Pac-12 Semis: Wildcats Deliver KO Punch To Buffs
Mar 15th
Buffs still hope for NCAA tourney bid
Release: March 14, 2014
By: B.G. Brooks, Contributing Editor
LAS VEGAS – The Colorado Buffaloes got the first-half start they wanted Friday night against Arizona, but the start of the second was another story – one of shock and maybe a little bit of awe.
The fourth-ranked Wildcats, the top seed in the Pac-12 Conference tournament, held the fifth-seeded Buffs to only two field goals in the second half’s first 12:32, coupled that shutdown with a 20-4 run, and raced away with a 63-43 semifinal win at the MGM Grand Garden Arena.
“In the second half, that thing got away from us quick,” CU coach Tad Boyle said. “If Arizona makes shots and with the way they guard consistently, they’ve got a chance to win a national championship.”
CU’s Xavier Talton drives against Arizona
Arizona (30-3) plays the winner of Friday night’s second semifinal – UCLA vs. Stanford – on Saturday afternoon (4 p.m. MDT) in the Pac-12 championship game. CU (23-11) awaits word on Selection Sunday to make potential NCAA Tournament plans.
“We’re obviously disappointed in the result, but we lost to a darn good Arizona team,” Boyle said. “That’s a hell of a team, a hell of a program. They’ve had an unbelievable year.”
His defense was pit-bull nasty to the Buffs, but Arizona coach Sean Miller returned Boyle’s kind words, complimenting Boyle and his staff on rejuvenating the Buffs after losing point guard Spencer Dinwiddie in mid-January.
Miller said outsiders can’t comprehend the magnitude of such a loss and what it takes to adjust: “I mean it knocks you back. You can’t call timeout, have a month to prepare and think about things. You have to get it right away.
“What Tad and his staff have done and what those players have done has been really nothing short of remarkable. The fact they’re sitting in the NCAA Tournament, our hat’s off to them and we wish them nothing but the best.”
The Buffs could have used some of the post-game goodwill from the Wildcats’ defense in the second half. Ahead only 27-24 at halftime, Arizona allowed a Josh Scott layup at the 18:32 mark, but didn’t permit another CU field goal for almost 5 minutes.
Nearly another 6 minutes passed before the Buffs got their third basket of the second half, and by then the Wildcats had rolled to a 51-32 advantage. The Buffs were on their way to a night of near-record lows:
· Their 43 points were the lowest since scoring 49 against Illinois (57) in the 2013 NCAA Tournament;
· Their 29 percent field goal shooting was the lowest since Arizona held CU to 32.7 on Feb. 22 in Boulder;
· Their 25 rebounds – the Wildcats hauled down 41 – were a season low, as were their 15 field goals.
“We knew they were good defensively,” said Boyle, “and we knew we were going to have to make some shots to beat them. We couldn’t get going. Their defense had something to do with that, our offense had something to do with that. You put those two things together . . .
“Listen, they’re a great defensive team, not a good defensive team, a great defensive team. They’ve shown it game after game all season long.”
When they’re dialed in, the Wildcats aren’t mediocre on offense either. Nick Johnson, the Pac-12’s player of the year, led Arizona with 16 points, getting help from guard P.J. McConnell and 6-7 freshman wing Rondae Hollis-Jefferson with 12 each. All of Hollis-Jefferson’s points came in the second half – and half of them during that explosive stretch when Arizona outscored CU 20-4 to take its 51-32 lead.
Askia Booker (12 points) and Xavier Johnson (11) were the only CU players in double figures. Booker said the Buffs “were right there with them in the first half. It just takes that two to five minutes for them to open up the game – and that’s exactly what they did. Their offensive rebounding was very aggressive, they were knocking down some jump shots. They’re very good.”
