Silver Linings Playbook – WSU Basketball Edition

Not sure if anyone noticed, but it happens to be Apple Cup on the Hardwood week for our Cougs with a game at UW on Sunday afternoon. While our season thus far has been forgettable, the Huskies have not been lighting the world on fire themselves and leaving Seattle with a win is still a distinct possibility. Would it heal all the wounds from a season that has been the sports fans’ equivalent of rooting for Walter Mondale in the ‘84 presidential election? Not really, BUT it would definitely feel better than losing (Like nabbing those electoral votes from Minnesota, right?). All you have to do is harken back to football season to appreciate the magical healing power of beating the Dawgs. Still, it makes one wonder, is there anything left to salvage from this season besides a smidge of pride in beating our rival? Hmmmm, If there is I will let you know after the jump…

This is probabaly going to be me during the Cougs Pac-12 Tourney game.

I think I can best sum up how I feel about this Cougar basketball season with this: Amieable and I are going to be in Vegas the week of the Pac-12 tournament and we aren’t sure we will even bother going to a game. Yeah. For real. That’s an astonishing admission, I admit, but I don’t think I am the only one feeling this way. So why am I still following this team? Pretty much one reason… Youth.

Downey Christian High has its own "youth movement". Julian Newman is 4'5", 11 years old and a Varsity starter.

When it comes to making excuses for this season one of the most commonly raised is a lack of talent. I’m not on that train. You don’t have to have watched WSU hoops for too many years to understand that there is talent on this team (and more waiting in the wings). Or, to be more clear, the current talent on this team is the type of talent you have to be able to win with if you are going to succeed in Pullman.

While I don’t buy the massive talent chasm argument one bit, I do think we are seeing a team that is inexperienced and missing some key parts of what could have made a big difference this season. Obviously losing both Reggie Moore and Demarquise Johnson left us without a scholarship point guard on the roster, shifting everyone’s responsibilities around and resulting in an offense that has been a discombobulated mess most of the season. The lack of a true point guard has been a bugaboo all year and recently both Coug Center and the Seattle Times have gone a bit more in depth about what that has meant for these Cougs on the court, bringing some well grounded substantiation to the hypothesis.

Recently we also were dealt the loss of our most effective player in conference games as Mike Ladd went down with a knee injury he may never return from. With no point guard and ⅔ of our senior leadership out of action, this team is just irreconcilably damaged.

As with most teams spiraling downward towards the end of a disappointing season, the fans and media are beginning to clamor for a “youth movement”. Of course, on a team with two seniors, one of whom is injured, a youth movement is pretty much all we’ve had all along. With a  sophomore trio of Lacy, Kernich-Drew and Woolridge, and frosh trio of Longrus, Boese and Leavitt all gobbling up significant minutes I can’t help but thinking, “hey in two years we should have one helluva experienced team on the court.” A guy can dream right?

Two years too long to wait? How about this: Next season, those six players, plus seniors-to-be DiIorio and Shelton will form a very experienced core of 8 players who will be joined by talented frosh guards Ike Iroegbu and Demarquise Johnson, as well as transfers Jordan Railey C and Brett Kingma (G). This is a nice mix of talent, plus experience to fill out the 2013-14 roster, with no significant losses going into 2014-15.

Unfortunately we go into the last few games of this season like we have at the end of just about every Cougar sports season; looking for hope for next year. While I think there is hope to be found, I’m not sure its enough to pull me away from the black jack table. Still for this week… Come on Cougs, beat those damn Dawgs!