HB Arnett’s

801 372 - 0819

hbarnett@fiber.net

1391 West 800 South – Orem, Utah 84058

 

Vol. 33, Issue 35 – March 25, 2013

 

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BYU’s Top Ten Most Wanted List

 

I watched a piece yesterday on television (Dateline) in which they detailed the story of an ex-LDS missionary that is now on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted List. (Click Here for a quick synopsis of the wanted fugitive)

 

That got me thinking. Is there a BYU athletics Ten Most Wanted List? In my mind and opinion, there should be. Here it is:

 

  1. Quarterback…BYU is only as good in football as its starting quarterback. It has always been that way and always will be. The man hunt looks likely to be over this fall. Taysom Hill should remove a “good” BYU quarterback from the most wanted list.

 

  1. Point Guard…This has been scintillating saga this season in the manhunt for a point guard. When Matt Carlino’s game is on, he is fantastic and allows BYU and Dave Rose to capture some basketball magic like the Cougars did in the second half last week against Washington. When he is off. BYU is very, very ordinary. If Rose can find a way to capture and lock down the “magic” Carlino BYU basketball can take point guard off the Top Ten Most Wanted list. With Carlino’s two year history of either being “on fire” or “on the Lam”, it is no surprise that Rose is saying that Kyle Collinsworth will see plenty of time next season at the point.

 

  1. Tight End…Dennis Pitta was captured by the Baltimore Ravens three years ago in the NFL draft. After being offered a second round tender by the NFL club a few weeks ago, Pitta is now guaranteed to get away with the loot. The tender will give Pitta $2 million plus in salary next season. If another team wants to offer more to the restricted free agent, Baltimore can always match. Since Pitta got away from the program three seasons ago, BYU offensive coaches have searched high and low for a replacement. Each fall and spring there are plenty of tips and touts about finding the next good tight end, but none of those tips have panned out. As the FBI guys like to say when in pursuit of a fugitive, maybe this will be the year and season for the Cougars.

 

  1. Quality Left-Handed Pitcher…I like what I see from new BYU baseball coach Mike Littlewood in the early going of this season. Unfortunately, good pitching, especially from the left side of the mound is still laying low in Belize and not playing baseball for BYU. This club has a quality pitcher in Desmond Poulson, but is still three arms short from being a pretty good baseball team. We will have to give Littlewood a few more recruiting seasons to see if he can remove decent pitching from the BYU most wanted list.

 

  1. Jimmer…He isn’t coming back. But the BYU legend is off the most wanted list since being placed in the Witness Protection program in Sacramento. There have been occasional sightings of Jimmer doing his thing in the NBA, but mostly he stays three doors down the bench from the Keith Smart and the Sacramento Kings’ dog house. There is a glimmer of hope, however. A Jimmer replacement may be on the horizon a few years down the road in Nick Emery. He will bypass the Witness Protection program and enter the two-year Witness Bearing program for the LDS Church. He leaves for Frankfurt, Germany in May.

 

  1.  PGA Tour Winner…Mike Weir was the last BYU alum to win a PGA Tour event. That was a few years back. The Canadian has 8 tour wins on his resume. BYU used to make a living producing golfers who could make a living playing the sport, but that seems like a few decades ago. As Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel used to sing…Where have you gone Joe DiMaggio, Johnny Miller, Mike Reid and Mike Weir?

 

  1. Polynesian Pipeline…The top quality LDS Polynesian high school football players seem to be extremely hard to track down these last few years by the BYU football program. It is worth noting that Bronco Mendenhall has now assigned more detectives and recruiters to locating these football fugitives. The Cougar staff now has 3 ½ assistant Polynesian coaches that will be joining the recruiting man hunt. That would be Robert Anae, Mark Atuaia, Steve Kaufusi and Guy Holliday. The new BYU receiver coach is half Samoan.

 

  1. Kicker…BYU has always had kickers in custody and on the roster, but they seem to be kicking without removing their leg irons. If you are going to play a big boy schedule, you have to have a big boy kicker.

