All year long, Oregon head coach Dana Altman has preached to his team about defense.
When the Ducks faced the USC Trojans tonight, and with the game on the line, it wasn’t Joseph Young’s scoring or Elgin Cook’s driving that made the difference. The Ducks got the job done on defense by limiting the Trojans to just six points over the final 5:40 to earn the 75-67 win.
“While we try and put things together, you just got to try and find a way to win ballgames,” Altman said. “We are a work in progress — still have a tremendous amount of work left to do.”
With the win, Oregon is now 13-6 overall and 3-3 in Pac-12 play while USC falls to 9-9 overall and 1-5 in the conference.
“It was definitely a big win, especially coming after a loss,” Oregon’s Jalil Abdul-Bassit said. “We just got to keep bouncing back and keep getting better every day.”
Young led four Ducks in double figures with 19 points, while Cook added 15. Dillon Brooks had 12 and Abdul-Bassit finished with 11. Jordan Bell led Oregon with a game-high 13 rebounds to go with his four assists and three blocks.
Led by the effort of Abdul-Bassit, the Ducks really turned up the intensity on the defensive side of the ball after USC tied the game at 61 with 5:40 to play in the game.
USC’s Katin Reinhardt had helped lead the Trojans comeback by hitting three three-pointers and hitting open teammates for the shot in the second half, but once Abdul-Bassit checked back into the game, Reinhardt struggled to find the hoop and was held scoreless over the final 10:20 of the game.
“I wanted to make him put it on the floor,” Abdul-Bassit said of defending Reinhardt. “It seemed like he was getting as many baskets or as many points going to the basket — a lot of his points came from three-pointers.”
The game couldn’t have started better for Oregon as the Ducks opened up with a 16-2 run over the first 3:47 of the game. They saw every starter score over that time span.
Although Oregon allowed USC to battle back to cut the deficit to 36-30, the Ducks closed out the half with an 8-1 run to take a 44-31 lead at the break.
The second half saw the Ducks struggle mightily from the field as they shot 24-percent (6-for-25) in the half and 14.3-percent (1-for-7) from three-point territory. What saved Oregon was its ability to get to the free throw line 23 times in the half, making 18 of them to really pull away late in the game.
Oregon will play host to UCLA on Saturday at 1 p.m. in a game that both teams need to win if they want to keep their slim NCAA tournament hopes alive.
“We need these two games to be back up in the Pac-12 standings,” Brooks said. “We can solidify ourselves as a great team.”
Follow Ryan Kostecka on Twitter @Ryan_Kostecka
Oregon men’s basketball snaps losing streak with big win over USC
Ryan Kostecka
January 21, 2015
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