Tuesday: two game previews + more

Texas State and Seattle go at it in opening the WAC tournament. The Bobcats defeated the Redhawks 86-83 in the Emerald City on January 24 and then took a 67-65 victory in San Marcos on February 28 so such makes it seem the two teams are fairly well matched. Vegas has the guys from the Northwest as four point faves.

Will the old adage of beating a team three times in a season being very difficult come into play?

Or can Coach Cameron Dollar's guys hold forward Joel Wright in check or at least make him take a large number of shots in order to get his points?

On 1/24, Clarence Trent scored 22 points and Deshaun Sunderhaus 17 for Seattle with Chad Rasmussen the leading scorer on 2/28 with 18 points. In the latter, Trent totaled three points and Sunderhaus nine. Figure that out.

This is a pairing that obviously could go either way. Seattle hasn't finished all that well so the likelihood is the Redhawks will need a solid lead down the stretch in order to be successful. Texas State is coming off a 90 point output.

Bobcat athletics and Redhawk athletics game report as does Bob Condotta.

There are no reported player injuries or absences.

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Then, San Jose State University battles Texas San Antonio. On December 31, SJSU won 80-67 in the River Walk City and the March 7 pairing was rained out. Keeping Michael Hale III and Kannon Burrage from scoring explosions appears to be the key in downing the Roadrunners or at least getting their shooting percentages lower than usual as Hale and Burrage will generally produce 30-35 shot attempts between them. But can a third Texas San Antonio player get into double figures? In that 12/31 contest, Jeromie Hill went for 22 points and led his squad with 15 shots. Forward Chris Cunningham and at least one backcourter will need to be sharpshooters for SJSU to make it competitive. Cunningham put up 19/8 on 12/31 while Levanne Pennington enjoyed 16 points. The now suspended James Kinney led with 22. Call this one a tossup -- whoever has the better shooting will win it. Vegas has the Lone Star Staters as three and a hlaf point leaders.

Roadrunner athletics and Spartan athletics game report as does Jerry Briggs.

For SJSU, it's the aforementioned Kinney, Chris Jones, Alex Brown and presumably Xavier Jones on suspension and therefore not available.

Hill was injured and out of commission in mid-January for San Antone but has been back since February 7. 

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Troy Machir offers his WAC tourney preview and isn't feeling it for LT.

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Kyle Goon writes about the USU - Texas Arlington matchup (the Mavericks won both earlier meetings). People tend to forget that the Aggies still finished the season at 21-9 and 11-7 despite losing its top two talents mid-way through. That is still quite the achievement.

KyleG also reports on Ken Pomeroy's shout-out to to Utah State, one that includes a 'quit-your-moaning' riposte to other teams with players out.

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Jason Groves is going with New Mexico State as his choice to emerge as the WAC tourney winner.