The Front Row with MARK NELKE March 29, 2012

I did not stay up to watch the Mariners opener Wednesday morning.

But I did wake up and started watching in the sixth inning, the score tied at 1. The M’s woke up four innings later, winning 3-1 in 10 innings.

Between the sixth and the 10th, it looked like the M’s of recent years — nasty pitching, ugly hitting. The A’s apparently de-emphasized hitting in their organization years ago, so they didn’t pose much of an offensive threat either.

The two M’s that can hit — Dustin Ackley, and Ichiro — did hit, with Ackley driving in two runs and Ichiro, who looks like one of those veteran slowpitch softball players who can serve the ball wherever they want, getting four hits.

Felix pitches eight strong innings and gets a no-decision — where have we seen that before?

REMEMBER, THE newest member of the West Coast Conference is the University of the Pacific in Stockton, Calif. — not Pacific University, which is in Forest Grove, Ore. Keep that in mind, Zag fans, when you make your travel plans for the 2013-14 men’s basketball season.

Conference roulette happens so often anymore that we’ve just resigned ourselves that our favorite leagues will never remain the way they always have been.

The Pacific-8 became the Pac-10 and, now, the Pac-12 — and was very nearly the Pac-16. The Big East looks way different now than when it opened in 1979 featuring men’s basketball.

(Speaking of leagues, is there going to be one for Idaho if the Western Athletic Conference continues to get raided by the Mountain West and other conferences?)

Anyway, Pacific will give the West Coast Conference 10 teams — assuming BYU sticks around. Even if BYU is just idling in the WCC until a better offer comes along, at least the Cougars provided another team to challenge Gonzaga and Saint Mary’s in men’s basketball.

Hopefully Pacific can do the same. The Tigers, who play their final season in the Big West Conference in 2012-13, are coming off an 11-19 season, but have won 20 games seven times in the last 10 seasons.

They’ve played in the NCAA tournament eight times, the last three coming in 2004, ’05 and ’06. I saw the ’06 team in Salt Lake City give Boston College all it wanted — back when B.C. was pretty good — before falling in overtime.

Pacific plays in the Alex G. Spanos Center, which seats 6,150. Gonzaga’s McCarthey Athletic Center (6,000) was the biggest arena in the conference until BYU (with its 22,700-seat Marriott Center) joined in 2011.

IF KENDALL Marshall hadn’t broken his wrist, I probably would have had much more of a rooting interest in the Final Four.

But with no North Carolina in New Orleans this weekend, I’m not sure who to pull for.

Do you root for the Kentucky One-and-dones, so coach John Calipari wins the national title he should have won in 2008 with Memphis, if the Tigers had only made a few more free throws down the stretch?

Or Louisville, which would mean coach Rick Pitino would have beaten his former school in the semifinals, and won with a roster where you’d be hard-pressed to name more than one player on it?

Or Ohio State, so Zag fans could say they lost to the team that went on to win the national title?

Or Kansas, which beat Memphis in that ’08 title game, and is back in the Final Four with a group of largely unknown players?

IN THE Women’s Final Four, I will root for Stanford, but I think Baylor is too big, too quick, and will win it all. Maybe the Brittany Griners will even trot out some neon green uniforms like their men’s team wore in the tournament.

I remember years ago when Stanford was the destination of choice for the top high school players on the West Coast. If you were good enough to be considered by Stanford, you were pretty good.

Since then, some of the top local players went to Arizona State and, more recently, are going to Gonzaga.

Funny to see UConn in a Final Four and no one is talking about them winning the title this year. They’ve only won seven national titles in the last 17 seasons.

Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2019, or at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter at CdAPressSports.