Men's hoops closes out regular season at home
The No. 22 UA men's basketball team came up with a new method in practice this week to stop ASU forward Ike Diogu.
"We're working a 3-3 (zone) lately," said Arizona head coach Lute Olson with just a hint of sarcasm in his voice. "We'll probably use that full time against them."
The Wildcats (18-8, 10-7 Pacific 10 Conference) won't be allowed to use six players at a time in order to stop the Sun Devils' super sophomore when Arizona State (10-16, 4-13) hits Tucson this weekend. With the opening tip set for 2 p.m. in McKale Center, Arizona will, however, try to duplicate the outcome of the teams' early-January meeting, a 93-74 UA thrashing to open Pac-10 play.
Olson said Diogu's timing is his most dangerous trait.
"He can get through, even with that big body, a crack in the defense, and then he has unbelievable timing on getting guys to go for fakes and using his strength to go through guys that are airborne," Olson said. "If someone flinches when he gives a fake, he's going to go up right then. His timing on that is probably as good as I've ever seen."
Olson said one reason that last-place Arizona State's season has been a disappointment was because of inflated expectations tied to Diogu's dominance as a freshman last year.
Diogu averaged 19 points and close to eight rebounds per game, leading ASU to the second round of the 2003 NCAA tournament.
"I don't think it was fair. A lot of that was done because of Ike's exposure as a first-team preseason All-American and some of the other things that people were expecting from him," Olson said. "It can't be that he's disappointed anyone.
"They are very strong inside with Ike, but it seems like they haven't had consistency on the perimeter."
This season, Diogu's numbers have jumped to nearly 23 points ÷ best in the Pac-10 ÷ and nine rebounds per contest.
Diogu's presence in the middle may concern Olson, but it's the competitive nature of his own marquee big man, junior center Channing Frye, that is one of the Wildcats' greatest assets, according to the coach.
"The big thing with Channing is that he wants to be able to say after he's played that he has played as hard and competed as hard as he can. Yet he does it in a first-class manner," Olson said. "You don't see Channing running down the floor chirping at somebody after he's dunked the ball or blocked a shot. He may show some facial expression after he does something, but it's never directed at the person. That's becoming a lost art."
Frye averaged 22.5 points, eight rebounds and 1.5 blocks during the Wildcats' split with Washington and Washington State last week.
Olson hopes there won't be any attempts at retaliation for the conduct shown by ASU fans in the teams' first meeting in January during Sunday's contest.
Despite trailing by more than 30 in the second half, fans in the student section at ASU's Wells Fargo Arena continued to rain profane remarks upon the UA bench and Olson, prompting ASU President Michael Crow to apologize publicly during a meeting last month.
Olson said he isn't concerned with the possibility of a repeat performance, this time by Wildcat fans.
"I would hope our fans would continue to do what they've done in the past, which is to come here and support the Cats," he said. "I want people to come here and support us. I don't want them to come and yell at ASU or anyone else."
Senior reserve guards Jason Ranne and Fil Torres will dress for the final home game of their careers Sunday afternoon, along with senior manager Nate Weigl and video manager John Castles.
Ranne, originally a recruited walk-on, was awarded a scholarship prior to his junior season, while Torres made the team in tryouts three seasons ago. Weigl will finish his fourth year with the program, while Castles concludes his seventh with the Wildcats, spanning both his undergraduate and graduate careers at the UA.
"It probably won't hit me until that last tournament game," Torres said, "which will hopefully be in the Final Four."