Arizona Wildcats Basketball: Wildcats Not Overlooking the Buffaloes (Whew!)

The Arizona Wildcats basketball team is not overlooking the Colorado Buffaloes, so we can breathe a sigh of relief, right?

Coach Sean Miller and his stars Brandon Ashley and Rondae Hollis-Jefferson want you to know that they insist there is no danger the Wildcats (24-3) will overlook Colorado (12-14) and only plan for Saturday’s biggest game left in the schedule at Utah.

Sounding like UCLA head coach Steve Alford before the USC Game (Alford had hernia surgery on Monday), Coach Sean Miller stated, according to Bruce Pascoe from Tucson.com, “We haven’t really talked about Utah, that game will take care of itself when our Colorado game ends. We’ve had a day off on Sunday and we practiced yesterday and we’re going to practice today and tomorrow, and 100 percent of our efforts are going to be on our next game.”

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Let’s look back at their only 3 losses in 27 games, didn’t everyone feel like these games were easy wins for the Wildcats? Aren’t we feeling like that about Colorado? Anyone remembers the Pac-12 Championship game a couple of years ago? Who beat us? The Buffs…and their fans are loud too. I have heard from reliable sources that Wildcat fans will fill the arena in Colorado and will be loud and proud, even above sea level!

I think it all comes down to confidence, attitude and being able to keep calm and stay focused no matter what is happening with the other team, the fans and the referee’s. This, I believe, is how they beat UCLA on Saturday.

Focus is the operative word here, Hollis-Jefferson agrees, “In those games we lost, we kinda looked past the opponent and as you could see it ended in a loss for us so we just have to focus on the now and the present.”

Ashley agrees with me and Hollis-Jefferson, even though he almost lost it during the UCLA game: “We lost three games this year and all of them have been on the road and each of them were against teams where we shouldn’t have lost that game. We gotta focus on every game.”

Colorado has lost their last two games to the Oregon schools. The Wildcats still have all healthy players with no one sitting out. For Colorado, coach Tad Boyle said Tuesday that center Josh Scott was operating at about 70 percent of normal due to back issues. He also gave his support to Wesley Gordon in the Oregon State post-game press conference, “If there is a bright spot, I thought Wesley really played well and I’ve thought he has really played well this whole Pac-12 season. He is quietly becoming maybe our most consistent player.”

Recently, went watching my Cats play football against the Buffs at my local hangout for watching games which are showing on the Pac-12 channel (my only way to watch because I have DIRECTV), they were staring us down. Of course I was wearing my Wildcat gear, but I had no idea why they were so steaming upset that we showed up. Finally I said something like, “This isn’t going to be easy” and I broke the ice. The Buff fans continued to explain that the Arizona teams are their “new” rivals; they see us as the team they have to beat. I had no idea! I don’t think many Arizona fans know this, I wonder if our head coaches are aware as well but should!

Feb 13, 2015; Seattle, WA, USA; Arizona Wildcats forward Rondae Hollis-Jefferson (23) dunks against the Washington Huskies during the second half at Alaska Airlines Arena. Arizona defeated Washington, 86-62. Mandatory Credit: Joe Nicholson-USA TODAY Sports

Coach Miller and his Arizona Wildcats need to win all of their four last games to be safe and to possibly get a No. 1 seed (but it is looking like a No. 2), but he is looking only at the next game now against Colorado, “For us it’s all about winning in Boulder. If you win in Boulder, if you beat a healthy Colorado team and get a hard road win, it’s a three-game season.”

BEARDOWN AND BEAT THE BUFFS!

Arizona vs. Colorado

Thursday, February 26, 6:00 PM on ESPN, ESP3

Coors Events Center, Boulder, Colorado

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