Pac-12 has failed Arizona Basketball with poor scheduling of games

With Arizona Basketball having no games this past weekend yet again, the Pac-12 Conference is failing its member institutions.

In the past three weeks, Arizona Basketball has played just two basketball games, and while that has largely been because of COVID-19 running rampant within the Pac-12 Conference and in College Basketball, it also shows some major shortcomings of this conference.

So far in the 2021-22 season, the Wildcats have played just two conference games, with three scheduled games postponed and one game rescheduled due to COVID.

While that is no fault of Arizona, or to the teams impacted by COVID per se; however, the Wildcats have been at the mercy of the conference for the past couple of weeks.

Four days after USC’s game that was initially scheduled against Arizona was postponed, the Trojans played Cal and then played USC today.

Meanwhile, while UCLA played Long Beach State on Thursday and played Cal on Saturday and has not played since.

During that same time frame, Arizona has had to sit at home, twiddling their thumbs, staying ready while patiently waiting for their next opportunity.

Granted, the Wildcats were rumored to be scheduled to play Colorado State this past weekend; however, the Mountain West Conference stepped in and stepped up, pushing for the Rams to instead play a conference game against San Diego State on Saturday.

While Arizona Basketball waits to play again, the scheduling nightmares fall squarely on the Pac-12 Conference.

If anyone holds the blame for how the past couple of weeks have played out, it is the Pac-12. As we are all too aware by now, the conference recently announced changes to their postponement and game rescheduling policies, and it is part of what has made things a nightmare of late.

Instead of using the breaks in conference play to make up for postponed games, the Pac-12 figured they would delay these games, instead of pushing for optimal viewership (which is a bit of an oxymoron coming from the Pac-12).

Beyond that, it is a bit naive to believe that the 100 or so games that are scheduled over the next 50-ish days, are going to be played without any hiccups or interruptions.

To me the solution is simple, the Pac-12 needs to be more diligent in getting these games rescheduled, or they need to start holding more teams accountable and calling these games forfeits because a team like Arizona is essentially being punished because of the conferences’ lack of organization or urgency.