Koa says “yes”, Opening Day

The long list of top Arizona high school basketball players choosing to play college at the University of Arizona continued on Thursday. No surprise that Koa Peat from Perry high said “yes” to Tommy Lloyd. Bobby Hurley was on Peat early and made a full court effort to land the 6’8 five star, but forces outside of his control made for an impossible task. From all outside appearances Arizona State was in it on Peat until the end, yet even a year ago I heard from those in the world of agents that he would eventually go to Arizona. There’s a infrastructure in place with the UofA that Arizona State doesn’t have. Not Hurley’s fault, all of those before him faced the same dilemma.
When the President of Arizona State pubically states that his 50 year old arena is “completely functional” and a “fine facility”, well, that just goes to show how committed leadership has been over the years.
Desert Financial has been a terrific naming rights partner and supporter of basketball, but that can only take a coach so far. In this day and age of NIL, shoe deals, agency representatives, and the little things that are big things, Arizona has it in place. Graham Rossini is doing his best to change the decades of neglect on the ASU arena,but it won’t happen overnight(I expect big news on a new facility here in 2025, likely in the summer). Koa can lean into Steve Kerr, Richard Jefferson, Channing Frye, etc, etc, etc. To think that he hadn’t heard from the University of Arizona alumni from all angles would be naive. Bobby Hurley can’t be blamed for finishing second. He did the best he could with the hand he’s been dealt…

IF Arizona wins tonight over Duke it would have to go down as one of the best days in the history of Arizona basketball. Landing Peat in the morning, upsetting the Blue Devils in the Sweet 16. Not many days better than that for a Wildcat fan…

The Suns are back! The Suns are back! Boston is town without Jayson Tatum…Er, uh, not so fast. Losing by 30 at home to the Celtics. Game was over halfway through the third quarter. Embarrassing…

It’s Opening Day and we have a baseball team that should get us through the long hot summer without much of a problem. A good Diamondbacks team makes triple digit temps easy to navigate…