A Grip on Sports: Everything old becomes new again and sometimes may end up being even better than it was

A GRIP ON SPORTS • We sat down this morning and realized we were suffering from an illness there usually is no coming back from. Writer’s block. Facing a blank slate that won’t fill itself. What to do? Follow Hemingway’s advice. No, not to have a stiff drink. To just start typing. And see what happens.

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• Maybe the stiff drink would have helped. All we could think to type was how odd 2024 seems in these parts. And how similar it is to 2008. When we were still middle-aged. Just finding out how much fun covering college basketball could be.

Mid-January. A trip to Tucson. A Thursday night. The Cougars, 14-1 and ranked sixth in the nation (actually down a couple spots from their highest point), face the Wildcats in the hellish landscape that is the McKale Center. A big deal.

Though not as big a deal as the matchup between the schools will be this week. Both ranked and 1-2 in the conference standings.

Back then, the Pac-10 – Colorado and Utah were still wandering in the wilderness – was one of, if not the, best basketball conference in the nation. UCLA, Stanford, WSU, Arizona State, were all ranked, the first three in the top 10 at times. Oregon, California, Arizona, Washington and USC were all tough outs as well. Only Oregon State, then and now, seemed bye-like.

It was a gantlet that left everyone bruised, battered and beset with losses.

Another came that Thursday night in Tucson. The McKale crazies heckled and hectored all game long, Chase Budinger and Jerryd Bayless combined for 45 points and UA shot twice as many free throws en route to 76-64 victory.

A home loss to Cal followed in a week and the Cougars, who would make the Sweet Sixteen as an at-large team, fell out of the top 10, never to return.

• The Cougs were, however, the best in Washington that season. They proved it on the court, handing Gonzaga its first-ever home loss as a ranked team. Nothing like that happened this year, of course, though an argument could be made Washington State holds that distinction again.

But it’s the Zags’ foibles that make this season seem like 2008. Then, and now, they were unranked during a chunk of the year. Then, and now, they lost a key early conference game to Saint Mary’s. Then, and now, they played a nonconference game midway through WCC play, and it came against a John Calipari-coached team.

Will the parallel path hold up? In 2008, the Bulldogs rallied. They won their rematch with the Gaels, albeit at home. They overcome all obstacles down the stretch and, despite losing to San Diego in the WCC tourney championship, made the NCAAs as an at-large school.

Don’t ask what happened there. Ask Steph Curry. He remembers. You never forget a 40-point night. Especially in the NCAA’s first round.

• Let us forget 2008. It’s time to look forward to 2026 or ’27 or ’28. What will college football look like?

Hey, don’t ask us. We’re not Hemingway and we’re certainly not Nostradamus. Crystal ball, time machine, peering through a black hole. None will be able to foresee how that will change.

Did anyone in 2008 (or 2020 for that matter) foresee USC, UCLA, Washington and Oregon would be in the Big Ten in 2024? Or that Arizona would be dealing with an almost $200-million-dollar budget shortfall as it enters the Big 12? Such things were unheard of a generation ago. That was then. Now we anticipate change. Hope for it, actually, because what college football – and the other tag-along sports – has become is untenable. Heck, the folks in charge can’t even figure out how to implement an expanded playoff system, even with a multi-billion-dollar ESPN offer in their pocket.

Don’t blame the Pac-2 for the issues, though their understandable intransigency is part of it. The Big Ten and SEC have a role too. Heck, every stakeholder seems ready to drive that stake right through the expanded playoffs’ heart.
A deal, which is on the table in key meetings today and tomorrow, should be hammered out, though. It has to be. Too much money is at stake.

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WSU: As we said, the Cougars are ranked. They’re 21st in the most recent Associated Press poll. Yep, ranked for the first time since 2008. Greg Woods covers the long road since we were writing similar stories. And more. … Elsewhere in the Pac-12 and the nation, when the conference morphs into, well, whatever this fall, there will be a new person in charge. Teresa Gould takes over. Will, actually, March 1. Jon Wilner has all the details in this S-R story. … Wilner also has his weekly rankings in the Mercury News. … There is another to pass along as well. … John Canzano passes along a mailbag. … There is a lot Colorado has to fine-tune for the stretch run. … Utah finally rose to the occasion on the road. … Tommy Lloyd agreed to a multi-million-dollar contract extension before this week’s showdown with red-hot WSU. He’ll also have a new athletics director to work with at fourth-ranked Arizona. … There is a women’s power ranking we can link for you as well as a roundup of the weekend’s great action. … Ninth-ranked Oregon State’s biggest big has a broken nose as the Beavers enter another key stretch. … Colorado dropped to 11th after a tough weekend.

Gonzaga: The Zags are still not ranked, despite their recent hot streak and a high NET ranking. Jim Meehan looks at that and the mock brackets, more of which are including GU. … Theo Lawson takes care of the WCC award news, with Ryan Nembhard winning the player of the week trophy. There is a trophy, isn’t there? A plaque, maybe? Certificate? … There is also another Zag Basketball Insiders Podcast to listen to, if you are interested. It’s right here. … The Zag women moved up a spot in the latest A.P. poll. And they are locked in the same NET position. … Elsewhere in the WCC, a former Santa Clara player has developed into a key part of the Golden State Warriors. … Saint Mary’s will be without a key player for an undetermined length of time.

EWU and Idaho: Around the Big Sky, Montana’s women are the best 3-point shooting group in the nation. … Idaho State has been in a slump. … In football news, Montana has a coaching vacancy to fill.

Chiefs: Spokane needs to keep winning. It couldn’t Monday night, losing 6-3 in Vancouver. Dave Nichols has the coverage.

Velocity: The weather is warming. The season is nearing. And Spokane is filling out its roster. Ethan Myers has more in this story.

Seahawks: The running back corps under new coach Mike Macdonald will look pretty much the same as what Pete Carroll trotted out there.

Mariners: George Kirby isn’t a loner. Except when it comes to working on his craft. Don’t change George. It’s been working.

Kraken: Another hockey team we’re interested in, another one who really needed to win Monday. And another one that failed, dropping a 4-3 decision in overtime at home to Detroit. … A Seattle legend was honored at the game.

Storm: New stars. New focus. Same old success? We’ll see.  

NASCAR: The track dried enough the premier event could be run, albeit on Monday. The holiday wasn’t one for Kyle Busch, who was disappointed once again as William Bryon picked up the win.

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• Our stiff drink of choice? A hot cup of black coffee. Maybe two. That gets us through writer’s block, linkage searches and computer issues. Anything, really. Caffeine. Other than what you do to our blood pressure, we love you. Until later …