WSU women somehow unranked..still

After finishing a weekend in Oregon by defeating Oregon State 63-56 and #21/18 Oregon 85-84 in OT, the Cougar women now have a 13-4 record and are still not ranked or even receiving votes in the latest AP top-25 poll...

Stanford (4), Utah (8), UCLA (9), Arizona (19), Oregon (23), and Colorado (24) are all ranked with USC receiving votes after the latest poll released on Monday.

The first two of their four losses came early against BYU in the Northshore Classic in November (which they turned around and won the tournament) and against UW early in December. Their last two losses came on a weekend homestand against current #8 Utah (71-66) and #24 Colorado (65-54) on December 30th and January 1st with no students in town and attendance barely over 1,500 for the two games combined.

What else was missing the weekend they lost those two games? Two-time All-Pac-12 member Charlisse Leger-Walker. With one of the conference’s best players playing, the Cougs are 13-2 (3-1) on the season.

It’s not just me complaining at this point. Of the current 12 replies to the conferences tweet announcing the AP rankings, 10 are about WSU. I know the conference doesn’t create the AP Poll but people are noticing something is missing.

Not only are they not receiving any respect in the polls, they have tallied just one Pac-12 Player of the Week award. Leger-Walker won it in the first week of the season. This is not due to them not playing well... Leger-Walker leads the conference in average points per game, 13th in three-point percentage, 3rd in free-throw percentage, 2nd in assists, 10th in steals, and 3rd in minutes played. Bella Murekatete is tied for 11th in average points per game, 9th in rebounds, 15th in field goal percentage, and 4th in blocked shots.

I know these are averages per game stats were talking about, but just one player of the week award? Come on.

Leger-Walker, Murekatete, and the rest of the Cougs will try once again to prove people wrong this weekend as they host USC on Friday at 7:00 pm and UCLA on Sunday at noon. Both games can be seen on Pac-12 Networks.

*****

Football:

WSU reportedly set to hire former Eastern standout Nick Edwards as receivers coach

Nick Edwards, an NFL assistant who played and coached at Eastern Washington, is expected to become the new wide receivers coach at Washington State, according to a report Sunday evening from Bruce Feldman of Fox.

Basketball:

Men Ready for Rocky Mountain Road Trip

The Cougars visit Salt Lake City to face Utah at the Jon M. Huntsman Center, Thursday, Jan. 19 at 7 p.m. MT (6 p.m. PT) on Pac-12 Mountain and Pac-12 Washington. WSU has won two of the last three against the Runnin’ Utes

A Grip on Sports: It’s hard to top the basketball weekend Washington State just had

The weekend isn’t quite over. Today is a holiday, which means, for many people, there is one more day tacked on. But even without the extra 24 hours, it was one of the more productive basketball weekends around Washington State University.