The schedule:
Pac-10 Tournament
At Staples Center, Los Angeles
All games on Fox Sports Arizona, except championship game on CBS
All times MT
Wednesday March 10
No. 9 Washington State vs. No. 8 Oregon, 9 p.m.
Thursday March 11
No. 4 Arizona vs. No. 5 UCLA, 1 p.m.
No. 1 California vs. 8-9 winner, 3:30 p.m.
No. 3 Washington vs. No. 6 Oregon State, 7 p.m.
No. 2 ASU vs. No. 7 Stanford, 9:30 p.m.
Friday March 12
4-5 winner vs. 1-8/9 winner, 7 p.m.
3-6 winner vs. 2-7 winner, 9:30 p.m.
Saturday March 13
Championship game, 4 p.m.
UCLA basketball: Bruins open Pac-10 tournament against Arizona
By Chris Foster
The Los Angeles Times
March 6, 2010 | 7:20 pm
UCLA will face Arizona in the Pacific 10 Conference basketball tournament on Thursday at noon.
The Bruins enter the tournament as the fifth-seeded team and will face a Wildcats team they have lost to twice this season. Arizona beat UCLA, 77-63, in Westwood, and rallied in the second half Thursday for a 78-73 victory in Tucson.
This is the lowest the Bruins have been seeded in the tournament since they were eighth in 2002-03, Coach Ben Howland's first season in Westwood. If UCLA wins its first-round game it will play either California, Washington State or Oregon in the 6 p.m. game on Friday. Oregon and Washington State play in the first round game on Wednesday. The winner faces top-seeded California on Thursday.
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It's UCLA again
Bruce Pascoe | Posted: Saturday, March 6, 2010 8:08 pm
Arizona Daily Star
UA will face UCLA in the first round of the Pac-10 tournament, with the winner advancing to face top-seeded California or the winner of Wednesday's play-in game between Washington State and Oregon.
The schedule:
Pac-10 Tournament
At Staples Center, Los Angeles
All games on Fox Sports Arizona, except championship game on CBS
All times MT
Wednesday March 10
No. 9 Washington State vs. No. 8 Oregon, 9 p.m.
Thursday March 11
No. 4 Arizona vs. No. 5 UCLA, 1 p.m.
No. 1 California vs. 8-9 winner, 3:30 p.m.
No. 3 Washington vs. No. 6 Oregon State, 7 p.m.
No. 2 ASU vs. No. 7 Stanford, 9:30 p.m.
Friday March 12
4-5 winner vs. 1-8/9 winner, 7 p.m.
3-6 winner vs. 2-7 winner, 9:30 p.m.
Saturday March 13
Championship game, 4 p.m.
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The Wildcats still had a chance to face either OSU, UCLA or Stanford after their game. So when Sean Miller was asked if he'd prefer to face a committed zone team such as OSU or somebody else, he said that it mostly mattered how his team came out to play.
"I will say we have momentum on our side," Miller said. "We won three in a row, and all three games came down (to the wire). We've been resilient. We enter the Pac-10 Tournament as a confident team."
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Arizona finished in fourth place, exactly where they were picked in the conference's media poll, outright at 10-8. USC, Oregon State and UCLA ended up in a three-way tie for fifth at 8-10.
UCLA beat OSU twice head-to-head. But since USC is still entered into the tiebreaking equation, according to a Pac-10 spokesman, and the Trojans beat UCLA twice, a three-way tie needs to be settled. The three teams' collective records against each other is 2-2. The tie gets broken by their record against the team highest in the standings on down as far as necessary.
All three teams beat Cal once but UCLA and USC were 1-1 against ASU and OSU was 0-2. So UCLA wins the tiebreaker.
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Is the draw a good thing for Arizona? Miller said "you can play that game a lot," about which team to face again, but didn't want to.
I figure it's as good as any draw, because Arizona has beaten UCLA twice and the Staples Center really doesn't give the Bruins a huge homecourt edge because of its vastness. Also, it's a midday game and I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of Bruins fans sit it out and wait to see if they should bother showing up Friday night.
Then, if UA can get past them again, the Wildcats will either get California, Oregon or Washington State. UA beat California once in their best all-around game of the season and the Bears wouldn't have nearly as much motivation this time since they have won the league outright and would have won their first-round Pac-10 game, thus improving to 22-9 and presumably locking themselves into an NCAA tournament berth.
It also wouldn't be a huge surprise if Oregon, with its recent play and previous Pac-10 Tournament success, comes out of the weeds to beat Washington State and then Cal. By Friday, fatigue would definitely be an issue for the Ducks.
That leaves Saturday's final game. If Arizona can somehow get there, the Wildcats will probably be looking at ASU or Washington, the two teams that will be the hot picks of many to win what should be a wide-open tournament.
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