handle him last year? How did he do that? It's we saw what he did against Arizona. He was unstoppable,

you know. And then the guards, well you got to make sure that somebody else doesn't beat you, and their guards beat Arizona, and then that's how we found out that they needed to be better on defense, right, right, And the officiating whenever you play for due is always going to be really important. If your BIG's getting foul trouble the earliest possible time they can, you're gonna be in it for a long while, right, And it depends on what they're gonna call. Like in the game on Saturday with with

with Arizona Umar, right, the guy's backing into him. Umar is just you know, shoving him and shoving him and shoving him. A couple of times, they called him a couple of times they didn't. I'm like, okay, how do you decide whether you're gonna call the fill on Umar there

or not? Right? Because I mean they were going at it. I mean, Umar was putting forearms in the guy's back, and you got to call it a couple of times, then a couple of times he didn't get a call, and I didn't understand what what makes you make the call? Yeah? Well that was a great game and a great week, a issue

in Oregon. And guess what here we are with two final regular season games, right, Arizona must win both to win the title pack twelve regular season title maybe well Washington, Washington States, that have to be Washington, well at home? Right, Yeah, I mean yeah, you never know, you never know, but still then you never know. I still think that guy's day's game for Arizona's gonna be a tougher one. Email got guys, they've be like guys, they don't they're not playing like the god guys.

The question is, right, have they quit? Are they mailing it in? They're not going to n Cuba Tournament there. I mean, I don't even think they want to play in the n I t It's they wanted to be over with. Yeah, but remember this is a team that had Arizona

pretty bad in the first well. And and the thing is, if you're if you're a player at u C l A and you have any pride in your body whatsoever, and Arizona's coming to town with a chance to win the PAC twelf Tournament PAC twelve Championship, You're gonna You're gonna give it all you have. The question is will that overtake whatever other feelings they have about their season? Are they gonna come out ready to player they come out and say

screw it, I just want I just want this to be over. But if Pauli is never attended, well attended, this is the game that they show up waiting for. Yeah, this is Arizona brings up the stars in La and a lot of U A fans out in La too for And then Saturday, who knows with the with the lebron and o'bronni and and and get to give and said so and look forward to all that. The women's team, the women's team, Oh we did we talked about No Friday, was

it Friday, Saturday? Thursday, the Thursday night they got beat, it was a game they should have won. And then then Saturday you could just know it was the clock struck twelve for those guys. That was you know, I mean Ucla went out to what a thirteen to nothing lead, and Arizona was just never never had a chance. Uh. They looked they looked

fatigued. Yeah, they looked I'm not gonna say uninspired. They just look like, this is a bad This is the last place I kind of want to be right now, because you know, it's been such a grind for them. It's kind of like, okay, let's let this happen. Their seed is locked in for the packed off tournament. Not that I think anybody

was thinking about that. They wanted to beat Ucla, but it was like, okay, let's just get past this and you know, take a break, get into the into the packed off tournament and and go from there. And I think that's what that's what they did. But they were just they never had a chance. So they played adomobile. They played Wednesday night, right the first night, and then if they win there, they have a chance at USC one more time. They played Wednesday night at seven against Washington.

Yeah. Yeah, so maybe win a couple of their maybe they get in into the tournament. But we'll see what happens with him. Anything else, a lot of state championships. Maybe we start talking to kids or high school or high school coaches. This week, Yeah, tomorrow. I think I think we're gonna get Mike Bibby. So that'll be fun. I'd be fun. He saw that middle last week. I want to see how he

thinks he would have fit in here. I think I think Bibby with this team, Uh, that's all they need, you know what, all they need? You just got, you just got. You gave goosebumps to a bunch of Arizona fans just now because kind of really he would be the guy that kind of that's what they need that is missing. Like, so we'll talk to him, I'm hoping tomorrow. I spoke to him over the weekend. So anything else Now. I watched a lot of college basketball this week.

