If the Oregon men’s basketball season is a giant game of Pictionary, then the Ducks are trying to draw an NIT bracket with “McArthur Court” written on it.
And the sand timer is close to running out.
Oregon backed itself into a major hole by losing to UCLA and Southern California last weekend in Eugene. The Ducks have three games remaining, all on the road and one against a top-10 opponent. Oregon will most likely need to win two games to reach the NIT.
“Our goal is simple: We need two wins,” Oregon head coach Ernie Kent said. “So we need to win a game this weekend.”
Of course, even the non-ranked foes will be tough matchups for the Ducks. Arizona State, Oregon’s Thursday opponent, defeated the Ducks by 27 points earlier this season.
Meanwhile, No. 9 Arizona has won six straight home games and, since losing to Stanford Jan. 6, has won 11 of its last 13. One of those losses came at the hands of Oregon Feb. 1.
Oregon State, the Ducks’ final opponent, has played tough recently, losing by three points to UCLA in overtime and defeating USC by 15 points last weekend.
So Oregon clearly wasted a golden opportunity in Saturday’s overtime loss to USC, because the NIT window just won’t get any larger.
Fired up
A buzzword at Oregon’s practice Tuesday was “intensity.”
Kent mentioned that the Ducks would need it to win in Arizona, Anthony Norwood mentioned that he thought the team had it, and Freddie Jones said the team might need a little more than they displayed in practice.
“We just need to play our game, with confidence,” Norwood said. “Today was good; we were intense [at practice].”
Norwood and Jones were two keys to the Ducks’ high-flying offense in Saturday’s overtime loss to USC. Norwood scored 16 points on 4-for-7 shooting from three-point land. Jones scored 20 points and got the Mac Court crowd into the game with incredible dunks and off-balance layups.
Oregon’s Freddie Jones knows he’ll need to be at the top of his game if the Ducks want to keep hope alive for an NIT bid.
Jones believes that the Ducks will need more intensity to beat the Arizona schools.
“Obviously it wasn’t enough against USC,” Jones said.
Homecoming
Norwood will return home this weekend.
The Tucson native has a history of performing well against his hometown buddies from Arizona.
Last season, Norwood started for the first time against the Wildcats in Tucson and notched 11 points, four rebounds and three assists. This season, Norwood scored 11 points again, going 5 of 5 from the line against Arizona in a 79-67 Oregon victory at Mac Court.
Norwood is looking forward to going home once more.
“It’s good to go back there and play against all my friends,” Norwood said. “We already played them once here, to break the ice, but they’re going to be fired up to see us again.”
Road blues
The Ducks have had bad luck on the road against top-25 teams recently.
Recently, of course, means the last 24 years.
Oregon has not defeated a top-25 team on that team’s home floor since Jan. 7, 1977, when the Ducks toppled No. 7 UCLA at Pauley Pavilion.
TV time-out
Thursday’s game between Arizona State and Oregon will not be broadcast on television, but will be broadcast on KUGN 590 radio. Saturday’s contest between Arizona and Oregon will be broadcast on the Oregon Sports Network, starting at 5 p.m. Pacific Time.
