Cougs still crying.

Well, WSU fans are still whining about their loss a week ago. To be fair, I would have been pissed too if we lost a game that way. I wouldn't have called the technical if I was a ref.

But, I'm not a ref. And, while Coug fans have been right in the sense that I've seen celebrations before without a T being called, the WSU bench and fans did go overboard for the celebration as well. Usually its just the bench guys jumping a few feet onto the court. WSU had players nearly out to midcourt, slapping towels at Casto like they were in the locker room. No, it probably should have been a warning, not a tech, but it was excessive.

And, if Oregon would have lost that game, I would have been pissed about the homer job the refs gave us in the first place. The game wouldn't have gotten to overtime without that little bit of home cooking. We had the game well in hand, but the refs were giving Klay Thompson ridiculous star treatment, as if he were Michael Jordan. Calling a lot of incidental contact, and non-contact, that they weren't calling on the other end. EJ Singler drives down the lane and hits a bucket that gets waved off on a charge call, and Klay Thompson then charges into EJ on the other end, but goes to the Free Throw line and fouls EJ out. Mike Dunigan gets held by Casto, allowing WSU to get an offensive board and putback, and Mike gets called for Casto bumping into his knee on the other end. WSU scored only 1 field goal over about the final 8 minutes of regulation. The rest was ref aided points from the stripe.

42 Free Throw attempts for WSU to 16 for Oregon, and the Cougs complain about the one call that didn't go their way.

As I said, I'd be mad about that call too, but one call doesn't decide a game. A bunch of calls going in the favor of one team is much more damaging.

But, I decided to write this, not to debate the validity of the call, but to highlight something obvious that the crying Cougs keep failing to mention. I'll use Seattle P-I Coug writer, Jim Moore, as my example from his latest blog.

That put the Cougs in front 80-78. With .3 remaining, Oregon could not realistically pull off a game-tying or game-winning shot. The only thing you can do with one-third of a second left is "re-direct" or tip the ball in. And with the Ducks inbounding 94 feet from their basket, a WSU victory was more than likely assured.

I keep hearing this argument from the Coogs. That the game was literally over, because we couldn't do anything from full court with that little time. How is it that this keeps getting brought up without mentioning that the following play actually already happened earlier in this very same game.




Are the odds that we pull that off again in the game fairly low? Sure. The Cougs would definitely put people back there to worry about that play happening again. But then again, they could also easily foul us in the act of trying if they are agressive in their defense of it.

Scoring with only 3 tenths of a second left puts the odds highly in your favor, but if you are going to say that it was "over", at least have the decency to mention that you were burned, from 94 feet, in that very same game.