Roundup: Utah baseball out to prove last year wasn't a fluke

The college baseball season begins this weekend, and Lynn Worthy of The Salt Lake Tribune writes that Utah baseball wants to prove 2016 wasn’t a fluke. The Utes are picked to finish sixth a year after winning the conference crown (they were picked to finish last a year ago).

Jeff Metcalfe reports that Arizona State athletics brought in $94.6 million in revenue in fiscal year 2016, and $100 million is a definitely possibility for FY2017.

Plenty of basketball to get to, so let’s start with the Pac-12 Networks recap of Stanford women’s basketball’s 72-66 win at Cal in the first of two matchups between the sides this week. Alanna Smith had a career-high 27 points in the win.

The men will do battle Friday night at Maples, and Rusty Simmons tells us that Grant Mullins is becoming a solid perimeter shooter for Cal. He’s shooting 42.7 percent from downtown this season, good for eighth in the conference.

Lauri Markkanen broke out of his slump in Arizona’s 78-59 win at Washington State Thursday night, and here’s the stats breakdown from the Wildcats’ triumph in the Palouse (Arizona Daily Star).

Washington State men’s basketball coach Ernie Kent called out his team after the loss to Arizona, saying his guys keep on making the same mistakes. Jacob Thorpe has the details.

Despite Oregon’s 79-61 win over Utah Thursday night in Eugene, Ducks head coach Dana Altman wants to see his team step up its rebounding game. Utah outrebounded Oregon 38-31.

So much for that cold start to conference play… Colorado men’s basketball has won six of its last seven games, most recently defeating Oregon State 60-52 in Corvallis Thursday night and ending the game on an 8-0 run (Pat Rooney with the recap).

Read this Q&A with Isaiah Thomas courtesy of Marc Spears of The Undefeated. The former Husky is about to make his second NBA All-Star Game appearance this weekend in New Orleans. Is there a better Mr. Irrelevant in NBA history?

Clay Fowler features UCLA men’s basketball guard Isaac Hamilton, the “old guy” on the team as a senior. Sounds like he’s a pretty responsible dude, and there are some good background stories on how that’s come to be in this link.

Gina Mizell gives us 10 Oregon State football storylines to watch as the Beavers begin spring practice Friday.

And check out the recap from USC men’s volleyball upsetting No. 6 Stanford in three sets.