CORVALLIS — In the darkness of night, inside a bus driving in the right lane of southbound Interstate-5, the television sets all flickered the same motions.
Play.
Stop.
Rewind.
Play.
It was 10:30 p.m. Saturday, and the bus was filled with the Oregon men’s basketball team, which was traveling the 47 miles from Corvallis to Eugene.
Oregon had just beat Oregon State, 63-51, but instead of rejoicing over its Civil War triumph, Ernie Kent wasted no time in going over the game film with his team to show them what they did right and what needed improvement.
Oregon’s win Saturday, its fourth straight, kept the Ducks (14-4) atop the Pacific-10 Conference standings, tied with Southern California at 6-1 in league play. The Ducks equaled their win total from 2001 and topped their five league victories from last year.
And Monday, the team climbed four spots to No. 19 in the Associated Press poll.
But for this year’s Ducks , what they do next matters most. The next game is always “a big game,” and putting the past behind them has helped the Ducks rebound from the consecutive December defeats to Massachusetts, Portland and Minnesota.
“Those three losses toughened us up as a basketball team,” Kent said.
When Oregon ended its season in Gill Coliseum last March, it hoped for an NIT berth that would never come. After their latest visit to their in-state rivals, the Ducks spoke not of the NIT, but of the NCAA Tournament. Their voices were filled with confidence instead of just hope.
“We’re in control of our own destiny now,” senior Freddie Jones said. “I want to take this thing as far we can take it. That’s our main goal. As long as we keep taking care of business, it’ll all take care of itself.”
Jones led Oregon’s workmanlike victory against Oregon State with a solid 16-point outing, while Luke Jackson contributed 15.
But the real spark for Oregon, continuing its trend of balanced scoring, came from forward Robert Johnson, who helped set the tone early by scoring six of the Ducks’ first 10 points. Johnson finished with 12 points, 11 rebounds and three blocks, giving him an early birthday present as the junior celebrated his 21st Sunday.
“It was a great team game,” Johnson said. “We neutralized them in the beginning and kept going.”
Johnson’s hot start was followed by a Jones reverse alley-oop dunk off a pass from Luke Ridnour. On Oregon’s next possession, Jones knocked down two free throws to give the Ducks a 14-2 lead with 13:20 to play in the first half that the Beavers could never fully recover from.
“We were ready to play this game from the beginning and it showed,” Jackson said. “From beginning to end, we controlled the tempo.”
Even when that tempo didn’t involve running the fast break.
Oregon State, like California and Stanford the week before, slowed the game down and forced Oregon to play in the halfcourt. And like the games against the Bay Area schools, the Ducks adjusted to the different style of play and found a way to win.
The Beavers kept up the slower pace throughout the second half and made runs to close the lead to single digits, but the Ducks always kept them at arm’s length.
“Yes, we like to run, that’s our forte, but we want to show people that we are a very versatile team that, when we need to play halfcourt, we can play halfcourt,” Kent said.
Oregon’s biggest advantage in the game was a 50-34 lead, but the Beavers closed to within 51-44 with eight minutes to play, which turned up the volume among the 9,479 fans at Gill Coliseum.
From there, though, the Ducks made key defensive stops and outscored the Beavers 12-7 to “grind out the win,” as Kent would say later.
Oregon State’s Philip Ricci was the only Beaver scoring double digits, with 12 points. Forward Brian Jackson only picked up six while dealing with foul trouble. The Beavers (8-9, 1-6) have been competitive in most of their games, but don’t have the wins to show for their effort.
“We’re not that bad a team,” said Jackson, the Beavers’ forward. “There’s just been a few stretches in games that have hurt us. Wins will come.”
For Oregon, the wins have been coming and they probably will continue to this weekend when the Ducks visit the Washington schools, which are a combined 1-15 in league play.
After jumping out to a 6-1 Pac-10 start for just the second time in 63 years, the Ducks aren’t taking anything for granted. Their sights are set high and they don’t want to slip, as they have already in their loss at Arizona State.
So the sight of a late-night video session aboard a bus on a freeway shouldn’t be too surprising when realizing what potentially lies ahead in the coming months.
“I’m not saying we’re there yet, but we’re certainly on our way,” Kent said. “We’ve got a target on us now, but that’s OK.
“We want to run with this thing.”