One must give Oregon credit.
When the Ducks miss, they miss big.
Oregon went long on three-point attempts, but came up short in an 86-75 loss to Arizona State in front of a sold-out McArthur Court on Saturday night.
The Ducks attempted a school record 38 three-pointers and connected on 14.
“We didn’t make enough three’s,” Oregon forward Luke Jackson said. “We thought they might zone us because they did it before up here. We just didn’t handle it very well.”
Oregon (12-9 overall, 7-7 Pacific-10 Conference) didn’t handle it at all. That led to the Ducks’ third loss at Mac Court this season — the most in a single season since 2000-01 — and second in a row in Eugene.
The discrepancies on the statistics sheet between the two teams were big. Arizona State corralled 40 rebounds to Oregon’s 27. The Ducks committed 27 fouls — 18 in the second half — which led to 36 Arizona State free throw
attempts.
The Sun Devils made 26. Ike Diogu had 13 attempts, hitting on nine. He made three more than the Ducks even attempted.
In other words, it was a cold night in Eugene.
“With everything at stake on the line, I expected us to play sharper basketball,” Oregon head coach Ernie Kent said. “The blame falls on me for not having my team ready to play. As big as this game was, I thought we could have given a better effort. Ultimately, they wanted it more than we did and played key basketball at key times.”
As much of a step forward the Ducks took against Arizona in a loss Thursday, they took an even farther step backward Saturday.
The presence of Aaron Brooks in the first half did little to quell offensive jitters. Despite jumping out with nine points — on three three-pointers — in the first two minutes, the Ducks succumbed to Arizona State down the stretch.

The Sun Devils (10-14, 4-11) came back and took a one-point lead five minutes in. Four minutes later, Arizona State started a stretch run that kept Oregon scoreless for five minutes.
All the while jumping out to a four-point lead that it never fully relinquished.
“I thought our team did a good job of managing the game,” Arizona State head coach Rob Evans said. “They showed patience. When you do that, you give your club a chance to win ball games.”
While the Sun Devils showed patience, the Ducks did not. En route to the 38 three-point attempts, Oregon showed little poise down low. The Ducks’ big men — Ian Crosswhite, Mitch Platt, Jay Anderson and Matt Short — combined for 21 points and 10 rebounds.
Diogu had 23 points and 12 rebounds on his own.
“They hit some big shots, killed us on the boards and had a lot of second-chance points,” Kent said.
Jackson had 16 points two days after a career-high 42 against Arizona. He shot 6 of 13 from the floor and was a key piece of the offensive puzzle that Arizona State focused on during the game.
The Sun Devils didn’t disappoint. Jackson scored just seven points in the second half.
“We knew where he was,” Evans said. “We were going to make sure we knew where he and (James) Davis were.”
Which, Jackson would say, is frustrating.
“For me, every game is just so important,” Jackson said. “It’s hard not to put everything I have into every game.”
Davis picked up some of the slack left by Jackson, scoring 18 points on the strength of 6 of 15 shooting from beyond the three-point line. The 15 attempts tied a school-record.
“This was a big game,” Davis said. “We let a lot of opportunities get away from us. They’re trying to fight their butt off to get to the Pac-10 (Tournament).”
Now comes the hard part. With California losing to Southern California on Saturday, the Ducks remain in a tie for fourth place with the Golden Bears in the Pac-10.
But unlike most years, a fourth place finish in the conference will not suffice when aiming for the NCAA Tournament.
The consensus is that the Ducks need to win their last four games — including road contests against Stanford and California — and win the Pac-10 Tournament to get a bid.
That will be tough, to say the least.
“We’ve just got to fight,” Davis said. “We haven’t been playing with a sense of urgency. We have to have more fire when we’re out there.
“We’ve got to play for ourselves and our pride.”
Four games are left to prove that.