It was it's like, you know, I had some stuff to do on Saturday, but it was around the house, so I just put games on all day long. Did you watch the Ziggs? I did not watch that. It looked good by that time. By that time, I was kind of I was kind of done. I watched late. It was like yeah, because I mean I started watching, you know, I watched, uh, watched that Creighton game, a bunch of that Creighton game. They're

good and uh. And that was on Saturday. But then I had the I had the I had the Arizona game, the men's game, and then came back and watched some more basketball for that. I watched a bunch of basketball yesterday. I was watching Nebraska and Nebraska. Who did Nebraska play? I watched Nebraska Rutgers Steve they need the Nebraska's Nebraska is a surprisingly good in a weird way. Yeah, uh so, so a lot of basketball. It's march mane. I watched Stanford Colorado last night. I saw that horrible.

They're horrible. I watched that game and it was one of those games too where I thought, watching two teams do really bad things, you know, you go, how is either team going to win this game? And then Tristan de Silva went off in the second half and then he had like five or six three pointers in the second half of Colorado, and then they blew them out. And then I thought I got today. I came and I thought, how the hell it's Stanford bed Arizona. I don't care where.

I don't care if it was in two the coaches backyard. Scanford's not a beating Arizona two times in a row. Just so, I think you hit the nail on the head with the word can. I wrote about it two weeks ago, a week ago with Washington State matchups. If they find a team that plays slow, methodical, has a big man and a nice guard, Arizona is that's sir, Kryptonite. It's been the cryptite forever.

Slow them down, and guess what happens in March. Teams start to slow down, they pay some stims because you got six attempts at that apple, well, you know, six bytes and if you miss the bite, your teeth get lodged in there, you get screwed. I think I think it's I think it's gonna be a fun tournament, you know again, and thinking about last year, you know when all these teams came out of nowhere,

Yeah, you know, to get into the final four. Yeah, I don't know that it's gonna be like that, because I think I think the teams that are sitting there at the top right now one are aware, right that they should be, that they have to be at their best every single game. You know that that a team like a you know, a San Diego State or an fau or or Miami Florida, they're lurking out there. Yeah, well, you've been to enough or tournaments. All sounds good.

Instance, it sounds good. It doesn't work that way because you go into the gym and there's this feeling like like we watched last year. I think Virginia lost. You saw Purdue La lose, and you're thinking, okay, Arizona saw that another ready, right, you see that that's not gonna happen

to us, and then it happens to them. You know who among Arizona fans is not thinking about the fact or is thinking about the fact that, you know, assume Arizona is the number one seed, even if they're a number two seed, that they're going to the Huntsman Center at Utah where they lost to Santa Claira Santa Clara, So Claire. That has not been a kind place to Arizona. You know, that's where they lost in the sweet

sixteen to Kansas, anythink right? Uh? Oh no, I mean not in the lead eight that Kansas game in the Jason Gardner So you would you were good? You went. I went to Anaheim in the ninety eight. Ataheim was that year. It was St. Clara though has been another common place. It was Wisconsin. They lost to Wisconsin in the first in the second round there. Yeah, oh that's what it was, right yep. So back in two thousand as the number one's next one, number one overall

seed. Yeah, so we'll see Salt Lake. Be carever what you wish for. So let's go and get to morrow. Let's take our break. Mike of course he'll be joining us from the Sporting News and uh yeah, if you got if you got five minutes before he comes on, read his column that you can you can search him on Twitter or something like that, and he wrote a column that pretty much involved Arizona. So, uh, stick around, we're gonna ask him about all of that. Be right back.