 

  1.  League Affiliation for Football…For many Cougar fans this should be at the top of the Most Wanted List. Thanks to ESPN, BYU football is surviving nicely at the moment, but eventually it is going to be a case of the haves and the have nots. The haves will have super conference affiliations. BYU will need to find a way to crash that party or be very, very creative as an independent. The Big Boys of college football own the bank and they are closing the doors soon and won’t be opening any new accounts.

 

  1. Fill in the blanks…You get to choose the final most wanted spot. Here are some suggestions. A media and public relations coach for the football staff; BYU Rugby and Men’s Soccer as sanctioned sports at BYU; A home and home in football with Ohio State; Continued good health for Dave Rose; Continued recovery and good health for Taysom Hill; A BYU star in women’s sports other than soccer; An I Phone app that allows big time BYU football boosters in the stands to call plays. There is already an app that allows some of the biggest boosters to call the shots.

 

Mercer on Tap Tonight

 

NIT AND WNIT PROVIDING NICE PHOTOS IN PROVO

 

The BYU men’s and women’s basketball programs are having some nice success and getting good snapshots of their NIT and WNIT tournament participation in Provo.

 

Like most pictures, however, nobody but family are really interested in seeing those photos.

 

Ditto for the NIT and WNIT. On the national radar nobody outside of the fan bases of those teams still playing in the two tournaments are interested.

 

If you are reading this letter, you should be interested because both BYU teams are still playing in those tournaments. Here are a few snapshots for your perusal.

 

BYU photo shopped Washington right out of the NIT picture last Tuesday with a 90-79 opening round win over the Huskies. Tyler Haws led the way for the Cougars with a spectacular 37-point scoring spree.

 

Despite Haws’ production, the game was never really in focus or finished until Matt Carlino came to the party in the second half of action. The sophomore guard sealed the deal with 18 second half points for the Cougars.

 

BYU now faces Mercer tonight in Provo. The Bears are out of Macon, Georgia. The winner advances to the quarterfinals of tournament play. Click here to see the current NIT brackets.

 

A win today and BYU will either be hosting another game in Provo on Wednesday against Louisiana Tech or traveling to Hattiesburg to take on Southern Miss. La Tech and USM play tonight in Mississippi. Southern Miss is the No. 1 seed in BYU’s bracket. Louisiana Tech was the No. 5 seed and BYU the No. 3 seed in the bracket. The team with the highest seed gets to host the games.

 

Mercer won the regular season title in the Atlantic Sun Conference. That is the same league that produced Florida Gulf Coast, the current NCAA Cinderella.

 

The two teams split the home and home series during the regular season, but it was FGCU that won the post season league tournament and earned the NCAA bid.

 

Mercer also beat Florida State in Tallahassee early in the season. You may remember FSU as the team that handled BYU easily in Brooklyn in the Coaches against Cancer Tournament. Mercer is currently 24-11 on the year and is coming off a 75-67 win over Tennessee in Knoxville. The Bears were led by Travis Smith against the Volunteers. He had 25 points in the win.

 

 The game tips off at 7 pm Mountain Time and will be televised live on ESPNEWS.

 

On the Women’s side in the WNIT, BYU came away with a very nice 69-58 win over San Diego State last Saturday in Provo.

 

The Lady Cougars will now face WCC foe St. Mary’s in Provo on Wednesday. Tipoff and TV coverage is pending and dependent on what the BYU men do tonight. The pending status is also waiting to see if BYU men will be hosting another game in the Marriott Center on Wednesday.

 

If that happens, it will be a NIT and WNIT doubleheader. For WNIT brackets and other information, click here.

 

IS BYU VOLLEYBALL CHUGGING TOWARDS NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP?

 

Based on what the BYU men’s volleyball team did this past weekend on a California road trip, the logical answer is yes, a national championship is front and center on the horizon.