The Wildcats’ defense in the class of the Pac-12, said Booker, because “they guard the ball very well. They’re always in gap help. There’s a lot of times I get by a guy and another guy is right there. If I kick it out they’re contesting the shot – and it’s always a great contest. You have to be very efficient and knock down shots to beat this team. If you don’t do that, it’s going to be tough for you, especially if you don’t get stops. And they rebound the ball very well.”
“They’re so physical,” added guard Xavier Talton, who hit a pair of 3-pointers (8 points total) and finished with five treys in the last two games here. “I think their gap help and their guards really guard the ball. That’s a big thing . . . the way Sean Miller recruits, he recruits athletes. Them staying in front of us is a big part of keeping us out of the paint – which is want to do. That’s a big testament to them.”
Among the Buffs’ chief goals was to prevent a devastating early Wildcats run that essentially buried CU in Arizona’s two regular-season wins. The Buffs fell behind 18-4 in their 69-57 loss in Tucson and 22-5 in their 88-61 loss in Boulder.
There was no such surge on Friday night – at least not in the first half after the Buffs managed to stay close (27-24) at intermission. A trey by Gabe York a second before the halftime buzzer gave Arizona its three-point lead.
The Wildcats had gone up 22-13 with 6:08 left in the half, but the Buffs stayed strong. Over the half’s last 6 minutes, CU outscored Arizona 11-4, and Arizona’s 27 points were the third fewest by the Wildcats this season.
CU needed an efficient second-half start, but Arizona wouldn’t allow it. Meanwhile, the Wildcats were getting revved up, quickly scoring outside on baskets by McConnell and a 3-pointer by Johnson, and inside on a Johnson tip-in and another by Hollis-Jefferson.
When Booker finally got CU’s third basket of the half, putting back his own miss and hitting an “and-one,” the Buffs closed to within 38-32 with 13:55 remaining. Still, the game seemed on the verge of slipping away, and the inside work of Hollis-Jefferson provided a significant shove. After hitting a pair of free throws, he scored on another tip-in then powered for a layup to give the Wildcats their biggest lead – 44-32 – with 10:15 to play.
Boyle called a timeout, but the Buffs came out of it with a missed layup by Booker. Trouble – and a 7-0 Wildcats run – were coming: McConnell hit a trey, Gordon scored on a put-back and Jordin Mayes added a lay-up.
Suddenly, the Buffs were down by 19 – 51-32 – and the Garden Arena reverberated with “U of A, U of A” chants. The Wildcats extended their lead to as many as 22 points in the final 5 minutes and the Buffs were left to wait on Sunday and the NCAA Selection Committee.
“I’m proud of our guys,” Boyle said. “We’ve got a lot of fight, a lot of heart. We’ve gotten better over the last three weeks of the season, but it was a disappointing end. But our season’s not over – that’s the good news.”
Contact: BG.Brooks@Colorado.EDU
Pac-12: Buffs Survive, Advance By Their Magic Number – 59
Mar 14th
By B.G. Brooks, CUBuffs.com Contributing Editor
LAS VEGAS – If you’re thinking the Colorado Buffaloes are stuck on 59, you might be onto something. But here in Sin City, where gambling is the big engine that could, that’s a long way from crapping out.
It’s a magnificent number, a winning number, for Tad Boyle and his revitalized crew.
The Buffs’ last three wins – against Stanford in the next-to-last regular-season game, against USC in the first round of the Pac-12 Tournament, against California in the quarterfinals – have been by the same score: 59-56.
The Buffs’ two wins here have ended in identical, nail-biting, fist-gnawing fashion: CU is up by three in the closing seconds and survives a 3-pointer to tie at the buzzer.
In racehorse college basketball, 59 points are not a lot. Boyle’s guys love to run and score, but that’s not how this team – this season – has evolved after Spencer Dinwiddie’s knee injury in mid-January. In their last seven games, the Buffs haven’t hit 70 points, with 65 in a one-point overtime loss at Cal the high mark.
