Last season, Arizona shocked the women's college basketball world by going on a remarkable run in the NCAA tournament and coming up one shot away from a national title. The team fell to Pac-12 Conference opponent Stanford.
Since that deep run, Arizona lost its star guard Aari McDonald to the WNBA draft leaving many people in the game questioning who will be the team's go-to player now that its best player has moved on.
That question seems to be on the minds of coaches in the Pac-12 as well. Tuesday morning, the Pac-12 released its preseason coaches poll for the 2021-22 season with the Wildcats falling all the way down to fifth in the conference.
The top vote-getter was defending national champions Stanford, which received 11 of the 12 possible first-place votes. After the Cardinal, the rest of the top-five went Oregon, UCLA, Oregon State, and Arizona, in that order.
The difference in the placement of Oregon State and Arizona was narrow, the Beavers received 86 points while the Wildcats received 83 to put them in fifth.
During coach Adia Barnes' tenure with Arizona, the Wildcats have taken an underdog "us against the world" mentality, and this season looks like there won't be a change of mindset.
PAC-12 PRESEASON COACHES POLL
1. Stanford (11 first-place votes) – 121 points
2. Oregon (1) – 108
3. UCLA – 101
4. Oregon State – 86
5. Arizona – 83
6. Washington State – 70
7. Colorado – 65
8. Arizona State – 47
9. USC – 45
T-10. Utah – 25
T-10. Washington – 25
12. Cal – 16
Should Arizona have been higher on the list? GOAZCATS.com staff writer Troy Hutchison gives his thoughts on the poll and where he would have placed the Wildcats in his version of the poll.
Watch his full breakdown of the list in the video below.
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