Looking for Head of the Pac

If there’s a really good team in the Pacific 10 Conference, now might be a good time for it to show itself.

Heading into the fourth weekend of conference play, the top five teams each have two losses. UCLA and Washington each have lost twice at home. Arizona and California each have one home loss.

Tim Floyd, USC’s first-year coach and a veteran of the Big 12 Conference, said Tuesday, “I don’t recall seeing anything quite like this six games into a conference season. It gives guys sitting there in ninth place a lot of reassurance to keep your team going.”

And although that’s great for the ninth-place teams, it may not be so great in March when a bunch of guys from around the country hole up in a hotel and start picking teams for the NCAA tournament.

If all the top Pac-10 teams have five, six, seven conference losses, those pickers can think, “Wow, that Pac-10 is full of tough, talented teams and they’ve done a great job, so let’s take five of them.”

Or they can say, “Wow, this is the conference that had teams lose to UC Davis, UC Irvine and Eastern Michigan. This is the conference where Oregon and Oregon State were swept by Portland. Then Oregon and Oregon State swept Arizona over the same weekend. And we’re supposed to think Arizona is tough? Nope.”

Washington State Coach Dick Bennett fears the second scenario is more likely.

“The talking heads on the major networks, particularly ESPN, have influence,” Bennett said. “The fact our RPI was not as high at the beginning, I fear that will hurt us. I thought our teams would continue to improve and clearly that has happened.

“Oregon, Oregon State, USC, clearly, they’ve improved. That probably will not be credited. It concerns me greatly how many teams we’ll get in.”

Since the 1978-79 season, only once has the conference had so many teams with two losses this early. That was in 1987, and UCLA, after starting 0-2 in the Pac-10, won the title with a 14-4 record.

That might be the worst thing that could happen this season, Bennett said.

“If one or two of us get way ahead, that may hurt because the rest of us will appear to be mediocre,” he said, “and that might be worse than if we have four or five teams at the top.

“I used to never pay attention to all the talk, having coached 38 years in the Midwest. Now I’m more aware of what is said, how people speak about those conferences in the East and Midwest and only make fleeting references to the Pac-10. They’ll say stuff like, ‘If the Pac-10 is as strong as they say it is, they’d better start winning.’ That stuff is damaging. I don’t care what the computer says, those [NCAA] people get in those rooms and talk about that stuff.”

What should be talked about are all the injuries. Three of UCLA’s top six players are sidelined, probably for the season. Oregon State seemed to be hitting its stride with its upset of Arizona last weekend, but Coach Jay John said steady senior Lamar Hurd has a strained groin that might keep him out two or three weeks.

Bennett has used 11 starting lineups in 14 games. He has used three configurations since starting point guard Derrick Low broke a foot Jan. 3.

Cal has dressed only 10 players five times, and Coach Ben Braun learned Tuesday that senior forward Rod Benson, who had 10 points against Stanford last weekend, may have a torn knee ligament.

Washington was without 6-foot-8 forward Mike Jensen for nine games after he had shoulder surgery in September.

“It’s hard to get continuity,” Washington Coach Lorenzo Romar said. “You look at UCLA, all the injuries they’ve had, and it’s amazing the games they’re winning. But I don’t know if the rest of the country notices.

“And right now, I think it hurts the conference chances for NCAA play with everyone jumbled right there together. Someone needs to step up. Sometimes these logjams happen, but usually over an 18-game stretch teams end up separating themselves. That will probably happen, but this year I don’t think it will be a three- or four-game separation. Maybe only one or two games.”

Romar’s Huskies seem the most likely to stay high on the national radar. Preseason pick Arizona is the one team that can’t use injuries as an excuse. Yet, the Wildcats have lost three of their last four games and are trying to avoid their first three-game losing streak since 1991-92 when they play host to Stanford on Thursday. Arizona’s 10-6 start is its worst since 1986-87.

“You could see this and say, ‘What a grueling conference race they’ve got going in the Pac-10,’ ” Oregon Coach Ernie Kent said. “But they’re probably saying, ‘Wow, the Pac-10 is down.’ I’ve never seen it like this before. We all look alike, play alike, and it makes the games look alike.”

And, at the end of the season, it might make too many of them NIT-alike.

When to Believe

While Duke and Florida are on top of nearly every national poll because they are two of the three NCAA Division I unbeaten teams, the third hasn’t been so well-respected. Pittsburgh, with its 14-0 record, didn’t crack the top 10 until this week.

History must make skeptics. Last season, the Panthers were 10-0 before finishing 20-9 after a first-round NCAA loss to Pacific. Two seasons ago, they were 18-0 before finishing 31-5 and losing to Oklahoma State in the Sweet 16. Three seasons ago, a 9-0 start turned into a 28-5 season and an upset loss to Marquette in the NCAA tournament.

Former Pittsburgh coach and current UCLA Coach Ben Howland preferred to schedule preseason patsies instead of preseason tests and his successor, Jamie Dixon, has continued that philosophy.

But in the last couple of weeks the Panthers have wins over Wisconsin and at Louisville, suggesting this season could be different.

Pittsburgh has a 24-year-old senior point guard, Carl Hauser, who has the kind of presence and steadiness so crucial in the heat of conference and tournament play.

“We are tough, and we aren’t scared about anything,” Hauser said after the Panthers rallied from a seven-point deficit in the last 13 minutes at Louisville. “This team believes.”

It Could Happen

Kentucky is trying to avoid its first four-game losing streak since 1990, and the Wildcats have dropped out of the national polls. Coach Tubby Smith’s team can’t score -- they haven’t cracked 70 points in two weeks. If an NCAA tournament started now, it’s likely the Wildcats wouldn’t be in it -- which hasn’t happened since 1992.

And although Louisville is still nationally ranked, the Cardinals also haven’t beaten any team of national repute. They even lost to Kentucky.

After they lost to Pittsburgh at home last weekend, Coach Rick Pitino said, “We’ll be lucky to be in the NIT if we keep playing like this.”

Only three times in two decades have both of Kentucky’s premier programs missed out on NCAA tournament play. It could happen again.

Welcome Home

Remember Coppin State? The Eagles and Coach Fang Mitchell stopped by Pauley Pavilion as part of a 14-game season-starting trip that took them to Clemson, Xavier, Oklahoma, Michigan, Illinois and Michigan State. The Eagles were 0-12 on Jan. 4. Now they’re on a four-game winning streak and are 4-1 in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference.

“See,” Mitchell said, “it paid off.”

Who knows, maybe at the end of the season UCLA will be able to count Coppin State as an NCAA tournament team it has beaten.