The Oregon Ducks’ women’s basketball team was able to secure a bounce-back win over the Idaho Vandals 59-51 on Friday night. Despite the win, there were still signs for concern for the team which came off of two road losses prior to this matchup. Many of the issues that came up in the win against Idaho are issues that have plagued the Ducks all season.
The main issue was 3-point shooting. For a team that began the year leaning heavily into an outside-in approach that favored high volume three-point shots, Oregon has run ice cold as of late. A 1-8 3-point shooting performance in the loss to the No. 11 Baylor Bears was followed by a 1-11 showing against the Vandals. Both nights were well below the season average for the Ducks in attempts, which was 18 attempts-per-game before the Baylor contest. The decrease in attempts could be a sign of a shift in offensive focus, or it could be the product of moving away from a facet of the offense that is not working.
“We made one three tonight and I think we made one last game,” Kelly Graves, head coach of the Ducks, said about the shooting. “That’s not going to win very many games, not in this day and age.”
The other season-long woe that appeared again in Friday’s contest was turnovers. Oregon had 12 turnovers in the game, which is below its season average of 15.6, but most of the turnovers came off of bad passes. Idaho was able to use these turnovers to score 12 fastbreak points in the game. Passing has been a weakness for the Ducks so far this season, as they had just nine assists in the game, making this the third straight game that Oregon has finished with more turnovers than assists. For a team that does not move the ball at a particularly high rate, averaging just 14.0 assists per game, the amount of live-ball turnovers coming off of bad passes is concerning.
Despite some of the negatives from the contest, there were some promising things to come from the game. The emergence of Phillipina Kyei as a post scorer has given a nice breath of fresh air to the Oregon offense. Kyei tied her career-high with 16 points, making this the third time already this year she has reached that total. Kyei also set a season-high with 17 rebounds in the game.
The focus of the Ducks appears to be taking a more inside-out approach, as opposed to the early season focus on guard-play and threes. This has allowed for Kyei to become a much more featured part of the offense thanks to her massive size advantage over most defenders.
One half of the low-scoring affair was due to an inefficient Oregon shooting night. However, the other side was the result of great Ducks defense. Oregon utilized both zone and man-to-man defense to constantly throw new looks at the Vandals. The Ducks had five blocks and four steals on the night, but that number could have been way higher. Oregon was active in the passing lanes all game, tipping passes and forcing ball-handlers to pick up their dribble. Sofia Bell especially excelled at that. She had just one steal, but she affected more than a few passes and forced a couple turnovers that would not directly show up on the stat sheet.
Overall, the Ducks were able to get back into the win column despite some poor offense. The defense, which seems like it might be the Oregon calling card this year, was able to erase many of the mistakes on the offensive end.
“Defense is what’s going to win us most of our games, so we’re just putting a lot of emphasis on it,” Chance Gray said about the defensive play.
After two straight losses on the road, a home victory for the Ducks could be exactly what they need to get some momentum heading into the rest of the season.
