In today's edition of The Daily 12-PAC we tip our caps to Husky hoops, look at the impact Mike Leach is already having at Wazzu, the impact Arik Armstead is projected to have at Oregon, and an OSU player looking to make an impression on NFL scouts.
One Big Happy Family At UW
Steve Sarkisian is a big basketball fan. When he was down at USC, he and Seahawks coach Pete Carroll would spend lunches playing hoops. So it's no surprise Sark has followed the Washington basketball team closely this year - he is a big supporter of all UW sports.
Sarkisian has regularly posted praise for the Husky basketball squad via his blog, and we at The DTP wanted to make sure we did as well. So, keeping it football themed, here is our congratulations to Coach Romar and his guys by way of Sark's blog.
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The Mike Leach Effect
The attitude is Pullman is changing. Just read some of these quotes from WSU players, and you'll see the impact Mike Leach is making on Wazzu's football program.
I think Leach was a fantastic hire, I haven't been shy about saying that. But I also think he's got his work cut out for him. The first thing a coach needs to do when taking over at a new place, is get the current team to "buy in". Definitely seems like that's taking place at Washington State. Now, let's see if it can carry over on to the field.
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SI Predicts Which Early Enrollees Will Make An Impact
Sports Illustrated put together a list of which early-enrollees will make an immediate impact this spring, and an Oregon Duck made the list.
Mega-recruit Arik Armstead, who will also play basketball in Eugene, is a player SI feels will make a splash at Oregon from day 1, and it's hard to argue with that. Interestingly, if you followed Armstead's recruitment, you'll know that a lot of schools thought he would be a better offensive lineman, than a defensive one. But Armstead wants to play D. Wouldn't it be nice to have so much talent that we could be considered one of the top impact players in class of 2012 playing in our secondary position? Oh, and he'll play basketball for the Ducks too.
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OSU's Hekker Making The NFL Take Notice
Here at The DTP we are big fans of punters and kickers. Actually, we are jealous of them...they never had to do conditioning when the rest of us did.
Oregon State punter Johnny Hekker is doing his best to try and make NFL scouts take notice of his ability, and it seems that they are, according to this piece in the Corvallis Gazette Times.
Sidenote: this kid could be Seahawks' punter, Jon Ryan's stunt double.
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