WAC NOTES
WAC TEAMS IMPRESSIVE IN EXHIBITION GAMES
WAC teams have gone a perfect 8-0 in this year’s exhibition season. During those eight exhibition contests, teams from the WAC won by an average scoring margin of 25.8 points.
WAC TOURNAMENT RETURNS TO LAS VEGAS
The 2013 WAC Men’s and Women’s Basketball Tournament will be held March 12-16 at the Orleans Arena in Las Vegas and will include all ten WAC teams. Ticket information and tournament format will be available soon at www.wacsports.com.
WAC WELCOMES FIVE NEW HOOPS TEAMS TO LEAGUE
The WAC welcomes Denver, Seattle U, UT Arlington, UTSA and Texas State to the league this season. The five new teams join Idaho, Louisiana Tech, New Mexico State, San Jose State and Utah State to create a 10-team WAC basketball league. The WAC had an eight-team league last season.
ESPN TO TELEVISE 11 WAC BASKETBALL GAMES
The WAC has announced its 2012-13 basketball television schedule, a slate that includes 11 WAC games to be televised on ESPN networks. In all, four games will be shown on ESPNU and five on ESPN Regional Television (ERT). ERT games will be made available to the markets of the participating teams. In addition, the WAC Tournament men’s and women’s championship games will be shown on ESPNU. Additionally, games determined by ESPN’s BracketBuster could increase the number of WAC games aired on ESPN Networks.
ESPN SEARS BRACKETBUSTERS
For the 11th year in a row, the WAC has partnered with ESPN and several other top college basketball conferences for ESPN Sears BracketBusters, a weekend men’s basketball event matching potential NCAA tournament hopefuls against each other. Six WAC teams will be a part of this year’s pool of teams. The event will be held February 21-23. The match-ups for Sears BracketBuster Saturday will be determined by ESPN in conjunction with the conferences about three weeks before the event.
WAC TEAM-BY-TEAM NOTES
Denver Pioneers (0-0, 0-0 WAC)
University of Denver fan support and overall attendance hit an all-time high with an average of 5,460 per game at Magness Arena last season, a two-year increase of 176 percent ... Denver posted a school-record 22 Division-I victories in 2011-12, including a 4-3 record against the Ratings Percentage Index (RPI) Top 100 and finishing 14-2 at home in Magness Arena ... DU led the Sun Belt in scoring defense, free-throw percentage, three-point percentage, assists, assist-turnover ratio and rebounding defense last year ... the Pioneers return four starters from the 2011-12 season - senior Chase Hallam (7.5 ppg.), junior Chris Udofia (14.5 ppg.) and sophomores Royce O’Neill (9.9 ppg.) and Brett Olsen (7.6 ppg.) ... junior Chris Udofia led DU in scoring 10 times and finished second in the SBC with a team-best 15.6 points in league-play ... he earned Sun Belt Conference Defensive Player of the Year.
Idaho Vandals (0-0, 0-0 WAC)
In Idaho’s first three seasons of WAC play, the Vandals posted a combined 7-41 record against the conference. In Don Verlin’s four years as head coach since 2008-09, Idaho has won 33 WAC games and finished at least third in the conference three times ... Idaho’s back-to-back postseason bids to the CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament in 2011 and 2012 mark just the fourth time in school history that the team has qualified for postseason play in back-to-back seasons ... this year, the Vandals will try to become the second Idaho group to make it to the postseason three years in a row (1981-83) ... senior center Kyle Barone is the WAC’s top returning rebounder ... he was fifth last season with 8.0 boards per game ... Kyle Barone enters his final season at Idaho on pace to become one of the best all-around big men in UI history ... he can become the first Vandal man to reach 1000pts/750reb/100ast/100bks.
Louisiana Tech Bulldogs (0-0, 0-0 WAC)
Raheem Appleby was tabbed as the WAC Freshman of the Year, and was also named to the second team all-WAC and all-Newcomer team ... Michael White enters his second year as the Bulldogs head coach after registering a 18-16 record in his first year ... the Bulldogs return three starters and six other letterwinners from a year ago, with only two seniors in J.L. Lewis and Brandon Gibson ... the Bulldogs advanced to their first-ever WAC Tournament final last year after a semifinal win over Nevada 78-73 ... the Bulldogs attempted 777 three-point field goals last season, a new program record. The previous record was 598 set in the 2009-10 season. They made 258 of those three-pointers which was also a school record ... the Bulldogs used 19 different starting lineups last season, the most in the nation ... eleven different Bulldogs made at least one start.
New Mexico State Aggies (0-0, 0-0 WAC)
New Mexico State won the 2012 WAC Tournament, its third title in school history and second title in three years, earning the 19th NCAA Tournament berth in school history ... New Mexico State was only one win away from tying the school record for wins in a season and most wins since the 1992-93 season (26) last year ... nationally, NMSU was ranked No. 3 in rebounding margin, No. 11 in scoring offense, No. 25 in field goal percentage and No. 27 in scoring margin ... individually, Daniel Mullings was one of only 13 players nationally with a triple-double last season and Wendell McKines ranked fifth in double-doubles, eighth in rebounds per game and No. 29 in points per game ... coach Menzies has recorded 102 career wins, which ranks fifth at NM State, and recorded the third 20-win season in his tenure ... Daniel Mullings recorded the third triple-double in school history.
