Cats make Red/Blue debut

In case anyone actually cared, the Red beat the Blue 62-58 on Sunday afternoon. Of course, with an intersquad scrimmage, winning and losing are less important than how well the teams play.

Freshman power forward Grant Jerrett puts a hook shot over Matt Korcheck.

The Blue team trailed by as many as 13 with less than seven to play, but battled back thanks to a 13-5 run that cut the lead to just five with 3:04 to play.

The Red seemed to ice things on back-to-back buckets. Gabe York hit a three, his lone bucket of the game, and Kaleb Tarczewski added an inside bucket to make it 60-50.

That should have ended things, but the Blue team had a final run in them. The Blue rattled off six straight in a 50 second span. Solomon Hill had a dunk, Angelo Chol had a put-back and Nick Johnson dunked off a miss.

The Red tried to milk the clock but T.J McConnell's driving lay-up was swatted out of bounds by Angelo Chol.

On the other end Brandon Ashley drew a foul and converted both foul shots to cap the 8-0 run and trim the red lead down to two. The blue went to the ful court press, but a long pass by Grant Jerrett was hauled in by McConnell who laid it in with five seconds to play to seal the win.

Johnson, in a losing effort, led all scorers with 20 points. He was 4-8 behind the arc, but was 4-5 at one point. He also added four assists and three steals.

Kevin Parrom led the REd team with 17 points and six boards, making 4-7 threes. Jerrett had 14 points and eight rebounds. He also added four assists.

Ratios
Take away T.J. McConnell's three assists and four turnovers and the Wildcats had 22 assists and just 10 turnovers. That is better than 2:1.

Nick Johnson may not have won the dunk contest, but he did have the best dunk on the day.

Inside Out
Grant Jerrett was 4-4 inside the arc and just 1-4 outside the arc. He has been one of the team's best three-point shooters from behind the arc.

First Bucket
Both teams started slow, combining to go 0-8, but it was Mark Lyons who got the first bucket of the day.

Wrong Way
While driving into the arena area I saw a man clad in a blue full body leotard, heading AWAY from McKale. I sure hope he just forgot to buy tickets early and was turned away from the sell out and was not headed somewhere else.

Setting The Tone
We're all friends here, so I guess I can tell you I tend to be very superstitious. I really believe the music I listen to makes a difference on game day. So just in case, I decided to throw big man Kaleb Tarczewski a bone. On my walk from my parking spot to the arena I rocked Planet Of Zeus, a Greek hard rock band, on my iPod. IF he has a big season 2.3% of the credit needs to go to my obscure music collection.

1988 Revisited
The bulk of the 1988 Final Four team was on hand to be honored. They were introduced before the game. For those who followed that team it was hard not to get goosebumps when the "Steeeeve Kerrrrr" chante erupted. I was a little surprised at the ovation Kenny Lofton got. Not that he does not deserve a good ovation, but I was shocked he had the third loudest of the group. OF course biggest ovations saved for Kerr and Sean Elliott.

Dunk Contest
No matter how good the dunks were in the dunk contest, Tom Tolbert gave each kid a "4", until Gabe York dunked over Matt Korcheck AND Angelo Chol. Sean Elliott, Steve Kerr and Jud Beuchlar, Craig McMillan all scored accurately. York won the contest with a perfect 50 on his second dunk.

Channing
Also on hand was former Wildcat big man Channing Frye. Frye is not playing this year for the Suns due to a heart ailment.

Standing O
Rich Rodriguez, 12 hours from a 52-17 pasting of UW, got a standing ovation when he spoke to the crowd in the first half. Probably a little different than he'd receive in Ann Arbor. Still calls ASU "that team up north."

Solomon Hill drives on Kevin Parrom.