Coach Vaughn's take on the goofy umpiring from the Enterprise article:

Excerpt: “They told me the first-base umpire did not have a good look at the play because the stretch was towards him. That’s why they agreed to get together. One of the other umpires had our guy clearly off the base.

“My argument to that was … our catcher started jogging off the field when the first-base umpire called him out. Which means the second run scores when our catcher is trying to hustle back to catch a throw when he was ready to get off the field.”

The umpires told Vaughn that it didn’t matter. Vaughn said they told him: “In that situation, you have to play through.”

Furthermore, the umpires told Vaughn the second run home after the “third out” was going to score anyway. Vaughn didn’t agree…

“If we have a catcher there, we have that second runner dead to rights and we’re down one instead of two.”

http://www.davisenterprise.com/sports/crazy-ninth-inning-does-in-uc-davis-4-2/

Aggie recruit TJ Shorts from Saddleback College was named SoCal Player of the Year by Signal the Light Basketball:

"T.J Shorts (Saddleback) is our player of the year for Southern California for the 2016-2017 season."

https://twitter.com/sgnlthelgthoops

Shorts, a 5'10 PG recently had 33 points, 6 rebounds and 5 assists as Saddleback won the Riverside Tournament. It looks like we might have two dynamos at PG next year with 5' 10 Shorts and 5'8 Hennings.

Seems to be the case! The part that seems so outrageous to me is that the runner scored from first with no Aggie player covering home because the Ags left the field after the first base ump had initially called the batter out for the 3rd out of the inning. How the heck can the umps allow the runner to score from first, after the apparent 3rd out was called at first, in a play that was so close that had to be discussed to be overturned?

If the batter had been initially called safe at first it seems likely that a play could have been made at the plate or the runner from first wouldn't have even tried to score, but the Ags had left the field thinking the inning was over. That's crazy!

The Athletics Department recap covered the crazy controversy also:

Excerpt: "UC Davis held a 2-1 lead in the ninth, turning the ball over to its closer, Zach Stone (2-1), to try and nail down the win. CSUN, however had different plans, getting a double off the bat of Dylan Alexander with one out and another two batters later by Michael Russo that snuck under the glove of a diving Alex Aguiar, allowing the tying run to score."

"A fielder's choice left runners on the corners with two outs for Justin Toerner when controversy ensued. Toerner's chopper over the mound was fielded behind the second base bag and thrown on to first where the umpire called the head-first sliding Toerner out, as the Aggies made their way to the dugout after the apparent third out of the inning."

"However, following a conference between the three officials, the call was reversed, ruling that Toerner safe after it was determined that the throw pulled Cameron Olson's foot off the bag, allowing both William Colantano, who was at third when the play happened, and Alvaro Rubalcaba to score, the latter coming all the way around from first when there was no one manning the plate, UC Davis having run off the field after the apparent third out."

http://www.ucdavisaggies.com/sports/m-basebl/recaps/040117aaa.html

I did the same thing, 6th. There is a November tournament and a December tournament. We're in the December Vegas tournament and, just for a little more confusion, it appears that there is a Hosts' bracket and a Visitors' bracket.

We are definitely playing Nevada in Reno on 12/17 and then we are listed in the Visitors' bracket semifinals on 12/22 along with NC A&T and 2 other teams TBD. The Visitors' finals are scheduled for 12/23.

Nevada is listed in the Hosts' semifinals bracket along with 4 teams TBD.

Pretty confusing to me....

Good luck to Coach McCann. He always seemed to have a great relationship with his players. Guess the Aggies will be going up against him in the future.

A step up in intensity for Coach Copp. Florida International (in Miami with an enrollment of 55,000) is a member of D1 Conference USA and football in Florida is like basketball in Indiana where losing is not an option. Best of luck to Coach Copp. I always thought he was a good one.

Lots of interesting tweets on his twitter page:

https://twitter.com/CoachJeffCopp?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor

It appears that freshman forward Peter Hewitt 6'9 215 will be transferring:

http://www.verbalcommits.com/players/peter-hewitt

That's a well written article by Gallaudet. Jim Les is a very principled man and I think he highly values the principles of UCD athletics. He has often expressed how much he and his family love the Sacramento area too. So it appears that he has found a place and a program that are very satisfying for him at this stage of his life and career.

I read something on Gio Nelson's twitter account a couple of weeks ago that he had surgery for an ACL.

Kansas has the offensive firepower to just explode and, when they get it going, they are awfully good. They got a couple of players that look like they will be successful in the NBA.

Tremendous year for the Aggies and all but one senior is coming back. I wasn't able to watch this one but it sounds like the Ags may have just run out of gas after all the road games and finals. It seems like teams feel that the way to beat the Ags is to focus on shutting down Bertsch and pressure the ball to create TO's (19 TO's in this one had to hurt).

Can't wait to see these Ags next fall with everyone coming back and some great recruits coming in.

The Aggie defense needs to step it up or WSU is going to sprint out to a double digit lead.

Travis DeCuire of Montana has withdrawn from consideration:

http://missoulian.com/sports/college/montana/griz-coach-decuire-no-longer-pursuing-cal-basketball-job/article_292bb20e-c310-541e-afcd-dc9e1eb059f4.html

Bob Dunning writes about the women not getting a home game:

http://www.davisenterprise.com/update/bob-dunning-march-21-keep-winning-ags-and-maybe-well-get-a-home-game/

Given the $$$ and the bigger stage, you would think if Cal offered the job to Les that he would leave. But, you know, sometimes coaches just find a place that fits for them in many ways like it was for Sochor here at Davis. Davis has many things which I think are important to Les like our emphasis on scholar ballers with high character and the opportunity to continue to build this program from his vision. He has a lot of history and many friends and contacts in the Sacramento area and has said he and his wife love the area. So I think there a factors here that make the Davis job very special too and that offers a quality of life that may not be as good for him in the bay area.

Good point. I think these 4 coaches are just the beginning and there will certainly be some big names yet to come.

Cal would probably pay Les 3-4 times what he makes here and he would be coaching at a program that expects success at the upper D1 level and has resources. Of course, along with that comes the high pressure to win or get canned. Les is an intense competitor so I could see him aspiring to the upper level of D1 basketball.

On the other hand, he has quite a bit of history and lots of friends and contacts in the Sacramento area His wife, Jodi, is in real estate in the Granite Bay area and, I believe, that his son, Tyler, is working in San Francisco.

We're seeing more and more of these international rosters in basketball particularly and in many college sports in general. For example, Saint Mary's annually mines the best men players from Australia, the CSU women's basketball team was largely from Scandinavia and some of the powerful SoCal water polo teams are essentially made up of the best players from Eastern Europe.

It's must be costly to actively recruit in foreign countries but it seems to be a very effective way to build competitive teams at the D1 level. I wonder if we'll ever see the Aggies, in any sports, begin this kind of recruiting?

Pathetic coverage by the Bee! They are totally snubbing the women.