Tuesday Coug Stuff

• The Xavier Thames era is officially over at WSU.  Well, I don’t know if you can call one season averaging 4.6 points per game off the bench as a backup guard an “era”, but it is something anyway.  X has decided to transfer to San Diego State, in a move that was anticipated for at least a month or so.  Now that it’s official, yeah, it’s disappointing, but what can you do?  You want them all to stay and work out and become stars, and Thames was highly thought of coming in, regarded as a “win” for Ken Bone in keeping Thames to his commitment despite Tony Bennett packing it in for Virginia.  He seemed like he could be a good fit moving forward, possibly playing alongside Reggie Moore at some point to form a strong duo in the backcourt.  But that’s all over now.  Good luck to young X, and we wish him all the best.
• In other moving-on type news, it’s also official on Josh Luapo.  Grades have done him in, as announced by Cougfan yesterday.  No surprise, as the word was pretty clear early on this spring that he had to move mountains in the classroom if he was going to make it this fall.  Luapo’s loss thins out the defensive tackles, and combined with Toby Turpin’s departure, it’s a little uneasy inside. 

  However, remember a couple of things here – 1) Brandon Rankin really blew it up inside this spring, and clearly made the most of the opportunity in front of him.  I know it’s May, but Rankin looks and sounds like the real thing, and could make a real impact inside this fall.  And 2) There IS SOME DEPTH INSIDE…seriously!  Bernard Wolfgramm still has some work to do, but the odds appear very good that he’ll make it after the summer.  And there’s still guys like Dan Spitz, Anthony Laurenzi, and Justin Clayton.  I know it’s not an ideal situation, but at least it’s not like the last few years, where there was virtually no other option available.

• A long read on the Cougs for this fall, at a blog called Presnapread.com.  That site is doing a full-blown preview on virtually every Division 1 FBS program from now until September, every flippin’ day!  Wow.  Now, as you can probably imagine, they don’t LOVE WSU for next year.  In fact, we weigh in at #110 in the country (ouch). 
  

  Although, hey, it’s actually better than last year’s #114 in their ratings!….So we’ve got that going for us.  Anyway, I think it’s good to get outside perspectives like this.  Let’s face it, if you are reading this you are a Coug fan, and you are pretty close to what’s going on.  Sometimes it’s better to get that view from 20,000 feet to see things at a distance, instead of what’s right in front of your mug.  Not that #110 is anything to be happy about, and the article doesn’t really take a look at the overall talent level that will be considerably better in ’10 compared to ’08/’09.  If one were to write a preview and base it all off what’s been happening in the last two years, it wouldn’t be hard to come up with WSU and #110.  But still, it’s always good to get an outside perspective.

• What in the world is up with the baseball team???  After taking two of three at Stanford, WSU is now ranked in the top 25 Baseball America ??  Third place tie in the conference after winning six of their last seven??  FANTASTIC.  Hooray baseball. I know we aren’t a baseball blog, and quite frankly it’s hard to write about a team that you never get to actually see, you know, in person or on TV?  But they cannot be ignored!  Our own Longball has seen some games out in Pullman this year, so hopefully we can get a baseball post from him soon.    Grippi returned to action yesterday and had this write-up on baseball, so, check it out.

That’s it for now.  Enjoy your Tuesday, and as always, GO COUGS!