While the Emerald was on break, