Although Ohio’s Miami University wants to play the Cinderella role in the NCAA Tournament, its season has already been an improbable story after the team reached March Madness on a last-second prayer.
Senior Doug Penno’s three-pointer Saturday gave the Redhawks an automatic berth into the tournament, beating Akron University 53-52 in the Mid-American Conference tournament on a play that took nearly 10 minutes to review after fans had stormed the court.
Miami coach Charlie Coles, who went into cardiac arrest during a MAC tournament game nine years ago, didn’t know if his team had won, he was too busy dealing with the mass hysteria following the basket.
“I was just unruly,” Coles said to the AP after the game. “I almost got in three fights.”
With that type of finish in its conference championship, the drama in the first-round game against Oregon will be hard to match. Should the Redhawks prevail, however, it’ll only add on to what’s been a magical stretch of games.
“It’s a good chance for us to surprise a lot of people,” forward Nathan Peavy said.
The Redhawks (18-14 overall, 10-6 MAC) know they’re going into the game as underdogs having lost 10 of its first 15 games and having lost to last-place Bowling Green University (13-18, 3-13) in its regular season finale.
Still, Miami proved it’s capable of catching fire when the team won its three games in the MAC tournament and sent regular-season conference-champion Akron (26-7, 13-3) packing.
“It doesn’t matter how they got here,” Oregon coach Ernie Kent said. “We’re all here now and anybody can beat anybody at this level.”
The Redhawks played three other NCAA Tournament teams this year and lost to each. In the second game of the season, they lost to No. 22 Kentucky 57-46, lost on Nov. 24 to Illinois 51-49 and Xavier beat them 68-53 on Nov. 29. Although each of those teams was a challenge for Miami, Coles said that the Ducks’ athleticism will be something they haven’t seen all year.
“Those guys are slow compared to (the Ducks),” Coles said to the Oxford Press. “They’re explosive. We’ll be tested. This will be the supreme test.”
Kent said Oregon, despite being the favorite, needs a complete game if it wants move past the first round. Miami’s defense has stifled many of its opponents and may try to limit the Ducks’ speed on the court.
“The majority of their defense is man-to-man,” Kent said. “And they’re really good at what they do.”
Kent said the defense forces its opponents to find shots beyond the key and that’s something that has happened to Oregon before.
“They sit in the driving lanes, very similar to what Washington State did to us,” Kent said. “They really sit in so they don’t allow you a lot of easy buckets. You don’t get driving layups. You don’t get a lot of post-up stuff. You don’t get a lot of second shots because they do a really good job of blocking out.”
Although Miami’s defense may limit opponents to score below its season average, an ESPN scouting report says that its offense isn’t nearly as complex. The report said the Redhawks lose when “an opposing team surrounds (junior forward Tim) Pollitz (the leading scorer) and forces his teammates to beat them.”
The Ducks will hold a normal practice today in Eugene before boarding a chartered flight to Spokane tonight around 6 p.m. They’ll practice Thursday at Gonzaga University and then have 45 minutes in Spokane Arena, the site of Friday’s first-round game, where they’ll perform shooting drills and hold press conferences.
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