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I'm Steve Rivera. He's Jakin Zaws. Now on the phone. We have Mike de Corsi from the Sporty News, longtime writer from the Sporty News. How you doing, Michael, I am doing well, Steve, how are you. I'm doing fine as well, but I have reservations just like you. I read your calling today about the Arizona basketball team, and they give me the hebgb's two. I didn't use the word hebgb's, but I like it. Well, you did use trust I have. I've been talking about

trust with this team. I don't know whether to believe in him or not. I think that compositionally there's a lot there. Yea. They have great size with follow and obviously a dynamic score in Caleb Love. And I've liked Tylan Boswell's talent from the first time I saw him last year with the Wildcats and wondered at times last year if they might not have had more success in

March if he were given more of the ball. And I know that he's been a little inconsistent at times this year, but I still do trust his talent. I believe in it. But you know, everybody's got to grow as a player at their own pace. You know, Michael, we all know what happened last year with Princeton, and then you know they were a

number one seed lost in Sweet sixteen. But does any of this trust they'll go even beyond that, you know, the Loud Olson years, the Sean Miller years, you know that that Arizona is just a team that has a reputation of you know, not meeting expectations in the tournament. Well, for me, it doesn't work like that at all, because I that's not my you know, my job isn't to go by feel or reputation or anything like

that. I don't worry about that. I mean, like for Purdue, I mean, what they've done recently has an impact because several members of the team that are trying to fight through that are members of the team that lost to Fairley Dickinson last year or that lost to Saint Peter's the year before, So that matters. But what happened under Sean Miller, which honestly they I mean, they were one shot away from the final four three times, so

I don't think it was that bad. And of course lut won it and was probably one shot the way from the final four three or four other times, and did make the final four on multiple other occasions. So I don't think of Arizona as an underachieving program. No, I don't buy that. So you talk about boswell, what other things concern you, or do other things concern you? Well, you know, the only thing that really you know, from like I said, from a compositional standpoint, I don't look

at them and say they don't have this. I don't look at them as a team that is lacking in a specific area where you would need in order to win a championship. Or they've got the top twenty offense and defense. They've got guys who are significant talents. Do they have a first round pick. I'm not sure whether that's true or not. That may be where ultimately, you know, they may not be quite talented enough, even though they

have really very good college players. You know, they have terrific college players. Catle Loves averaging nearly twenty points a game. We know what Umar can do, Keishaw Johnson is contributing so much. So they may not have quite enough talent to win at all. I think that's something that still could be determined. But from a standpoint of roster and the way they play, they have the ingredients. They shoot the basketball really well. They're seventeenth in the

country in three point percentage, and that's obviously an important component. Now, you've always had to have somebody who can break down a defense. If you don't have that, you can't win at all. It's just not possible. Because you get into the NCAA tournament, especially the deeper rounds, and opponents

have you so well scouted. They spend days, they don't eat, but they don't sleep, and they just watch every out of tape and they have you so picked apart, and they do their best to communicate that to the players. And what ends up happening is that somewhere in the game and this was true with Mike and Miles back in ninety seven, you just got somebody that's going to go make a play they can't stop. And that's what you

have to have. And so I think Arizona has that. That's I like a lot of the things about this team, but they keep giving us reasons to wonder, and the Washington State home game to an extent, especially the way it closed, even more so going to Stanford and losing, going to Oregon State and losing. The best teams don't often do that. You're right, yeah, And you made the point that you know when you add up the losses and the net rankings of their losses, that you know the Arizona's

got worse losses than most. I mean, I watched Stanford against Colorado last night and they were so bad, and I'm like, how did theirsonant to ever lose to the to this team? You know? And I guess that's that's a part of it. Do we tend to lean towards we think more of the worst possible scenario as opposed to thinking of the best possible scenario? Because the team that I saw on Saturday against against Oregon looked like a team

that could win the national championship. Well, you know, I mean, I think that the reason you concern yourself with the worst scenario is that it only takes one of those, right, And that's that's like if it was a series, you'd look at the best because the best is ultimately gonna win out, like if it was a seven game series, like in the NBA, the best is ultimately gonna almost always going to win out. And and

so that's not true in the NCAA tournament. If you throw one of those games out there, it hits you in the face, as it did a year ago against Princeton. And I think that's that's the concern. I think the team two years ago that lost in the Sweet sixteen. I mean you saw much they struggled even in the TCU game in the second round, So they were more beatable than these past two teams have been. So to speak, this team in particular, there's a lot to like about it. I

don't want anybody to get me wrong about this. I mean, I think when you have a shot blocker, and you have a creative guard who can take the ball to the lane, and you have excellent three point shooting and you defend, which they do, then you have a lot of what you need to do well in the tournament. But you have to find that level of consistency well. And let's go there to the guy who guides them in

