Hereafter

[Wayne23]

1/11: Up 11 after 10. Up 19 at the break. It's all us so far. Up 16 with 10 left.

74-52. Terrific D! 17, 8, 3 with 4 steals for Hart. All 5 starters had 10 or more.

+10 RBs, 18 TOs. WE held them to 37.7%, 3-18 on threes.

Akpo had another less than stellar night, 10, 6, 4. His man had 16.

9-5, 1-2 Utah is here next. Their starting 5 graduated and it shows. They have a very good C and their guards can score. We think we're better but we'll need to play well.

[Wayne23]

1/14: Back and forth. Up 7 after 10. We're scoring inside pretty easily. Up 9 at the half. Up 7 with 10 left. They're staying close.

77-71. They went on a late run and took a 7 point lead. We battled back.

Akpo had 18 and 9. 13, 7 for Sims, 12, 6 for Maxx.

+9 RBs, 13 TOs. We shot only 34%, hit 10 fewer field goals and were 0-13 from behind the line. But we went 43-57 at the line to 14-20. Their coach took a late T out of frustration. Can't say I blame him.

We're 16-1, 4-0.

3-12, 0-4 USC is here next. This is not a good team. They have trouble scoring and they give up a lot of points. We should absolutely own the paint.

Little bit of a crop shortage in soy beans. Nothing serious at this point but the department head says it's a plant disease and he hasn't figured it out yet.

[Wayne23]

1/18: We open a big lead early. Up 14 after 10. Up 15 at halftime. Akpo got 28 in the 1st half. Up 17 with 10 to play.

93-64. A laugher. 33, 11 with 3 steals, 3 blocks for Akpo. 16, 12, 4 for Sims. 9, 2, 8 for Smid.

We hit 13 more field goals. +21 RBs, 11 TOs. +28 in the paint, +16 on 2nd chances.

Next one is a challenge, at #6 Arizona ST, 18-0, 5-0. They've beaten 3 ranked teams, two of which were #5 when they met. Their C may be the best in the country; he gets 23.7 and 9.4. We score 9 more a game but they have the #1 D in the nation, give up 13 fewer than we do. We should have an overall edge inside, if we can contain that C. They're only favored by ½ point.

The soy bean crop appears to be in some trouble. There's a new disease attacking it and soy bean production is completely shut down, which puts a strain on the food supply. We're managing but choices are limited.

[Wayne23]

1/21: We score the first 11 points. Up 11 after 10. Kent Maxx is HOT! Akpo too! Up 19 at the half. Up 17 with 10 left.

84-72. Maybe the biggest win of my coaching career. It was never closer than 9 after the first few minutes.

20, 10 for Akpo, 20 for Maxx, 11, 7 for both Sims and Hart.

+6 RBs, 12 TOs to their 21. We took 13 more shots, made only 2 of them but +10 from the line. I couldn't be happier.

11-6, 3-3 Washington ST is here. We score 10 more per game, give up 1 fewer. Big edge on the boards. They're an outside focused team.

18-1, 6-0, #12 (before the new poll), NET #8. Alone in 1st with AZ ST and Wash one back, Oregon 2 back.

No improvement with the food supply issue. Evidently we may need to destroy our entire soy bean crop and start over. We always keep a supply of seeds taken from healthy plants in reserve. Food choices remain limited, but there's enough to eat. It's not as bad as when the explosions happened. But if this goes on for a long time choices will need to be severely restricted eventually. Soy is a BIG part of our food supply.

The cause of the problem has not been discovered.

[Wayne23]

1/25: It's close early. Down 1 after 10. Late mini-run gave us a 4 point lead at the half. Up 10 with 10 to play.

87-80. They never got it closer than 6 in the last 10 minutes.

19, 9, 3, 3 steals for Akpo, 18, 1, 8 for Smid, who stretched a tendon. Day to day. He may see limited time against UCLA. 12, 11 for Hart, 13 for Blen.

Only 7 TOs to 16. +5 RBs. We won it inside.

9-9, 2-5 UCLA is here. A great program having a down year. They have a terrific SG but not much else.

Still no idea what is causing the soy bean problem. The entire crop is now being destroyed and the soil the beans are growing in will undergo even more testing, and probably massive sterilization, then re-fertilization.

We've launched a probe to the rogue planet. It will be some time before it sends us any useful data.

[Wayne23]

1/28: Early lead. They come back. Up 1 after 10. Up only 1 at the half. I kick some butt at halftime. Up 8 with 10 left. Big late run!