That’s the longest low-scoring stretch in Boyle’s about-to-be-completed four seasons in Boulder. But here’s the more telling bottom line number: Boyle’s fourth CU team has won 23 games (10 losses), making this season the second-most productive in terms of wins in school history. (His first two Buffs teams finished with 24 wins.)
And turning to something more topical since it’s the month of madness, those 23 wins should remove any mystery – if there was any – that might have shrouded CU’s inclusion in the NCAA Tournament field. Selection Sunday looms for the official word, but the word will be good. Book it.
But Friday finds the Buffs with things other than the NCAA Tournament on their minds. They have a semifinal date at 7:06 p.m. MDT with top-seeded and fourth-ranked Arizona in the MGM Garden Arena. Upsetting the Wildcats, then winning the Pac-12 championship on Saturday would remove all Selection Sunday mystery about the Buffs’ NCAA future; the tournament champ is in automatically.
Accomplishing that begins with beating powerful Arizona, whose players defend like they were guarding loved ones from a home invasion.
“They took a lot of pride in guarding us . . . we got punched in the mouth by a really good basketball team and we saw Arizona, I think, at their finest,” Utah coach Larry Krystkowiak said Thursday after Arizona had clamped down on his team in a 71-39 quarterfinal win. The halftime score: 34-13. Utah’s Big Three – Jordan Loveridge, Brandon Taylor and Delon Wright – were a combined 1-of-16 from the field.
The Buffs know something about the Wildcats’ defense from their regular-season meetings. Arizona won 69-57 in Tucson, 88-61 in Boulder. The Wildcats give up points as willingly as the IRS gives away cash; they lead the Pac-12 in scoring defense, allowing 58.7 points a game.
That’s very close to CU’s magic number of late – 59 . . . Hmmmmm.
“They’re the best defensive team in our league,” Boyle said. “It’s not even close. They’re the best rebounding team in our league. It is close there.”
That’s because CU is at 37.9 boards a game, while Arizona is at 38.9.
In their two wins over the Buffs this season, the Wildcats leaped to large early leads – as they did against the Utes Thursday. CU fell behind 18-4 in Tucson and 22-5 in Boulder in what would end in the Buffs’ worst home loss of the Boyle era.
Whether it makes a difference or not Friday, this is a different CU team, a more focused team. Eli Stalzer, who stepped to the foul line Thursday in the final 6 six seconds and hit one of two critical free throws, said the Buffs have learned something about themselves and the high energy Boyle wants from them since a March 1 loss (75-64) at Utah.
“Now it seems like guys don’t think they can take plays off; every possession is important,” Stalzer said. “We’re all working hard to do our best.”
That’s partially attributable to the transformation of junior guard Askia Booker, who has averaged 16.3 points, 5.7 rebounds and 3 assists. He’s shooting 46.7 percent from the field (21-of-45). In the two Pac-12 Tournament games, he has averaged 19 points a game, 5 rebounds and 3.5 assists. He’s hit 50 percent from the field (16-of-32).
Maybe more important than the numbers, Booker’s composure has stood out. He’s become CU’s glue, if you will, which at one point in his career might have seemed improbable if not impossible.
Boyle said, as a coach, “you hope” a player develops like Booker has: “He’s had an interesting career; he’s grown up exponentially – especially since Spencer went down. He was thrown in the fire of a leadership role . . . he’s done a great job. And that’s what’s so gratifying about doing this job. You see young men come in, where they are as freshman not just physically and skill-wise but emotionally, spiritually and maturity-wise. He’s come a long way.”
So have the Buffs. Boyle’s second CU team (2011-12) won the inaugural Pac-12 Tournament in Los Angeles with a four-day, four-game run as a No. 6 seed. His fourth team, as a No. 5 seed, is within two wins of a repeat. Boyle doesn’t have near the veteran leadership on this team that was apparent in L.A., but he’s seen a similar trait develop over the last several weeks. That would ownership.
