WCC Tourney - Las Vegas

Play-in game tonight, a few Pilot fans have rolled in to town.

Priority question: P-Nut, who gets the bucket o' beer, and where is it happening?

Oh jeez...  I totally forgot.  And, ummm, I'm not going to be in attendance this year... so I may need a proxy!  

PilotRiotBG, are you in Vegas?!  You won last year, narrowly edging out Blacksheep! (I can confirm that BS does in fact know how to power through a victory bucket). For salt-in-the-wound purposes, here is how last season's contest ended:

1 PilotRiotBG    74
2 Blacksheep    73
3 Friends of Coky (is this R54 or DTR?)    71
4 mattywizz    71
5 MaizeBluePurple  71
6 DoubleDipper    70
7 W W Winkie     67
8 Pilot2002       67
9 PilotNut       66
10 PilotFan4Life     65
11Terry Cahill         62
12 PilotDad1       61
13 Aleppiek      61
14 UP7587      56
15 Stoney     54
16 Woodless!    51
17 ShipstadPilot11    47

Have fun, Vegas-bound folks!  Don't hit it too hard too early tomorrow... you have a loooong day to pre-funk; remember the moral from the tortoise and the hare story!

Too bad.  We'll miss you at the late night session at the Alligator Bar.

If PilotRiotBG is here, the bucket's on me this year

Don't forget the pregame fun beginning at 7:30 Saturday prior to the UP/GU  game.

As you enter the Orleans Arena just stay to the left and go to the end of the concourse.

As most know, the hotel is full of Iowa farmers,  many of whom are wearing GU gear....and they will darn near fill the arena for the game, but if UP can stay in the game, I'm sure the Pilots will pick up fans from most of the other schools.

It's unfortunate,  but the few UP fans that are here are in section 103, which is directly behind the GU bench, and we are surrounded on all sides by red shirts and blue caps with the rendering of a dog.  I reckon those dogs will be doing a lot of yapping tomorrow night!

LMU beat USD 64-61 tonight behind the excellent playing of the Purple Pride Pep Band.   The band is a little lighter than it is in Portland because only the student members and the director are here.  Stange that LMU didn't have its band, but their dance teem was really twerking at times.  

The LMU /SMC  and UP/GU games will both be televised on ESPN2....first game tipping off at 7, and UP around 9:30.

Maybe the 9 pm start time is past bedtime for farmers.  

USD wasn't playing the Pilots, so they reverted to their normal game, and instead of looking like the G.S. Warriors, they looked like the Washington Generals.  Four turnovers trying to inbounds after a basket.  Lots of sloppy play.  LMU had a few fans there, and about 8 students.  I didn't notice any USD fans.

UP players and coaches were there watching until mid 2nd half.  Not sure what they learned from that game.

I hate to say it, because I love my Pilots, but there is no way I am staying up for a midnight tip on the East Coast.

I happen to have just moved to Kyrgyzstan and was randomly going through the Russian language stations when, of all things, the Pilot/Bulldog game popped up on Viasat Sport Russian Satellite television. A loss to the Bulldogs is just as uninspiring when the announcer is translating the action into Russian. Oh well. At least, from UGA Pilot's perspective, the good news was that it was an 11 am Sunday morning tip Central Asian time for me.

Kyrgyzstan!  Wonderful people....but the government not so much from my experiences there years ago.

If you can,  send a picture from among the locals with your Pilot gear.

So, after all the that... it is SMC vs. GU again in the championship game. GU beat BYU in a great game (too bad the officiating didn't match).

So who do we like tomorrow night?

Actually, I think the officiating has been pretty good the whole tournament. Tonight was the first time there were some obvious mistakes. The refs have been letting them play every game. BYU took advantage of that with their aggressiveness. They just couldn't finish some of their shots at the rim, and missed some critical 3P attempts.

I really like SMCs efficiency, and pick them to win.

