Arizona guard Nic Wise relaxes in the locker room before practice Wednesday at Verizon Center. After missing seven games, Wise has been back in the UA lineup for two weeks.

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WASHINGTON — Jordan Hill should be able to dunk over West Virginia's smallish interior defense tonight. Jerryd Bayless will not have to deal with huge, physical defenders.

Chase Budinger, Nic Wise and Jawann McClellan may get some tasty three-point looks over the Mountaineers' matchup zone defense, too.

But in the Arizona Wildcats' first-round NCAA tournament game against West Virginia at the Verizon Center tonight, matchups may be secondary to an advantage the short-handed Wildcats have not had much of this season:

They are healthy and rested.

Not only have Bayless and Wise been in the lineup together for two weeks now, getting a chance to reacquaint themselves with Arizona's effective down-sized offense, but the Wildcats also have had a full week off since they lost to Stanford in the quarterfinals of last week's Pac-10 tournament.

West Virginia has had only one day less to rest, having lost to Georgetown in the semifinals of the Big East tournament Friday, but the Mountaineers go solidly with eight men in their rotation. UA interim head coach Kevin O'Neill has been known to use just six or seven, if that, so rest is always at a premium.

"I think it's real beneficial," McClellan said. "We haven't been healthy in a long time. … We don't like to lose, but we got to rest a couple of extra days" because of the Stanford loss.

O'Neill let them take full advantage of the week, too. He first gave them three days off, then held brief full-intensity practices only on Monday and Tuesday morning. Wednesday was an easy day, physically: The Wildcats held walk-through drills Wednesday at Georgetown before going through their mandatory public shootaround at the Verizon Center.

"Coach has been taking it easy on us," forward Bret Brielmaier said.

In addition, the Wildcats are allowed to keep on their normal body clocks, being assigned late practices and game times at what are essentially normal Tucson times.

Their travel was a cakewalk, too. The Wildcats boarded a charter flight at Tucson International Airport after practice Tuesday morning and arrived at their hotel about five hours later.

A trip to Washington State takes nearly twice as long, and even trips to any of the Pac-10's schools except USC and UCLA are more involved than this week's, because the Wildcats do not charter and usually must make a connection or bus trip from Tucson.

So by the end of the shootaround Wednesday night, the Wildcats were rested and good-natured enough to put together an impromptu dunk contest. Bayless, Budinger and McClellan also appeared in good spirits during their Wednesday news conference.

"I feel a lot fresher than I have been the whole year," Bayless said. "It definitely makes a lot of difference."

Bayless has had the longest time to recover from injury: He missed four games around New Year's because of a knee sprain he suffered the night before the UA lost at Memphis on Dec. 29.

Wise returned two weeks ago at Oregon State after undergoing surgery for a torn meniscus Feb. 6. Brielmaier has been in and out of the rotation since suffering a sprained shoulder Dec. 22 — a significant injury for him because the use of his shoulder is critical to his valued screening abilities.

But Brielmaier said his shoulder feels fine and that his teammates' condition will make a difference tonight.

"Our bodies are fresh," Brielmaier said. "We have fresh legs, which helps on the defensive end, because that's where guys sometimes take off when they're tired."

Since January, the Wildcats are 4-1 during the first of two games during a week when both Wise and Bayless are healthy. That one loss was Jan. 17 at Stanford when Bayless was in only his second game back and struggled with shoe problems.

So tonight, that Arizona record with a fully rested, complete lineup since New Year's could move to 5-1.

Maybe.

"We had 24 hours more" rest than West Virginia, O'Neill said. "I don't know if that helps or not. Both teams should be pretty well rested. Both teams should be ready to play their best basketball. And hopefully it will be a great basketball game."