July 13 marks the return of college football video games. I'm not just talking about the yearly release that's basically just a roster update and minor tweaking. The EA franchise is back and back in a big way.

For the last few years, the general consensus among hardcore sports gamers was that the franchise languished into mediocrity. But folks up and down will tell you NCAA 11 feels like a whole new game in many respects -- with flawless ESPN presentation integration, improved gameplay, more animations, online management integrated into dynasties, and so much more.

One major letdown of this year's game? The cover athlete. Just when we thought we finally got rid of Tim Tebow, he's immortalized on the front cover of NCAA 11. My initial reaction was to try to Photoshop the Tebow Tears from last year's SEC title game into the cover. No dice.

However, courtesy of Operation Sports' commenter, miami2005734, NCAA 11's cover received an upgrade in the form of Arizona corner, Trevin Wade. (Click here for full hi-res version.)

NOTE: I used Phil Steele’s amazing guide to help me with my forecasts.

Continue reading this post »

Hello. The other day, I got a great idea of how the conference blogs could compete and trash talk in a way thats a bit more civilized then just name calling. I ran this idea by the guys at ATQ and some thought it could work. I'm now progressing through all the Pac-10 blogs passing along the idea.

I'm going to make an online dynasty when NCAA 11 comes out, and hopefully a representative from each Pac-10 (maybe even including Utah and Colorado) SB Nation blog will compete to see who is the better blog.  By the way, I have no clue if this has been done before, and no idea if anyone of the 10 people in Pullman even own an Xbox, but I figured I should give it a shot.

Of course, entry is entirely up to you guys, and you can pick your representative any way you like (tournament, just picking someone, etc.) But it would be cool if everyone in the Pac -10 could represent their teams. Comment below if you're interested in the idea.

It's pretty much a go ahead for the new ginormous conference. I'm trying to optimistic and hope for the best to come with this expansion, but if the U of A has trouble competing with the California schools in sports, mainly football, it's only gonna get tougher with Texas and company.

I know though that we can still compete in softball, swimming, basketball, etc... But the other sports are gonna alienate us from the big stage even more. Especially in football and baseball. The Cats have had their brief moments of glory and how glorious they were, but it's only gonna be harder and we might not see anything like that again. With the majority of the either 1st or 2nd best conference in college football merging into the region of the AZ schools, it won't be easy. But there might be one plus side, a slight chance of a win over the Sooners, only because brothers are competitive, but I could be wrong. As for baseball, we've always competed and had seasons ranging for mediocre to champions.But again with one of the best conferences in baseball as well, it's gonna be harder. However, the fact that we have a pretty good team to look forward to next year, should help for recruiting, depending on how they finish.

As for other sports, I think it will only make them better. With stronger competition and tougher games, Basketball & Softball can only flourish. Think of the talent pool that will attract & how sharper it will make other teams, in addition to the latter two.

The bottom line is, not just  for Arizona, but for all schools, with this enormous conference schools that were never that great at a sport won't be, and schools that are or used to be good, will.

On the same note, according to the local news, it's already the Pac-10, because apparently the CO Buffaloes are migrating to our conference.

Well, I can see that FanPosts are not very popular over here.  But you know what is popular?  Making new friends!  Everybody loves meeting new people.  Except for those with social anxiety disorder.  Like Ricky Williams. 

But if Ricky Williams were here now, he'd assuredly take off that football helmet and dive into all the fun.  We got some new friends coming to town and we have to show them what it's like to join the Pac10.  You can't let those Sun Devils have all the fun.

I've already gotten the party started.  All you have to do is join the fun!

Colorado

Texas A+M

Oklahoma

Texas

There's no Oklahoma State site and Texas Tech won't let me start posting until Friday, so they miss out on all the fun.  THEIR LOSS!

VIVA LA PAC10!  VIVA LA PAC16!

Well, the Cats found out today that Ray McCallum will stay home and play for his father at the University of Detroit. This is a disappointment to say the least as he is probably the best pure point guard coming out of high school this year.

 In addition, Brandon Knight chose UK, signaling a potential domino effect where in Josh Selby ( top three point guard) falls to KU and the Cats are left whiffing on all the major point guard recruits this year. 

I like Momo as much as the next guy but I think the Cats could really benefit from adding another point guard to spell Momo or perhaps push him to up his game. In a perfect world the Cats add Selby and one from the Jack/ Lamb/ Hill/ Polee group. In reality I expect Jack and maybe Lamb.

Who is on your wish list?

Any insider intel?

There is a good article in todays paper about Cason and a neat video showing him training in Tuscon with the UofA track coaches.  Cason will be the starting CB for the Chargers this year and will really be able to shine.  On the other hand, if he doesnt perform, his career in the NFL will fade quickly.  Hopefully, Cason is also going to lend a little support to the UofA during his visit and work with some of our CBs.  He definately should....

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2010/apr/08/turning-the-corner-chargers/

In case you're interested, I wanted to pass this along to you guys. I've written the SB Nation Pac-10 Tournament preview for the SBNation.com mothership, and I'm hoping many of your will take a few moments to check it out -- for a couple of reasons.

First off, you might learn something. But since I'm aware that you might not, since a lot of you are pretty darn smart and knowledgeable, you should go over there anyway just to see the cool stuff we're doing as a network.

If you've never been over there, the preview is actually the lead story for what's called a "StoryStream." I'll be continuously updating the stream with posts as the tournament advances, meaning that link above will be your one-stop shop for everything related to the conference tournament, including tidbits, game recaps, video, etc.

Updates are shown chronologically, with the most recent ones at the top. (You can also toggle it to show the oldest posts first, because hey, we're like Burger King -- have it your way.) Additionally, you can help me out by clicking the "submit your post" button on the stream to pass tips my way if you find things that you think could be included on the stream.

The best feature, I think, is this: If you use an RSS reader, you can subscribe to the stream here. The feed will deliver each update I post directly to your reader over the next four days. Pretty cool.

And if you dig it, take a look around the SBNation.com site -- I think you'll especially appreciate the college basketball page.

Derrick Williams and Nic Wise were both named to the all Conference 1st team.   Derrick Williams also was named as the PAC10 Freshman of the Year.  After a challenging first year under Head Coach Sean Miller our topsy turvy Cats do manage to garner some accolades before the conference tournament even starts.

Well done gentlemen!

Continue reading this post »

Last year, we CougCenter.com authors put together our inaugural Pac-10 all-conference awards. As we were working on this year's edition, a thought hit us.

What if we did a fan vote across all the SB Nation Pac-10 sites?

Here's your chance to get your voice heard. After the text is a link to a form you can fill out to submit your votes. It's pretty lengthy, but you have to fill the whole thing out  for your vote to be counted.

Just a few points of clarification.

1. We're asking for your home blog because it might be interesting to see how certain fan bases vote.
2. We're asking for your SB Nation user name because it will hopefully help keep us from getting spammed. Don't worry, we won't share how you voted, unless ...
3. If you leave a comment and we use it on the results post, we'll attribute it to your user name. If you don't want that to happen, don't leave any comments.
4. Base your selections on performance in conference, not the whole year.
5. This is an all-conference team, therefore, you are asked to select players who would actually comprise a basketball team. None of this wishy-washy, best five or 10 players regardless of position crap the actual conference does.

That's about it. We'll post the results on our site next week.

VOTE HERE NOW.