Random observations from the tournament:

Neither LMU nor Pepperdine sent a pep band to Vegas.  LMU borrowed UP's musicians for their first game, had none for their second game.  Pepperdine had empty chairs both of their games.  Weak.

Traditional cheer squads featuring lifts, flips and waving, are boring.  That's GU and BYU.

On the other hand, GU and BYU have the best pep bands.  GU is the most energetic.  BYU has the most horns.

UP has the best dance squad. USF is also very strong, with military like precision in their moves and stances.

Pepperdine's dance team had lousy music, not great dancing. SMC's had some lousy choreography.

Some dance teams lack diversity.  USD is all blonds.  USF women all have dark hair, with one exception.

There were more BYU students at Saturday's game than Monday's game.  There were very few GU students at Saturday's game, but they showed up Monday night.  Still not a numerous as in previous years.  Very few students came from other schools.  Or none is some cases.

If there is a family with kids, 99% they are BYU fans.  

The average GU fan is collecting social security.

BYU fans stand a lot.  GU fans yell for people to sit down.

Wally is one of the least active mascots.  Cosmo (BYU cougar) and Spike (GU bulldog) run around or do flips.  The Gael and the Don dance.  The Wave is pretty lethargic, too.

UP had a nice pre-game social on the arena concourse.  Good food and drinks, t-shirts, raffle prizes, the dance team and Coach Pfaff visit.  GU has pre-game socials, which they charge admission for.

Sure glad I sold my ticket to tonight's final last night.....when I arrived at McCarren Airport 30 minutes ago the lines to the flights to Salt Lake City were hundreds of yards long....

I certainly agree with each and every one of up7587's random observations from the tournament,  but it seemed from his comments that he spent an inordinate amount of time evaluating the dance teams.  

Forgot one:
The anticipation of the buffet meal always exceeds the satisfaction after (over)eating.

Other than the cheer squads/dance teams, there wasn't a lot of arena entertainment. T-shirt tosses with only two shirts. Guys trying for layup/free throw/three point to save on car insurance. Guys shooting from half court to get Lyft coupons. But last night there was a spectacular halftime show by a young women who twirled objects with her feet. Very fun. @WillsWCCblog has a short clip, but I can't seem to copy it.

up7587 wrote:Forgot one:
The anticipation of the buffet meal always exceeds the satisfaction after (over)eating.

One more: The fun you have drinking and tailgating at NASCAR is only exceeded by the pounding headache the next morning

I'm happy to see that USF won the women's championship -- a team other than Gonzaga or BYU.

I'm not happy to see Gonzaga about to win on the men's side. Again.

(I can't find the dead horse emoji)

I hear there was some type of game today...

Gotta admit I was pulling for GU because they are (for now) THE Northwest college basketball team and the players are the most well-known because of their TV exposure, but most importantly, the GU win could mean the WCC will have two teams in the Tournament!

Not only will two teams bring more prestige and shared money to the conference, they will also give the conference more TV time which in turn should attract more quality players to the conference.

#pragmatic

UGAPilot wrote:I'm happy to see that USF won the women's championship -- a team other than Gonzaga or BYU.

Absolutely!!!

It was a very entertaining game to watch as BYU started the game with a 10-0 run and eventually led by 15 points in the first quarter before USF did what they usually do best.....play tight ball hawking defense.  I think there were only 17 seconds left in the game before USF took their first lead of the game, and they then forced BYU to turn it over twice in the closing seconds with game on the line to pull out the 70-68 victory.

BYU was easily the regular season champ and the #1 seed, but the #6 seed Dons' win ensures two WCC teams will head to the Tournament.

Status quo for future tournaments.
west-coast-conference-orleans-arena-announce-three-year-extension-05-12-2016

This is good news, in my opinion. When staying in vegas for that long, being off the strip is nice. Good to see that the Orleans Arena will be adding new video and scoreboards... the previous versions were hard to read.

The buckets of beer shall continue....