Tymy Lloyd. You know, third year has won a lot of games, but as you pointed out, and lost in the sweet sixteen, lost in the first round. Now he still has stuff to prove. Yeah, I think until you do it, it's always a question, and usually the best coaches do it, even if it starts slowly, even if there are times when you say that's not matching the seed in the early stages. Ultimately the better coaches do that, and I think that will happen for Tommy. It's

just a question of when that time arrives. Does it arrive this year? Probably, but not definitely. Until it happens, it's I don't question him as a coach. Goodness, this is the third consecutive year he's produced a championship level team. I don't question him as a coach at all. But there is the question of getting it done in that tournament is different than than performing on a week to week basis, as he has excelled three consecutive years.

Now that's a different deal. And like I said, I don't have any doubt that at some point he's going to cross over that river. But it's just a question of when that happens. Do you do you have any ideas on teams that Arizona needs to watch for. And I'm talking more in the early rounds, not necessarily the first round, because that's just a crapshoot. You know, somebody shows up and beats you. You're you're not going to get beat in the first round. But that's not going to happen to

this team. A second round. I'm not worried about that at all. Right, a second round team or a sweet sixteen team, the kind of matchup that they would really want to avoid. I think it might be somebody that that pressures the basketball because although I like Kyland's talent, I'm the one thing I don't know that yet I'm in love with is his ball handling ability. I think he's I think he's a really good I think he's got very

good vision, and he's certainly a fine shooter. But I'm not one hundred percent sold on him in terms of like if he were playing in the Big Ten and they had to play Penn State, which is a pressure oriented team. It's the first team that comes to my mind because I work at the Big Ten Network and I see it every week, and so that I'm not

saying that Penn State would beat them. I'm just saying a team that plays in that vein, and I don't know, I mean, how many other teams in the tournament will do that at I don't know how many teams that are in the tournament that do that will wind up in Arizona's neighborhood. So I think it's hard to say for sure, but I think that, you know what, I think that one of the teams they need to look out for would be Gonzaga, because Gonzaga is probably you know, there's a shot

that they would be in the West. I mean because either Kenzaga or Saint Mary's is probably going to get put in the West because of preference. And I think the team that earns that will be the one that prevails in the in the West Coast Tournament next week. And so they're good enough to bother

to bother Arizona. They've got size, they've got a terrific point guard in them, hard, they've got guys who can make shots now, and they have some confidence after really not having much for the first half of the year. And that's a team that right now I have as a seven. If

Arizona were to fall to it too, that would be a problem. It wouldn't be a problem if Arizona. If Arizona's a one, they won't see Gonzaga until the regional final because if if I'm wrong, I may be wrong that Gonzaga is a seven, but I don't think they'll be in an eight nine game. I don't think they put a team with Gonzaga's metrics and an ability in an eight to nine game, and dare them to be the number one seed. I just can't That's that's not the way you protect. The

number one seeds are there to be protected. That's why you make them number one seeds. And why why you would put a team that's in the high teams in the in the net and ken palm and that has Gonzaga's level of ability in an eight to nine game. I just can't buy that. Well, you sure stirred the juices with two song people. They've been waiting for a Gonzaga game. They cannot get what they wished for here exact. Let's go through the rest of the So we got about four minutes about the rest

of the league. Are we going to see what we saw last year with so many people, so many teams from out of the blue planes well and get into the final four. I don't think it'll be like that because I because I really believe in Yukon and Purdue to an extent at least to make the final four. I really believe in Yukon a lot. Houston is going to be hard for whoever plays them. And as I said, I think I trust Arizona less than the three I just mentioned, but way more than

