The Audio Thing

WOODLAND HILLS -- I'm not in the mood to rehash tonight's 91-74 loss to Northridge, so we'll talk about peripheral issues instead.

If you have an Internet connection, you've probably heard what former UC Davis player and assistant coach Dan Hawkins had to say about the anonymous Colorado player's parents who are not particularly excited about the start date for offseason conditioning. I've heard this audio four different times on the radio while driving around Southern California today. Also, while having dinner after the game, I twice saw a still of Hawkins come up on the television. I can only assume ESPN and Fox were discussing (and playing) his outburst.

UCD had its own audio issues earlier in the year relating to basketball Gary Stewart's use of a chair and trash can as projectile. A lot people at UCD were unhappy about the California Aggie posting the audio of the chair/trash can incident. Two weeks later, after the loss to Pacific, Stewart asked all the reporters present to turn off their recorders during the postgame press conference. That only happened once, thankfully. I bring this up only to note how intense things could have been around the Stewart incident (if Davis was better known, or if there had been video). In the 21st century, little blips of audio can suddenly take on lives of their own. For better or for worse, this is the world we live in now.

Localizing the big story

If you haven't already seen these pieces from Andy Katz and Pat Forde on ESPN.com, they're worth your time. The NCAA asked some veteran college basketball writers to come to Indianapolis and create a hypothetical field of 65 for the tournament. I always thought the NCAA would do well have a journalist in the meeting room every year, just to deal with the sheer volume of misinformation peddeled by the blowhards on sports radio. For what it's worth, Katz and Forde insist that reputation has very little to do with who comes out of the selection room, but I don't know of any coach who actually believes that. Maybe the sheer volume of basketball coverage alleviates some of the importance of tradition. But in baseball just about everyone believes you need to back-to-back solid seasons if you're a nobody trying to break into the field. And three years ago, a deserving Cal Poly team was left out of the I-AA playoffs in favor of Lehigh (who, the year before, had been the consensus 17th team out of 16).

UC Davis coach Gary Stewart is on the West Regional Advisory Committee for the NCAA tournament. His job is to rank the teams in the region at the beginning of January, the beginning of February and just before the start of the conference tournaments. That's one of the bits of data that the committee has in the room when it sits down to pick the field. Stewart says doing his rankings are an arduous task, one that seems to take much longer than he expects every time he sits down to do it. It doesn't help, Stewart said jokingly, that assistant coach John Lamanna is always hanging around trying to make a case for his Washington State Cougars.

No penalties for Stewart

UC Davis athletic Director Greg Warzecka said late Wednesday afternoon that Aggie basketball coach Gary Stewart would face no sanctions for his outburst following Saturday's loss to Utah Valley State. On his way out of the media room following a 57-38 loss and a four-minute press conference, Stewart threw a chair, kicked another one and then overturned a garbage can. You can hear the audio from the final 30 seconds of the interview and the outburst below. Warzecka said his decision not to punish the fourth-year coach further was based on a fairly clean past track record while at UCD. For more on this and the Aggies' weekend jaunt to Cal Poly and UC Santa Barbara, pick up Thursday's Enterprise.

About two nights ago

Our good friends at the California Aggie have posted a link to the audio of UC Davis coach Gary Stewart's postgame rampage following Saturday's 57-38 loss to Utah Valley State. And in the absence of any fresh news to report -- Stewart closed his team's practice today -- I'll direct you to the audio. Stewart certainly seemed to be seething throughout the press conference, but what was most jarring from my point of view was that his fit of redecoration did not seem to be in response to anything in particular. The questions posed seem fairly harmless. What do you think?

UCD athletic director Greg Warzecka was on his way back to campus from the NCAA Convention in Orlando, Fla. today. Reached by phone, he said he had only recently received the report of the chair tossing incident. He said he still had a few conversations to have before deciding whether there would be repercussions. I'm not going to weigh in on either side of that. What I'll say is this: chairs are sitting on, not for throwing. And probably, it's best that everyone remember that in the future.