Cougs glad to be home
Published 10:41 pm Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Macaroni and cheese seems to taste better from a box at home than it does from a ritzy restaurant on the road.
Bedroom pillows, even worn, feel better at home than fluffy, perky pillows at the team hotel when the Washington State Cougars are on the road.
No out-of-town luxury can replace the feeling of being home, preparing for a Pacific-10 Conference opponent in the heat of a championship race. The No. 9 Cougars (17-2 overall, 5-2 Pac-10) begin a four-game homestand today by playing host to suddenly slumping California.
The results show the comforts of home — WSU is the only Pac-10 school still undefeated at home — but the Cougars know this is no time for a letdown.
“It’s almost like the natural thing is to relax,” Cougars guard Kyle Weaver said. “But coming off the split in Arizona (loss at Arizona, win at Arizona State), it gives guys the reminder that this thing is far from over and far from being perfect.”
WSU is 19-2 at Friel Court under second-year coach Tony Bennett — the second-best home winning percentage (90.5 percent) for a Cougars coach behind John B. Evans, who was 4-0 from 1902 to 1904.
The schedule has expanded since those days, and the competition, especially in conference, better handles life on the road.
“Now we get four in a row,” Bennett said. “Our motto is to steal them on the road, but you might have to steal them at home with how good this league is.”
Score-at-will Cal (11-7, 2-5) isn’t your typical ninth-place squad. Once 6-0 and just outside the top 25 in early December, the Bears have had difficulty closing out games. In all but one of their conference defeats, they have either trailed by a basket, were tied or led with three minutes remaining in regulation.
The past four home games have been losses.
“We don’t want to hit the panic button and say everything we’re doing is wrong,” Cal coach Ben Braun said. “We have to continue to find ways and make some plays down the stretch and be a little more solid, because we’re not far off.”
They have lost in a variety of ways — giving up uncontested 3-pointers against Oregon and Arizona State, missing a 3-pointer at the buzzer against ASU, committing untimely fouls in the final seconds against Arizona.
“You can’t have your head down. You can’t look back. It’s only going to get you distracted,” Braun said. “It doesn’t mean you’re a bad basketball team, or you’re poorly coached. It means you’re playing in the best league in the country. Your players have to put it in perspective and know that each week is a different opportunity.”