most of the other teams. I think that we'll see some of those teams get there. I mean last year that basically all the one cleared out and went home, uh and left at the Yukon and San Diego State and the rest. I think we'll see some measure of teams that are in the protected seed category one, two, three, four. I'll be surprised that there's too much in the way of intrusion on that top group. Who would be who would we be surprised. Let's say, look, you know you're purdueing

in Yukon aside that pitched them aside. But after that, which team would would you be surprised to see flame out? Early? Wow? I would be surprised the Houston flame out. I wouldn't be surprised to see Houston losing to Sweet sixteen level because I worry about the way they're composed offensively. A lot of people look past how teams are built and just look to results. But this is a team that is first of all, they're really aggressive on

defense. That a good team, not every good team, but some good teams can turn that to their advantage. If they break the traps, they can make it happen for themselves and then the second thing is that Houston's offense comes primarily from their guards, and I can't remember a team that's won a national championship by featuring two small guards who are their primary offensive options. Jamal

Sheded and LJ. Cryer are fantastic, and I would take one of them on my team every day of the week, but I'm not sure that I want two of them. I don't know that that's the best combination to win a championship. So that's the team I could see losing when we get to playing. Let's just say Creighton's in their region, I could see Creighton taking them out. Well, well, yeah, there's a lot of those teams. Outside of like Jay said, there's the four you know, four or

five Maybes or kind of definite maybees. The rest of it's who knows, the Creightons, the Iowa States, the Kansas if they get lucky. There's

so many of those two. Absolutely, I mean, Kansas on its best day, when they can hide the fact that they're still basically a five man team, can I mean, they have played with everybody in the country, and when they've been a little limited either by one of the players being absent, has happened with Kevin mccullor recently, or somebody doing a great defensive job

on someone like Dickinson, which happened over the weekend against Baylor. Then all of a sudden, they don't I mean, they need all five guys to go, because first of all, they don't have anybody behind them. Second of all, they can't convince Dewan Harris he's allowed to shoot. I mean, they just can't get him to do it. I mean, he's a very capable shooter, but he won't do it. And as long as that's the case, it limits them even more than they already are. Well,

Mike, we appreciate your time. We'll probably see you somewhere along the road. If not of the road, we'll see you in Phoenix. I would love that. I will look forward to it very much. Steve, it's great to talk to you. Thank you. Mike de Corsi appreciate you. Thanks much, Mike, thanks very much from the Sporting News Mike de Corci. Be sure to read him. If you can't find him, just google Mike de Corsi for the Sporting News. I really liked when you saw this

column this morning. You pointed out to me I liked because you don't reuse the word trust that you've been using, and you use it in the first first sentence exactly. I wanted to ask him which team, not Houston, U can't, Purdue Tennessee or Arizona, what he picked to definitely get into the final Yeah, and that way bracket I've already got used to ending at the sweet sixteenth. I got that from you, O good confromation. Right,

all right, let's take our break or we'd come back. We'll take your calls five two zero, four, one, six, seventy four, forty give us a call. We're talking basketball all day today, so would love to hear from you. We'll be right back. If you're an Arizona men's basketball fan, you know it's been successful for nearly forty years. Now take a look back at the Ludolsen era. In my new book, Lessons

from Loot. It was a labor of love through the eyes of twenty five former players, coaches, and friends to give insight to the coach and the man who led them, competed against them, and inspired them. Twenty five chapters for his twenty five years as Arizona's beloved coach. Lessons from lut is an insight to how he built the program into a national powerhouse. What one

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on Fox Sports fourteen fifteen. Hey, welcome back to my on the Ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve Rivera, He's jacins oas got a guy birthday boy, Kevin and today for fifteen minutes. If you like to call us or give Kevin a happy birthday, just do it by to zero four one, six seventy four and you can if you if you come over to this too, you can join us on our pin the tail on the Donkey game that we're gonna happen. We are. I have no time

for that. You ever play that? Yeah? Do it right? You know what it is in elementary school? You know what it is? Yeah? Yeah. Did you do your homework with Donna Summer? I did. Actually. On the way over here, I was listening some some hot stuff, some some last dance. Money. You're hard for the money, then make it the bad. Oh you got bad, girls, you got a call, but you got it? Okay, good. Hi, you're on the air and on the ball. Hey you guys, this is Dave.

