Sean Miller on if Arizona is an NCAA Tournament team: ‘No’

Sean Miller will defend his Arizona program with force if he feels it’s been wronged — Google “he touched the ball” for one example.

But the UA head coach only defends his program when it’s deemed unfair criticism. So asked on Tuesday to assess whether his 14-7 Arizona team coming off two blowouts looks the part of an NCAA Tournament squad, Miller’s answer was brief.

“No,” Miller told reporters at his weekly press conference.

Those past two games certainly have played a part in Miller and his players decidedly agreeing with the masses.

Ira Lee when asked if Arizona is an NCAA Tournament team: "After the past two games, would you think so?"

— Ryan Kelapire (@RKelapire) January 29, 2019

The Wildcats dropped a road outing against USC, 80-67, before losing to a down UCLA squad, 90-69, over the weekend.

It didn’t help Arizona that center Chase Jeter remained sidelined with a back injury, and his questionable status for Thursday’s matchup against Arizona State, which will air on 98.7 FM Arizona’s Sports Station and ESPN 620 AM, doesn’t bring a dose of certainty.

At present, the Wildcats are on the outside looking into the NCAA Tournament picture.

ESPN’s Joe Lunardi has Arizona as as “next four out” team. That’s also the consensus among the projections tracked by BracketMatrix.com, which as of Tuesday afternoon has Miller’s club in 10 of 91 brackets.

Safe to say that not many people — Miller included — believe Arizona can get into the Big Dance without a Pac-12 Tournament championship run.

Miller followed that up with basically saying Arizona needs to win the Pac-12 tournament in Las Vegas in March to make a seventh straight NCAA tourney bid. https://t.co/tAudTcr2AR

— AZ Desert Swarm (@AZDesertSwarm) January 29, 2019

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