San Jose State Spartans (0-0, 0-0 WAC)
Senior James Kinney set the San Jose State single season records with 86 three-pointers made on 216 attempts. Nationally, he finished the year ranked 25th in three-point goals per game at 2.77, and 38th in three-point percentage at 39.8 ... San Jose State returns five letterwinners and three starters from last year’s 9-22 team ... head coach George Nessman returns for his eighth season at the helm of the program with a 77-141 record at San Jose State ... senior James Kinney returns after leading the Spartans in scoring at 15.8 points per game in 2011-12. He scored in double-figures in 23 games including 31 points at Seattle and 30 points against UTSA ... Kinney is one of five players in San Jose State history to make seven three-pointers in a game. He made seven of his 12 attempts in a home win over UTSA last November.
Seattle U Redhawks (0-0, 0-0 WAC)
Seattle U will be competing in a Division I conference for the first time since the 1979-80 season, when Seattle U was a member of the West Coast Athletic Conference (WCAC) ... Seattle University enters its first season in the Western Athletic Conference after completing the reclassification process for NCAA Division I status ... Seattle U was a Division I program from 1950 through 1980, competing in 11 NCAA Tournaments during that time, advancing as far as the NCAA title game in 1958 ... Cameron Dollar, a member of the 1995 UCLA national championship team, enters his fourth season as head coach of the Redhawks after seven years as an assistant coach at the University of Washington ... Cameron Dollar’s father Donald Dollar, a highly-successful high school coach in Georgia, returns for his fourth season as one of the assistant coaches on the Redhawk staff.
UT Arlington Mavericks (0-0, 0-0 WAC)
The Mavericks opened up its new College Park Center last season which is home to men’s and women’s basketball as well as volleyball. The facility can sit 7,000 for basketball events ... UTA lost just one conference game last season, falling on the road to UTSA in its final regular season Southland Conference game ... UTA played in the NIT for the second time in school history in 2012 (also 1981) ... the appearance was the programs third in post-season play ... UTA reached the NCAA tournament in 2008 before falling to Memphis 87-63 in the first round ... the Mavs finished the regular season ranked No. 21 in the final collegeinsider.com Mid-Major Top 25 and No. 102 in the USA Today Sagarin rankings ... three returning starters return this season featuring Kevin Butler who scored 10.9 PPG last year.
UTSA Roadrunners (0-0, 0-0 WAC)
The Roadrunners have captured seven conference titles including four tournament crowns, and advanced to the NCAA Tournament four times (1988, 1999, 2004, 2011). In its last appearance in 2011, UTSA defeated Alabama State, 70-61, for the school’s first-ever NCAA postseason victory in any sport ... UTSA returns six letterwinners, including a pair of starters, from last year’s team that posted an 18-14 overall record and finished third in the Southland Conference West Division with a 10-6 mark ... the Roadrunners have won 76 games during the last four seasons, the program’s most successful such stretch in two decades ...last year, UTSA led the Southland Conference in free-throw percentage, 3-point field goal percentage and 3-pointers per game ... UTSA will be tested on the road this season with only one regular season home game prior to its first-ever WAC contest on Dec. 29.
Texas State Bobcats (0-0, 0-0 WAC)
Senior Matt Staff, an All-Southland Third Team selection will guide the Bobcats this season. Joining him is senior point guard Vonn Jones, who finished last season with the ninth-most steals in a single season at Texas State with 52 ... Doug Davalos enters his seventh season at the helm of the Texas State basketball program ... the Bobcats have ranked in the top 25 in the nation in scoring offense for the past five years ... the Bobcats have three returning starters, and eight returning letterman. Texas State has eight newcomers ... look for Joel Wright, Corey Stern, and Darius Richardson (all Division I transfers) to make an immediate impact for the Bobcats. Texas State is known for scoring a lot of points, and the 2012-13 season should bring the same outcome ... Davalos is the sixth-most winningest coach in Texas State history with 80 career wins ... Matt Staff is tied for fifth all-time in career blocked shots (56).
Utah State Aggies (0-0, 0-0 WAC)
Utah State accepted a bid to participate in the fourth-annual CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament (CIT) last season, extending its postseason run to 13 straight years ... Utah State returns three starters among five lettermen from last year’s team that finished the season with a 21-16 record, advancing to the championship game of the CollegeInsider.com Tournament (CIT) ... headlining the returners is junior guard Preston Medlin, who averaged 17.0 points per game to go with 4.4 rebounds per contest, and was named first-team all-WAC in 2012, marking the 13th-straight year that Utah State has had at least one player earn first-team all-conference honors ... Utah State led the WAC in attendance in 2012 averaging 8,406 fans per game, including three sellouts during the season ... USU head coach Stew Morrill has now won at least 20 games 17 times in his career and at least 17 games 23 times.