How how are you guys? Are doing, Gave fine, How are you doing today? I'm doing pretty good. Can we talk about Arizona's dominating women against Oregon? Yes, so I think that was a complete game in regards to all Arizona players. Oregon didn't have a chance to come back or make a run into the game. And I'm just very happy that we don't need that. We're not going to play them up in Eugene or our games or or in twos because we finally owned them in basketball, so they should stick

to football. So anyway, Wow, gay Well again, what you said a complete win? What did you like about it the most? I mean what what? What made it complete for you? Island Boswell has score nineteen points on the usual Kushat Johnston, Caleb loves Pela Lawson, Omar Bollo and and the and the Arizona's bench. So so far, so good. They need to uh continue. They needed to take care of business in LA and then next week the Pactful Tournament. They need to dominate that as well.

Let me ask you one last year, this pathetic Human Sequel Matter conference, So let me ask you one quick question, Gabe, I'm sure you fill out the brackets. No, it's bad. It's bad. Juju Okay, Okay, I was gonna say if you did or you I'm sure you did that. How many times you picked Arizona to win it all? But if you don't do it, never mind the question. I don't do it because

he's another thing. If any dumb ass politician picked Arizona to win them all, then they should go to hell because that's gonna get Arizona because Joe Biden did that last year and gets what they lost. You a bunch of dumbass nerds. Okay, I wish you would tell us how you fearly feel. But Gabe, thanks for calling us. Always spear down Arizona, go cap. I'm glad you keep the finger on the pulse of that cuss button. Have I have a couple of times I was eyeing it. Hey, that

was a good week too. Imagine if it would have been a bad week. I know, I know, yeah, yeah, they yeah, they crushed it this week. They still find the work matter Hutter Conference conference, the Mountain West? How do you? How are you asking about the Mountain West this year? I know we're talking. They're very good internally, but who knows how they're gonna be I mean they got they're saying six six Mountain West teams and you know in the tournament, but how good is their best

team? I only bring it up because some of me and my friends were watching these Mountain West games and we're watching these PAC twelve games and we're like, the Mountain West is better than the PAC twelve. Oh yeah, I believe, no question. The thing is how good are they? Yeah? And as and as we moved to the other conferences, all the Pack twelve teams move out, Like are these Mountain West teams just gonna scoop up all the I guess remains of all the gruits that are gonna be you know,

well, they're still going to be who they are. They're the Mountain West and the PAC twelve, the Washington States and the Oregon States are gonna probably end up in them. But in basketball and and there are aberrations. This is one of those years on one offs. This could be that one off. But they are improving, and who knows if the recruits don't want to go to East to go play, like you know, the Arizona's the world staying in the Mountain region that I was going to stay in the Mountain region,

but they've always kind of scrapped. New Mexico's kind of always scrapped, but it hasn't been good enough. Uh, you know those teams Nevada under Alfred on the collar. Hey you're on the air and I on the ball. Hey guys, hey, you know we haven't heard anything about New Mexico this year with Steve Rivera on the show. You have He's buried that story, hasn't he. I didn't even realize that who's their coach? It's a Patino Son. Yeah, Patino Son. You know I'm not in a lobo,

right, you know I'm not a Lobo. I'm gonna know that. I said, Yeah, you're in New Mexico state team. Those I don't know who they are. But Jay still thinks that they draw well, they have been drawn a big crowd and it's the toughest place to buy. When I think in New Mexico basketball, think of Norm Mellenberger and Grandpa Munster that's in nineteen seventy three. Wow, Well, they've been good, that's for

sure. Right now. The way I'm looking at Arizona in the Big Twelve, I'd say that Arizona would be in contention this year to win the Big twelve. But right now I put him fourth place, you know, Houston, Baylor, Iowa State, then Arizona. But in contention to win it all, you know, that's what it looks like. You didn't even mention Kansas, who could win it Kansas, Kansas running fifth or sixth something like that. This year. Oh that's crazy too because there's a lot of a

lot of really good teams. And then final word, I found out there will be no Big twelve network and they couldn't pull it off. And with the Sooners leaving the conference, there was nobody with the technological knowledge to pull it off. So there'll be no big pro network. Yeah, you're actually game you know, the the uh, non revenue sports and games like that that you see on the Pac twelve networks. They'll catch those on ESPN Plus.

