NCAA Basketball Washington

Rankings: AP: nope; Coaches: nope; BlogPoll: nope

Predicted Pac-10 finish: Media: 8; FanHouse: 7

Last year: 19-13 overall, 8-10 Pac-10, no postseason.

Key returners/newcomers: Jon Brockman, Ryan Appleby, Quincy Pondexter, Justin Dentmon/Tim Morris, Matthew Bryan-Amaning, Darnell Gant, Justin Holiday

Key losses: Spencer Hawes

Why they might be good: Jon Brockman is tougher than nails. He's the heart and soul of the team and UW's success will correlate to Brockman's productivity. Tim Morris, a transfer from Stanford who sat out last year, could provide some experience to a young team. Also, Washington gets just about everyone back from a team that missed the postseason, but still did win 19 games and beat some highly-ranked teams (UCLA comes to mind).

Why they might suck: Inside play cold be non-existent. Brockman plays much bigger than he is, but he won't have the help he did last season with Hawes. Seven-footer Joe Wolfinger will get a crack at it -- as will Londoner Bryan-Amaning -- but Hawes will be missed. UW could get back to the Dance, but it'll need to pull some upsets and get some stellar guard play from the injured Appleby and the inconsistent Justin Dentmon.

Though it appears that UW coach Lorenzo Romar and sharp-shooter Ryan Appleby are dance partners, that's unfortunately not the case.

Rather, the senior guard will be out for about six weeks with a fractured thumb. The Seattle Times explains.

UW coach Lorenzo Romar announced at Pac-10 media day today that guard Ryan Appleby fractured his thumb in practice yesterday and will be out six weeks.

Romar said Appleby was injured in a rebounding drill when Appleby tried to reach up and knock a ball away and jammed his thumb. Romar said the thumb is on Appleby's shooting hand.

Uh oh. With the Huskies needing strong guard play with the absence of center Spencer Hawes who ditched school for the NBA, this is a big hit. It seems that Appleby will be back by the time conference play begins, but still, not a lot of silver linings with this one.

With Appleby, things aren't so good in the neighborhood. (Feel free to slug me for that one).

Today at 5 pm is the deadline for underclassmen to withdraw their name from the NBA draft. Some seem to be taking it right down to the wire. Either because they like the drama or they honestly don't know.

Just because Roy Hibbert surprised everyone by returning to Georgetown for his senior season, doesn't mean other underclassmen big men are turning down the lottery or mid-first round possibilities.

Spencer Hawes out of Washington still has yet to sign with an agent -- yet. He has worked out with teams all over the country and has interviewed various agents. Hawes has even been invited to New York by the NBA for the draft. None of the various mock drafts have him lower than 12th. This, despite legitimate questions about drafting a raw project with a lottery pick when teams like that need help sooner. Everyone knows he will stay in the draft, but the formal announcement has yet to occur.

Here's the complete list of things I've seen from Spencer Hawes to make me think of him as an NBA prospect: He's seven feet tall.

That's it. So after yesterday's NBA draft lottery, I'm a bit surprised to learn that just about everyone's mock draft has Hawes listed as a Top 10 pick. Yeah, I get that being seven feet tall is something you just can't coach, and pro scouts love prospects with the things you just can't coach, but still.

Yes, he led the Huskies in scoring with 14.9 a game, and he blocked a lot of shots. But did you hear anyone during the last basketball season talk about Hawes like he was an elite player? I didn't. Did you ever see him take over a game? I didn't.

In March our Washington guy Zach Landres-Schnur described Hawes as good but not great, and that's my opinion as well. And I think if I were going to invest a lottery pick on a player, I'd want a player who's more than just "good."

The University of Washington Alumni Association had a swell idea: Put a poll on its web site asking who has more pride, the Washington Huskies or the Washington State Cougars. I think a statistician would tell you that this sort of poll is unscientific, but the Washington folks must have figured they'd win the poll easily, since it was on their own web site.

Actually, not quite. Cougar fans mobilized and voted en masse.

"This is hilarious. They are getting beat on their own Web site," said Zach Wurtz, student-body president at Washington State University. "Cougar pride is unmatched and unparalleled anywhere around the world."

Polls like this are kinda stupid anyway, but if you're going to do it, you'd better make sure your alumni are going to vote.

Hat tip: Sports by Brooks.

My fellow Fanhouse blogger Zach Landres-Schnur is has a fine perspective on the Washington-Pitt game from the Washington side of things. His Huskies went down for a second consecutive and identical score, 65-61.

Washington played a fine game and had a solid game plan. On defense, they stuck mainly to man-to-man. They trusted their big players to stay inside and keep the ball away or deny easy shots for Pitt's big man, Aaron Gray. That left their guards on the perimeter. Rather than play off, or gamble for turnovers, they played tight defense refusing to give space to allow uncontested 3s.

Instead, daring the guards to try and get past them and go inside -- where the big men were waiting. After some early confusion, Pitt's PG, Levance Fields took them up on the offer and started driving -- drawing fouls along the way. In the first half he had 1 basket but had 9 points because he was 6-6 from the free throw line. Fields finished with 15 points (2-9 shooting but 8-8 FTs, along with 4 rebounds and 4 assists).

It was solid scouting by the Washington coaches as Pitt's guards have not been adept at creating their own space or penetrating. Pitt's 3-point shooting was not there and a team that shoots close to 40% finished only 4-15. By contrast, a Washington team that had guards struggling with the perimeter shooting found their stroke with 7-11 shooting.

Neither team played to type the entire game. Pitt, a team that struggles with its free throws, shot 19-25 at the line. The Panthers really struggled to finish around the basket at times. Forward Mike Cook was the only one getting shots to go as he was able to drive and finish his shots -- and Cook's game had been a struggle for the last couple weeks.

Pitt's defense has been based on forcing tough shots and not allowing a lot of second chance points. Washington dominated Pitt on the boards, 37-27; but the Huskies were also forced into 16 turnovers.

Washington, only saw the inside game open up when the perimeter game was working. Usually, it's the other way. While the Huskies never got away from going inside, the shots for Hawes and Brockman didn't really start falling until Pitt had to play further away from the basket with Appleby, Oliver and Dentmon hitting things from outside.