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Show 1 Stein Song I (" By REECE STEIN Chronicle Associate Sports Editor Like everything in American civilization, basketball is spreading West. The domination the Big Ten and other Eastern conferences have held over the sport is slipping away and power is mounting in the Mountain West and the Pacific Coast. Indiana has been known as the cradle of basketball civilization. For many years the nations greats were consistantly from universities in Indiana, Ohio, Illinois and Kentucky. With the exception of Cotton Nash, Gary Bradds, Ron Bonham and a few others, the majority of this years basketball talents, and basketball basket-ball powers are from areas not usually noted for basketball strength. The balanced strength of the Western Athletic Conference this season points this out very well. Arizona 'State, Utah and New Mexico have all been rated in the top twenty. Brigham Young, without a senior on the team, got votes earlier, while Wyoming and Arizona have both met and downed tough opposition. The Sun Devils illustrated over the past weekend why they were number five in the nation to start the season. Joe Qaldwell, with two 28 point outputs boosted his yearly average to 21.4 and clammered to second in WAC scoring and rebounding. FLYNN ROBINSON, Wyoming's all-conference guard, leads the WAC in scoring with 23.4 for the conference and 24.5 for the season. He also leads the conference in free throw percentage with an amazing 92 percent with 45 hits. Utah is still the power in the conference according to latest press rankings. The Utes stand tied for 15th in the nation with San Francisco while New Mexico holds 19th in the Lobo's greatest hoop year in quite a while. The Utes' two losses over the weekend illustrate the potential of any team in the conference to break through and become a challenge to any national power. Arizona is not the big power in the WAC. Yet they hit an amazing 61 percent from the field against Utah and put on a display of basketball that would have been good in the N CJ A A finals. Speaking of outstanding shooting; New Mexico hit 66 percent against the Wyoming Cowboys last week, and Arizona hit 63 percent against the BYU Cougars. Both ASU and New Mexico took less shots from the field than their opponents and still won. Dennis Dairman, the 6-5 ASU forward hit 17 of 21 attempts over the weekend and now joins the WAC leaders in field goal percentage. per-centage. The Conference has five stars all hitting over 50 percent from the field. As for the Redskins, it was a somewhat disappointing weekend from the standpoint of losing after so many wins and holding the conference lead. Losses to two such outstanding teams on their home floors should not be counted as upsets however. None of the WAC teams were figured to win many games on the road. Six schools have won consistantly at home in both conference and non-WAC outings. UTAH DISPLAYED some outstanding basketball Saturday night in shutting off the powerful Sun Devils. With a little more assistance from two of Utah's scoring mainstays, Doug Moon and George Fisher, the last five games are still within reach. Saturday nights slowed cadence held the strong and balanced Devil five to only 71 points whereas they scored 110 the night before against BYU. |