Natalie Jones leads Arizona and is third in the Pac-10 with a 78.8 free throw percentage.
The top two Pac-10 teams are
one game apart with two games
remaining in conference season play
By Mindi Rice
Senior Sports Reporter
One of Stanford’s three Pacific-10 Conference losses this season came almost three weeks ago against the team now sitting one game behind the Cardinal in the Pac-10 standings.
With the final conference games of the season taking place this weekend, Arizona (20-7 overall, 12-4 Pac-10) and No. 10 Stanford (20-5, 13-3) are in a tight race for the No. 1 seed in the Pac-10 Tournament. The Wildcats travel to the Washington schools while the Cardinal closes its home season with Oregon and Oregon State.
“We are in control of our own destiny,” Arizona head coach Joan Bonvicini said following Saturday’s victory over Oregon. “We need to be a little tougher on the road. We are not going to look back, we are going to look forward.”
The second-place Wildcats closed their home season 14-0 at McKale Center on Saturday. Arizona is 3-4 on the road in conference play, which lends some worry to the Wildcats’ run at the top seed. They close the regular season against
Washington and Washington State this weekend.
“I am not sure why we play like we do on the road,” Arizona guard Dee-Dee Wheeler said. “I mean, we take the same players, but we don’t play our game.”
The race for the top of the Pac-10 doesn’t just include two teams, however. Arizona State (17-8, 11-5) is close behind in third, and Southern California (14-11, 11-6) is a half-game behind the Sun Devils.
The only conference teams who have a record — Pac-10 or overall — below .500 are the bottom three: Oregon, California and Washington State.
“The Pac-10 is a tough conference,” Oregon head coach Bev Smith said Saturday. “You can separate the top and the bottom. I think Stanford, Arizona, Arizona State and Southern California had good (non-conference) preseasons, and it carried through to the Pac-10 competition. The Pac-10 has tough teams that play well at home.”
With the Pac-10 Tournament taking all 10 teams, the bottom four play on the first day. The No. 7 and No. 10 seeds face each other first while the No. 8 and No. 9 seeds play the tournament’s second game.
The only team that appears to have its conference tournament position wrapped up is Washington State. The Cougars’ (5-20, 1-15) only conference win came at California.
The ninth-place Golden Bears (10-15, 3-13) have wins against Oregon, Washington State and USC. The Ducks (12-14, 4-12) sit at eighth in the conference, but close the regular season against California to decide which team will have the higher seed when the two likely meet in the tournament.
Freshman honors
Noelle Quinn, a UCLA guard, was named Pac-10 Player of the Week on Monday, the second consecutive week that the freshman has earned the honor.
The Bruins split road games at California and Stanford during the weekend. Quinn averaged 19 points, 11.5 rebounds and six assists in the games. She also had the Pac-10’s first triple-double of the season and the first of her career in UCLA’s win against California.
Top 25 reports
Despite the four-team race for the Pac-10’s top seed, Stanford remained the only conference team ranked in the top 25 in both polls released Monday.
In the ESPN/USA Today Coaches Poll, No. 10 Stanford kept its ranking from last week. Arizona State, Arizona and USC all received votes, though none came in the top 30.
The Cardinal also remained No. 10 in the Associated Press Top 25 Poll, while Arizona was the only other team to receive votes.
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