 

There is a lot of volleyball left to be played by the No. 1 ranked Cougars, but the ease with which BYU handled Long Beach State on the road Saturday night seems to indicate this might be the elusive year for the Cougars.

The 49ers were the No. 4 ranked team in the nation and beat BYU in 5 sets in Provo a few weeks back. This time it was BYU getting revenge and a 3-set win (25-22, 25-13, 25-15) over LBSU.

 

The game actually was not much of a contest for the Cougars. The best description and video of the match can be found here. Be sure and check out the video.

 

The Cougars also swept Cal State Northridge on Friday night in a three game sweep. BYU is currently 17-3 overall and 16-2 in MPSF play.

 

BYU 2, KU 1, Snow 1

 

BASEBALL TAKES TWO OF FOUR FROM KANSAS

 

BYU improved to 11-12 on the season by taking two of three games from Kansas last week. The series was set for a four-game series, but Friday’s contest was cancelled due to snow.

 

BYU won the opener with a 3-0 shutout of the Jayhawks behind a very strong pitching performance from Cougar junior right hander Desmond Paulson.

 

The Cougars closed the series on Saturday with a 6-3 win. Between the bookend victories, Kansas walloped the Cougars 14-6 on Thursday and Friday’s game was lost to snow.

 

PUBLIC PEEK AT SPRING FOOTBALL ON SATURDAY

 

BYU and Bronco Mendenhall will give Cougar Nation a chance to get their early only peek and perusal of this fall’s football team this Saturday at 11 am in LaVell Edwards Stadium.

 

The weather is forecast to be mild and so will the controlled scrimmage. Since Mendenhall took over as head coach, here are the parameters for spring football scrimmages open to the public: If a player is good, he won’t play. If he is good and is allowed to play, he won’t be allowed to hit or be hit.

 

That makes for a poor spring game, but it does make for a healthy squad in the fall. Regardless of the diluted format for this scrimmage, it is still football and the players are wearing BYU uniforms.

 

What we will see are second and third unit players scrimmaging against each other. It doesn’t do much for handicapping the upcoming season, but it always whets the appetite for the real thing in the fall.

 

Television Timetable

 

BYU vs. Mercer (M Basketball)

Monday, March 25 at Provo

Tipoff: 7:00 pm Mountain Time

TV: ESPNEWS

BYU vs. St. Mary’s (W Basketball)

Wednesday, March 27 at Provo

Tipoff: TBA

TV: TBA (If televised will be BYUtv

BYU vs. TBA (M Basketball) if BYU wins on Monday

Wednesday, March 25 at TBA

Tipoff: TBA

TV: TBA

BYU vs. Pepperdine (Volleyball)

Thursday, March 28 at Provo

Start:  7:00 pm Mountain Time

TV: BYUtv

BYU vs. Pepperdine (Baseball)

Friday, March 29 at Provo

First Pitch: 6:00 pm Mountain Time

TV: BYUtv

BYU vs. USC (Volleyball)

Saturday, March 30 at Provo

Start: 8:00 pm Mountain Time

TV:  BYUtv

 

Radio

 

BYU vs. Utah (Baseball)

Tuesday, March 26 at Salt Lake

First Pitch: 6:00 pm Mountain time

KOVO 960 AM | Provo, UT BYU Radio - Sirius XM 143

BYU vs. Pepperdine (Baseball)

Thursday, March 28 at Provo

First Pitch: 6:00 pm Mountain time

KOVO 960 AM | Provo, UT BYU Radio - Sirius XM 143

BYU vs. Pepperdine (Baseball)

Friday, March 29 at Provo

First Pitch: 6:00 pm Mountain time

KOVO 960 AM | Provo, UT BYU Radio - Sirius XM 143

BYU vs. Pepperdine (Baseball)

Saturday, March 30 at Provo

First Pitch: 1:00 pm Mountain time

KOVO 960 AM | Provo, UT BYU Radio - Sirius XM 143