A few final thoughs, quotes, etc.

Published 11:23 pm Thursday, February 21, 2008

Well, we never know anymore which Washington will show up, but tonight was definitely one of more good than bad for the Huskies.

It’s been tough to gauge this team all season. First, the Huskies lost their first three Pac-10 games, then they won three in a row, including a road win over then-ranked Arizona State. Seemingly in possession of some momentum, the Huskies instead played a stinker at Arizona, then lost three in a row at home before upsetting UCLA. Go figure.

But tonight, they looked a lot more like the team that upset UCLA than the one that looked flat against Oregon. It wasn’t always pretty, but there was energy and fight in the team.

As I mentioned in the last post, Venoy Overton came up huge tonight with 19 points, including 15 in the second half. He also spent most of his night harassing Arizona’s Jerryd Bayless, who scored 22 points made just six of 19 shots.

There was a telling moment in the first half when Overton fouled Bayless, who seemed to object to the foul and had a few words for his fellow freshman after he got up. Overton said he responded by saying, “It’s not going to be an easy night for you tonight.”

It was a pretty easy night for Bayless when the two teams played in Tucson, as he scored 26 points on 9 for 11 shooting, with a lot of that coming with Overton guarding him.

Overton said he tried to get in Bayless’ head early in this game.

“I know last game he got loose and just wanted to contain him and kind of just talk to him, slow him down a little bit, and throw him off,” he said.

Lorenzo Romar was obviously happy with Overton’s effort, saying: “I know that’s what he’s capable of doing. Tonight he was very focused. Athletes have a lot of pride. In Arizona Jerryd Bayless got away from us and Venoy was guarding him. I think Venoy was very inspired to play his best basketball. Venoy Overton was outstanding on both the offensive and defensive ends tonight.”

The Huskies struggled again as a team from the free-throw line, making 22 of 35, but their two point guards came up big from the stripe. Overton was 9 for 9, with all of those coming in the second half. Justin Dentmon was also perfect, making all six of his attempts, which all came in the final minute to help the Huskies protect the lead.

Here’s what Arizona coach Kevin O’Neill had to say:

“They had a great game plan. They looked at our team and did what I would do to our team. They’ve got 10 or 11 guys that they really just keep rotating in and out. There are no consequences for them. We’ve only got one penetrating guard (Bayless). It really puts us in a position out there where Jerryd is kind of stuck out there with the ball.”

O’Neill went on to point out Washington’s 23-3 advantage in bench points, a problem for his team, which used only seven players for five or more minutes.