In a great weekend of Pac 10 hoops I must give out my pick for the Pac 10 POTW, Taylor Rochestie.
Taylor led the Cougs to back to back road wins agains Oregon State University (in Overtime) and Oregon in his last visit to "Mack" Court. In these two games Rochestie tallied 44 points and 15 assists (both weekend high's for the Pac) while playing a pac 10 high 84 minutes of solid point guard play. He tied a WSU single game record for free-throws going 16 for 16 from the stripe against Oregon and reached a career milestone while in Corvallis where he eclipsed the 1,000 point mark. Surely his performance should be rewarded with the Player of the Week honor. So, if there is any justice in the world, the powers that be will AT LEAST honor him with an honorable mention for Player of the Week.
The only other player that is worth mentioning would be
USC's Dwight Lewis who led the Trojans to two wins over the Arizona teams. He did have 39 points and 6 assists (along with 5 turnovers in his 73 minutes of play) and Arizona/Arizona St. are definitely tougher teams than those Rochestie and WSU encountered, even at home in the Galen Center. So I won't be suprised if USC/Lewis gets the nod this on Monday but hope that the honor goes to Rochestie.
Going by straight statistics nobody had a better week than Rochestie. Going past the box-score, for those of us who know anything about WSU's style of play, 44 points is a huge number for anyone playing for Tony Bennet & Co.
In both games Rochestie was THE difference maker in the outcome vs. Oregon hitting big three's and every free throw needed in the second half. Against OSU, Rochestie made a three pointer and found Daven Harmeling for another trey, giving WSU it's last 6 points in regulation. He had 8 assists in the overtime win against the Beavers and hit his 1,000th point as an NCAA player. All of this while being targeted by opposing coaches as the primary player to "shut down." While the Cougs have other options (Thompson, Baynes, etc.) Rochestie was indespensible while the same is not likely true of Lewis who had plenty of help from the likes of Gibson, Hackett, DeRozan, etc.
Hopefully the news on Monday is reasonable but considering the fact that WSU hasn't had a Player of the Week since... it's been a while. Did I miss anything? Wanna plead the case for Lewis or someone else? Go for it.
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