The Week in Review: Week 4 of Pac-12 Women’s Basketball
Now that the conference has completed four weeks of games, West Coast fans are seeing themes emerging. Some schools are climbing the ladder and exceeding expectations, while others are falling by the wayside. It’s time to break those themes down so those across the nation can keep up with elite women’s basketball out West.
Stanford and Oregon dominate
The Cardinal and Ducks are showing why they were picked in the preseason to end on top of the conference. Both teams started conference play a week later than most of the league, but they lead in the loss column. Mostly because it’s hard to surpass zero losses.
They also hang around the top of the conference in one statistical category after another. Oregon leads the league in assists per game with 20.2. That’s good for fourth in the nation. Stanford isn’t far back, with their 17.0 apg coming in at fourth in the Pac-12. Both teams are in the nation’s top 15 when it comes to scoring margin.
As for individual rankings, you don’t have to go far down the list of any stat to find the name of a Duck or member of the Cardinal. There’s Oregon’s Ruthy Hebard leading the conference with a 69.9 shooting percentage. There’s Stanford’s Alanna Smith in the top five for scoring, field goal percentage and three-point percentage. Then, of course, there’s Oregon’s Sabrina Ionescu leading the league with 8.4 apg and racking up one triple-double after another.
Based on the upcoming schedule, it’s difficult to see where either team could lose before they finally match up on Feb. 10 in the season’s first ESPN2 broadcast for the Pac-12.
Over the next two weeks, Stanford will face Colorado, Utah and Cal (twice). Oregon will face Washington, Washington State, Colorado and Utah. Of those opponents, only Utah and Cal appear to present a real threat to either team. The Washington schools and Colorado share a total of three wins in conference play. Although rivalry games can be tricky, Cal has been sliding since they faced Connecticut.
The unfortunate part? The Oregon schools only face Stanford and California once this season — and it’s not until the second week of February.
The casualty of larger conferences and unbalanced schedules is guaranteed home-and-home match-ups between the conference’s top teams. With only two games getting ESPN2 treatment this season, losing out on these major match-ups is a big miss for the Pac-12.
The Utes are ranked!
The Conference of Champions has spent most of the season with five teams ranked and another one or two hanging around in the “others receiving votes” lists of the major polls. The depth of the conference is its strongest argument in the “best conference” debate.
The usual suspects — Stanford, Oregon and Oregon State — are still carrying the banner in the top 10 of the AP poll (and top 11 of the USA Today/WBCA Coaches poll). Arizona State has maintained its position in the mid-teens for most of the season, while Cal finally dropped out last week after being swept by the Arizona schools on the road.
After weeks of flashing on and off the “others receiving votes” lists, Utah has finally busted through to join them.
The Utes were last ranked in the AP poll over a decade ago, appearing in the final poll for the 2008 season. After starting the season 13–1, including 5–1 in conference, they finally got the nod at №21 this week. They also debuted at №24 in the USA Today/WBCA Coaches poll.
Utah is still untested, though. Their only ranked opponent this season was Arizona State, and they lost that game at home. According to Her Hoops Stats rankings, their toughest opponents have been ASU (No. 14) and Arizona (No. 38).
After a soft non-conference season, the Utes opened conference play with a very favorable schedule. In addition to the Arizona schools, they have faced Washington, Washington State and Colorado (twice). Those teams are 10–24 in conference play, and the two Arizona schools have seven of those wins. The Washington schools and Colorado account for three of the bottom four teams in the conference.
The good news is that the Utes will finally get to show what they can do against the conference’s best in the upcoming weeks. Over the next four games, they face Cal, Stanford, Oregon and Oregon State.
Due to the unbalanced schedule, these will be the only games they play against the conference’s three best teams this season. Utah and star Megan Huff can prove that they belong in the conversation with the conference’s top tier by grabbing an upset or two.
The Pac-12 Gauntlet
Speaking of Utah’s upcoming schedule, the Pac-12 did several of its teams no favors when putting together the year’s slate. The L.A. schools, the Mountain schools and the Arizona schools all have to face the brutal stretch of Cal, Stanford, Oregon and Oregon State back-to-back-to-back-to-back.
Those four teams are №5 (Oregon), №7 (Stanford), №10 (Oregon State) and №40 (Cal) in Her Hoops Stats rankings. While Cal fell out of the national polls after they lost to both Arizona schools, the other three are all firmly in the top 10 of the AP poll.
UCLA and USC were the first teams to have to face the task. The Bruins went 1–3 over those two weeks, their victory coming in overtime at Cal. The Women of Troy were swept.
The Arizona schools just wrapped up their first attempt at handling three straight top-10 teams. Arizona State went 2–2 with wins over Cal and Oregon State, and Arizona went 1–3 with a win over Cal.
ASU, Arizona, UCLA and USC will face the same series again late in the season. Colorado and Utah will breathe sighs of relief that they only have to face these four teams once each.
Players of the Week
The conference announces its Player of the Week and Freshman of the Week every Monday. On Jan. 21, both winners were repeat honorees.
Cal’s Kristine Anigwe took the Player of the Week honor for her epic performance against the Washington schools this weekend.
The team needed to get back on track. After opening the season 12–0, they hit a bumpy patch that started with hosting the Connecticut Huskies. The Golden Bears had been on a 2–5 slide dating back to that highly-touted game.
Anigwe put her team on her back and helped them do that. She went for 29.5 ppg on 66.7 percent shooting and added 20.5 rpg over the weekend. On the defensive end, she threw in 4 bpg and 2 spg.
Anigwe has a heavy load to carry, ranking third in the conference in usage rate (34.5 percent) behind only Arizona’s Aari McDonald (39.2 percent) and Washington’s Amber Melgoza (37.7 percent). She lived up to those demands, resulting in her third Player of the Week award this season.
Arizona’s Cate Reese took home the Pac-12 Freshman of the Week award for the second time this year. Despite losing by big margins at both Oregon State and Oregon, Reese emerged as something that the Wildcats have been desperately searching for since they entered conference play: another scorer to help McDonald.
The freshman forward averaged 17 ppg over the weekend during the toughest stretch on their schedule. She also averaged 5 rpg against both Oregon schools and threw in 3 steals against the Ducks.
Reese had shown that she could dominate against lesser competition, but had run into difficulties adjusting to conference play. Prior to this weekend, she had a total of 24 points in five Pac-12 games. Ten of those came in Arizona’s victory over Cal, which was the only conference game she’d broken double digits prior to the trip to the state of Oregon.
Her strongest contribution this season has been on the defensive glass, where she comes in at №66 in defensive rebounding rate. Her 7.8 rpg are good for ninth in the conference and second among Pac-12 freshmen. Numbers like that are the reason she’s the only Wildcat to ever win a Freshman of the Week honor.
