BearTalk

Friday is Pac-12 basketball media day. Among other things, the conference will reveal results of its annual preseason media poll.

Here is the ballot I submitted:

Cal is ranked No. 24 in the ESPN/USA Today preseason coaches poll.

North Carolina secured 30 of 31 first-place votes to easily top the coaches’ first poll of the season, Kentucky got the other first-place vote and is No. 2. Rounding out the top 5: Ohio State, UConn and Syracuse.

Other Pac-12 teams in the rankings are No. 16 Arizona and No. 20 UCLA.

Voters include Arizona State coach Herb Sendek and Randy Bennett of Saint Mary’s.

Cal will give fans their first chance to check out the basketball team with an open practice on Sunday, Oct. 30 at Haas Pavilion.

The event will run from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., including a post-practice autograph session,

I picked up two more college basketball annuals and Lindy’s has projected Cal to win the Pac-12 Conference and senior guard Jorge Gutierrez to earn conference player of the year honors.

Cal also is pegged No. 11 nationally by the magazine, the highest ranking we’ve seen from any publication.

“Mike Montgomery is coaching three of the best players in the conference,” veteran West Coast college hoops observer Frank Burlison writes in Lindy’s. “Jorge Gutierrez becomes a cult hero in Berkeley and below the border with a deep tourney run.”

(Burlison also admits he picked Cal to finish ninth in the Pac-10 last season, when they wound up tied for fourth).

Lindy’s remaining picks for the Pac-12: 2. Washington; 3. UCLA; 4. Arizona; 5. Oregon; 6. USC; 7. Stanford; 8. ASU; 9. OSU; 10. WSU; 11. Colorado; 12. Utah.

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Got my copy of Athlon Sports magazine today and Cal is tabbed to finish second behind UCLA in the Pac-12 Conference.  Arizona is picked third with Oregon fourth over Washington in a minor surprise.

The rest of the Pac: 6. OSU; 7. Stanford; 8. USC; 9. ASU; 10. Utah; 11. WSU; 12. Colorado.

Allen Crabbe and Jorge Gutierrez are part of Athlon’s five-man preseason all-conference team, joined by Reeves Nelson and Joshua Smith of UCLA and Terrence Ross of Washington. Crabbe is tabbed as the nation’s seventh-best scorer but, curiously, is left off a top-10 list of top shooters.

Cal’s Harper Kamp is a second-team pick, along with San Leandro HS grad Jared Cunningham of Oregon State.

The magazine picks UCLA’s Smith to win Player of the Year honors and Gutierrez as Defensive Player of the Year.

Athlon predicts the top five Pac-12 finishers will make the 68-team NCAA tournament final, with the Bears reaching the second round of the tournament.

Cal senior Jorge Gutierrez and sophomore Allen Crabbe are listed on the top-50 preseason list for the John R. Wooden Award, given each year to the nation’s top player.

The only other Pac-12 Conference players on the list are Reeves Nelson and Joshua Smith of UCLA.

BYU’s Jimmer Fredette won the award last season.

Here’s the Pac-12 Conference news release on the subject.

Courtesy of ESPN.com’s Andy Katz, here’s an interesting breakdown of the 50 candidates with anonymous comments on each from rival coaches.

The editors of Athlon Sports were asked to pick a potential surprise team in 2011-12, and the Bears were one of three names that surfaced.

The Pac-12 has posted its basketball pre-season prospectus and one of the tidbits included is a chart showing which opponents each school will “miss” during the conference schedule.

With two extra teams in the league this season, playing an 18-game conference schedule will require each school to miss two opponents at home and two on the road.

Looks to me like the schedule is favorable to the Bears.

Here’s why: Cal will miss playing the Arizona schools on the road and the Washington schools at home. If you consider Arizona, Washington and UCLA the three chief threats to Cal for the Pac-12 title, the schedule allows the Bears to miss playing two of the six matchups against those teams.

None of the other three schools misses more than one of the lead contenders.

The Pac-12 prospectus tells that us Cal returns 76.5 percent of its scoring from a year ago, tops in the conference.

There are no 1,000-point career scorers returning, but Cal senior Jorge Gutierrez ranks No. 2 among returnees in scoring (803 points), assists (287) and steals (109) while teammate Harper Kamp is fourth in scoring (740) and second in rebounds (373).

Blue Ribbon Yearbook has three Pac-12 Conference teams rated in its top-25, including the Golden Bears at No. 21. Arizona checks in at No. 10 and UCLA is No. 23.

Here’s the magazine’s full top-25:

BLUE RIBBON COLLEGE BASKETBALL YEARBOOK PRESEASON TOP 25

1.  North Carolina
2.  Kentucky
3.  Ohio State
4.  Syracuse
5.  Connecticut
6.  Duke
7.  Vanderbilt
8.  Pittsburgh
9.  Florida
10. Arizona
11. Kansas
12. Memphis
13. Louisville
14. Xavier
15. Wisconsin
16. Texas A&M
17. Florida State
18. Alabama
19. Baylor
20. Michigan State
21. California
22. Marquette
23. UCLA
24. Missouri
25. Michigan

Cal announced that season tickets for the upcoming 2011-12 campaign are on sale.

Click here to find the official link.