“You look at that team with Nate (Tomlinson), Carlin (Brown) and Austin (Dufault) – they took ownership down the stretch and made it happen,” he said. “Now, we had to win some close games there . . . but now we have to play one of the best teams in the country in the semis and we didn’t have to do that two years ago.”
I asked Boyle if his players would have any difficulty in blotting out those two regular-season losses to the Wildcats, particularly the one in Boulder that concluded ESPN’s College GameDay visit.
“I don’t know, we’ll see,” Boyle answered. “That’s a distant memory. It’s a new day, a new opportunity. The way our guys are playing right now and feeling about themselves, they want that opportunity, they relish it. We’re not going to play with a lack of confidence (Friday).”
Palm oil production a source of heat-trapping methane
Mar 13th
Methane leaks from palm oil wastewater
are a climate concern, CU-Boulder study says
are a climate concern, CU-Boulder study says
In recent years, palm oil production has come under fire from environmentalists concerned about the deforestation of land in the tropics to make way for new palm plantations. Now there is a new reason to be concerned about palm oil’s environmental impact, according to researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder.
An analysis published Feb. 26 in the journal Nature Climate Change shows that the wastewater produced during the processing of palm oil is a significant source of heat-trapping methane in the atmosphere. But the researchers also present a possible solution: capturing the methane and using it as a renewable energy source.
The methane bubbling up from a single palm oil wastewater lagoon during a year is roughly equivalent to the emissions from 22,000 passenger vehicles in the United States, the analysis found. This year, global methane emissions from palm oil wastewater are expected to equal 30 percent of all fossil fuel emissions from Indonesia, where widespread deforestation for palm oil production has endangered orangutans.
The methane bubbling up from a single palm oil wastewater lagoon during a year is roughly equivalent to the emissions from 22,000 passenger vehicles in the United States, the analysis found.
“This is a largely overlooked dimension of palm oil’s environmental problems,” said lead author Philip Taylor, a postdoctoral researcher at CU-Boulder’s Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research (INSTAAR). “The industry has become a poster child for agriculture’s downsides, but capturing wastewater methane leaks for energy would be a step in the right direction.”
The global demand for palm oil has spiked in recent years as processed food manufacturers have sought an alternative to trans fats.
For now, the carbon footprint of cutting down forests to make way for palm plantations dwarfs the greenhouse gases coming from the wastewater lagoons. But while deforestation is expected to slow as the focus shifts to more intensive agriculture on existing plantations, the emissions from wastewater lagoons will continue unabated as long as palm oil is produced, the researchers said.
However, the climate impact of the leaking methane could be mitigated by capturing the gas and using it to fuel power plants. Biogas technology has been used successfully for decades and it can produce renewable electricity at a cost that’s competitive with traditional fuels, the authors said.
The amount of methane biogas that went uncollected from palm oil wastewater lagoons last year alone could have met a quarter of Malaysia’s electricity needs. Tapping into that unused fuel supply could yield both financial and environmental benefits, the authors said.
Capturing methane at wastewater lagoons could be encouraged by making it a requirement before palm oil products can be certified as sustainable, the authors said. Current sustainability certifications do not address wastewater emissions.
Taylor, whose research typically focuses on carbon cycling in old-growth tropical forests, was inspired to do the analysis by undergraduate researcher Hana Fancher, who also is a co-author of the journal article. Fancher and Taylor were doing research in Costa Rica, where palm oil production is spreading, when Fancher became curious about how the oil was being processed.
“She has a wastewater background,” Taylor said. “She ended up doing an honors thesis on palm oil agriculture and wastewater emissions. This paper is an extension of that thinking.”
Other co-authors from CU-Boulder include Associate Professor Diana Nemergut, doctoral student Samantha Weintraub and Professor Alan Townsend, in whose lab the work was based. Other co-authors include Cory Cleveland of the University of Montana, William Wieder of the National Center for Atmospheric Research and Teresa Bilinski of St. Edwards University.
-CU-
