Pac-10 (12) Getting Its Due?

At the beginning of the season, many pundits said that the Pac-10 would have only 2 teams represented in the NCAA tournament. At the time it was most likely UW and Arizona. However, the Pac-10 sent four schools; Arizona, UCLA, UW, and USC.

Arizona is now playing in the Elite 8 after knocking off a number one seed in Duke! Not only just escaping them, but putting them away and beating Duke by a score of 93-77.

UW and UCLA both won their first round games as 7 seeds, and both gave a number 2 seed a run for their money. UW had the chance to win their game against the number 2 seed; North Carolina but lost in the final seconds due to a couple of poor decisions made by seniors.

USC was really the only embarrassing story as far as the NCAA tournament goes, as they did not show up to play Virginia Common-Wealth and looked ugly against the Rams. However, the more VCU continues to win, the more it makes USC look like they got beat by a highly underrated school and program.

That is just the NCAA tournament, the Pac-10 also has schools still playing tournament basketball in the NIT and the CBI. In fact, Oregon is taking on Creighton for the championship in the CBI. WSU is in the final four of the NIT with future Pac-12 member Colorado and the other two teams being Alabama and Wichita.

The Pac-10 had 7 schools in post-season tournaments and 8 if you count Colorado. 4 of those 8 are still alive and playing their way to win a championship.

The “ALL POWERFUL” Big East had a record 11 teams invited to the NCAA tournament and 2 are left. If Marquette loses tonight they only have UCONN left standing- their Big East Tournament champion. None of the other Big East schools were invited to any other post-season tournaments.

The Pac-10 is a basketball conference as well as a football conference and should be seen as a conference that CAN and WILL compete with any other basketball conference in the country. This season has proved that much, and hopefully the committee will recognize that and give the Pac-10 (12) its due.

REP the Pac-10!