Yeah, that's what they said. I don't know that you can get them all because there's one there's so many teams, so you're you're not going to get all of them, but you get some, you know, you get some of the stuff. Some of the you know, soft softball I'm sure will be a big, a big thing on ESPN Plus. Uh, some baseball as well. Oh, by the way, Sooners lost their first

softball game. I saw that one straight the softball game they came back to they came back to Tyan and then they lost it, which was crazy. But Richard, you know what this all this does is piss them off and they'll go on another seventy one. We hope, so we hope. So we got to do something to pay for our new forty six million dollars softball stadium. Just give that money back from the nil or the yeah, the nil, Well we have a small nil though we could draw from Steve,

we have you Oklahoma's thanks for colling like sends me know. He's a good boy from the from Oklahomas. Yes, I'm I'm kind of perusing the bracket, the men's basketball bracket and the standing. So the way it sits right now, Arizona would play either would play the winner of Washington Arizona State in the first round, which I'm gonna try like either one of them. Well, I'm not gonna like any of it because you want because I'm that Arizona

fan that thinks you can lose to anybody. That will be the late game, right would be that that would be the first game Thursday noon. Yeah, the number one seed plays Thursday at noon. Arizona is a two seed. Arizona is a two seed. They're talking the winner of cal Stanford and that would be at six. Okay, that would be So I'm pulling for the twelve o'clock games, so I can I could do something Thursday night in

Vegas. Yeah. Reminding everybody that daylight savings time starts before the tournament this year, so game times on the bracket are at the same time in Tucson, right because it happens this weekend. Yeah, it happens this weekend. No, it happens a Sunday before, right, right, Yeah, this coming weekends. This Sunday is the Sunday before the tournament. Festival books,

it's we're all week off. Everything's been yeah everything. Yeah. So so uh if you see if you see a bracket, those game times are also Tucson times. Yeah, so you've got the championship game earlier than before. It's that's sixth this year on Fox on Sunday on Saturday on Saturday. It gives you more trouble to go out and or chance to go out and get in trouble. What we used to do and we might still do it. Is we leave right after the game, right and then even come straight home,

get home about three or four in the morning. That's the extra hour. There's that. And then the Friday games are at five and seven thirty, which is an hour earlier than before, which is this is the long way of saying, that's why we we can't do our show there on Friday because of all these game times, right right, So next week we're gonna be probably be dark Tuesday Day on Monday will be our last show of the

week. Next week we'll come back and wrap it up and then depending on how Arizona goes that that's compaending on whether we have even have shows and because Steve will be on the road with you with the basketball nice SNI March is a busy time, Yeah, busy time. Again, we're not we're not radio hosts that that's all we do. We we have other stuff. So

we'll make a determination on that. But yeah, next week, a show on Monday, and then we're off the rest of the week because we're all we're all working at the at the Packwall Tournament, the final version of the pac TBE Tournament as what you know. I got a little I got a little misty eyed. On on Saturday, at the end of the game we did last I put I put a little something on social We I always do it the last game with my thirty fourth year at the table doing stats.