80-59. 12, 11 for Sims, 12, 9, 5 for Akpo, 14, 2, 4 for Maxx. We only played Smid for 18 minutes. I didn't want to push it and have him aggravate the injury. It worked, He'll be 100% for our next game.

+8 RBs, 11 TOs to 21. We took 9 more shots and made 9 more shots. We dominated inside.

20-1, 8-0, #10, NET #3. Up 1 on AZ ST, 3 or more on the rest.

At 12-7, 4-4 Oregon. We won by 10 at home. Their SG managed 29, and their PFF 19 and *. Except for their 6th man no one else did much, and they didn't play much D.

They turned it over 20 times. But they're hard to beat at home. Interestingly enough they usually play very good D, but they didn't against us. We'll need to make that happen again, and turn them over again, as well as control the boards.

Akpo is #4 on the Norton list!

Nothing new on the soy issue except that the sterilization process is slow. It needs to be handled meticulously in order not to ruin the soil, which would be really bad.

The probe is on its way.

I have to say again that I love my job. I see every part of the ship, work with every department, crunch all kinds of numbers. I wouldn't want to do anything else.

[Wayne23]

2/1: Close early. Up 9 after 10. Sub Jon Blen is hitting shots. Up 9 at the break. Up 13 with 10 to go. Strong finish!

88-67. Tim Smid hit a lot of shots, 21, 1, 3. 17, 6 for Sims, 12, 14 for Akpo, 12, 6 for Blen, 12, 4 for Hart.

+9 RBs and an amazing 4 TOs! We won easily but the line was a big difference, 32-41 to 11-16. And we controlled the inside play.

AZ ST stays 1 game back at the halfway point. Utah and Colorado are 3 back.

At 11-9, 3-6 Oregon ST. If we play our game we should win easily, even on the road. But if we just show up, we're in trouble. We're riding a 9 game win streak and we're looking a little complacent. I don't want to lose but a good scare would be good for us.

[Wayne23]

2/4: Tied after 10. They're playing well, especially inside. Down 2 at the half. We're getting that scare! Down 5 with 10 to go!

77-72. It was tied with 33 seconds left. Yep, we got a scare!

23, 1, 4 for SG Kent Maxx, including a three, a steal and a lay up, and 2 free throws, all in the last minute. 12, 12 for Akpo, 11 each for Sims and Hart.

Stats were close across the board. +6 from the line. Hopefully this will wake us up and make us less cocky.

22-1, 10-0. #6, NET #4. 1 game lead in conf.

16-7, 4-6 Stanford is here. They're a better team than their conf. record shows. They play good D and they rebound. We need to turn them over, but especially, we need to come to play!

A new crop of soybeans has been planted. Fingers crossed.

The probe tells us that the planet is travelling at an unsurprising speed, and at least so far there is nothing surprising or dangerous. But it will be some time before it gets close enough to tell us much about what may or may not be on the surface.

[Wayne23]

2/8: Up 7 after 10. Huge run, up 59-33 at the break. Up 16 with 10 to go.

100-82. I guess the close call did wake us up! 19, 8, 3 for Sims, 19, 2, 5 for Smid, 16, 2, 8 for Maxx, 16, 6, 4 for Milt.

11 TOs. We took 18 more shots, made 14 more. We hit 13 threes to their 2. Very unusually, they went to the line 40 times to our 22. Hart and Blen fouled out and Akpo had 4.

Still only 1 up on AZ ST, 3 on Utah. 7 to play and 5 of them are on the road, but we play AZ ST at our place.

At 11-12, 5-6 Washington. They have a solid back court, they score, they play D, and they dish really well. Their SF is a big scorer, too, and they have a deep, talented bench. But they score 18 fewer a game.

The soy beans are growing with no problems so far.

[Wayne23]

2/11: Down 5 after 10. Down 1 at the half. We're not playing well. Up 5 with 10 left. OT! They came back late. Double OT! We hit a three at the buzzer.

84-87. We didn't deserve to win, 23 TOs, .380 shooting, .297 on threes.

22, 6, 6 for Maxx. Nobody else did much. Only +4 on the boards and we got beat in the paint. Our guards kept us in it.

Akpo strained a calf and is out for about 2 weeks, will miss 3 games. Not good.

We're tied for 1st, 3 up on 3rd place.

Akpo is still #4 on the Norton list.

At 14-9, 7-5 Colorado. We won by only 8 at home. We turned it over too often and fouled too often. With Akpo out this will be a struggle. Jon Blen starts in his spot, at SF, with Sims moving to PF. We outscore them by 12 but they defend better than we do. We should have an edge on the boards.

They are 0-3 vs. ranked teams but all on the road.