This is a quote from Arron Afflalo in an article by Dan Weber: "The way we're playing, the way we're attacking the zone right now, I don't see us losing again in the Pac-10." Now I love Arron Afflalo's game and the way he plays. He's probably my favorite player on the squad, but is there any way this was taken out of context? Arron, am I missing something here?

Well, maybe since we looked so good in the second half of the Zona game, and since we dominated the two bay area schools when they came to Pauley earlier in the season, I guess it's obvious that we will sweep this week and then win out the rest of the Pac-10 schedule. Oh, another good sign is that we've lost the last four games at Cal by an average of 18 points (according to Brian Dohn). And, also improving our chances, Richard Midgley, Cal's leading scorer, should be in the starting lineup on Thursday (he didn't play in our first game against Cal).

Sarcasm aside, I will be rooting for Afflalo to prove prophetic, but I won't be shocked if he's wrong. I doubt we will be favored in either game up north, so I will be extremely happy with a split. But at the risk of stating the obvious, instead of thinking of the rest of the season or even this week, all of us (including Afflalo) should be concentrating on only one thing: the next game, which happens to be against Cal. And while much of the reason Cal spanked us in Pauley was that we couldn't attack their zone defense, the bigger issue is that we were unable to match up with the strength and athleticism of their big men. So unless we have figured out a way to prevent Cal from repeatedly getting uncontested four foot shots, I can't imagine the outcome is going to be very different from the first game. That said, this is definitely our most winnable road game left on the schedule, so hopefully we will play well and give ourselves a chance to pull out a W. A victory will be another significant step as we continue to inch closer to a NCAA berth.