But it was the last PAC twelve home game ever, uh for Arizona. You know, I think back to all those teams that you know, we've done visiting teams that came through, and the next year it's you know, it's Kansas and Houston and Baylor and all these other teams. Kevin, consume your favor right down this day, Call and call Jay's doctor. Hard doctor. He does have one. His doctor said there was not one to be

found exactly. I did, man, I got a little, I got a little misty, and you know, we all kind of you know, shook hands and knuckled and stuff like. You know, it's been a long run for us, and then coming up the packed off tournament, last one, it will be like, you know, I don't imagine even if even if they moved the big tent of the Big twelve tournament to Vegas the time or two they've got a crew. So we're done our work. Is done

after this tournament. So I'm sure I'll getting misty eyed one more time at the at the trophy presentation for the packed off. If we're there on Saturday, I will be there. Oh that's right, you will be there. Okay, I'm there no matter what. You know. I thought, you know, I was going back through the through the through the tournaments. This is the twelfth there eleven tournament. I thought Arizonas won five, but I thought they'd won more five. Okay, yeah, it seems like they would

have won. They won five of the eleven, but I thought they'd win more. I thought they'd win like at least two more in Vegas, Vegas, justin Veague. Yeah, because well you know what, because they won a lot prior to that. But yeah, they won five. You know, I just remember there being six times that we hated being there sat because Arizona was gone. The crowds definitely didn't work the same. Right. Then there was the one There was one year that they lost in the They lost

in the first round. That was a horrible way that was. That was so I'll tell you that was nobody there. It was terrible. I'll tell you that we can It was the Luke Walton, Jason Gardner. Year when Jason Gardner forgot his uniform and and people were saying, okay, what wasn't

that brilliant? Wasn't that brilliant Arizona which was kind of horbling, and now it's the number one team in the country at the time, we're number one seat in the country, and he forgot his uniform and they said, what a brilliant move by lout because now he don't have to play two more games, get him rested for the week after. And of course that was not the case. But you know people who have these theories, but you know, I it's just it's been a great run. I'll tell you what I

don't know about you. Everybody that I that I talked to you that is any semblance of a basketball fan is going to the turn Oh yeah yeah, if not even to get a ticket, just to go and see. I mean even people who you know, you know, the people have been saying, Okay, i'll go next year, I'll go next year, I'll go next year. They didn't go. They didn't go. They didn't go. Oh I got your car, it's gonna be like last one out turn out. The life so so this is my complaint. I'll see if you feel

the same way. I loved it at the MGM. I loved it at the MGM. It was cozy, it was fun, everybody lived in the most game action. It was crazy. And not that the T mobile is isn't any better, but it's except that the amateur is not the same, right because because you're you never had to leave the building, and you saw everybody, and you saw everybody. You come out of that, you come out of the arena, which would spill into the lob, into the casino,

and every bar was jammed with Arizona fans. They have all kinds of fans, but mostly Arizona fans, and you ran in you saw everybody. The way it's kind of spread out. Now, you know, some people go parking different places. There's you know, you got that one bar and grill and I still don't remember the name of it, but next door is right there. You know that that fills up. But it's not that part of it is not the same. I will say the venue is the arena

is really cool? Yeah, yeah, no question. Well it's MGM and then the New York New York, and uh, people go across the street to the MGM grand Yeah, so they scattered. They to me New York, New York that one of the nights after the Arizona would win you going to New York York the dance club, And that to me reminded me of the Ten Commandments when Moses came down with the tablets. It was really pissed. That's how it wasn't with Arizona fans just whooping to the It was debauchery

and at those things. And again I mean at the MGM Grant. Look, I don't do this. I stopped doing this long time. But at three four o'clock in the morning and I'm like, I'm looking at my watch, I'm going, what the hell am I doing? Go to bed man? Yeah, okay, okay, man, are you gonna see something? I was gonna ask him about the sports bar. Yeah, well it's there, plenty of those packed, everything packed. I'm still I'm looking very much

forward to it. This is gonna be a lot of fun. It canna be again a little heart wrenching, you know, once we get there, knowing that this is the last time we're doing this, gotta go out on a bank a blast. It's been okay, alrighty man, let's take our break. We're gonna come back. We still have right, we still have Shelby Masks coming up. Uh. He's a bracket guy for USA today, among others. We'll talk some some bracket stuff. You can yell at him

if he's got since he's got Arizona on the two line right now. And then we'll take your calls and we'll ast have breakings here at the top of the hour with birthday Kevin. We'll be right back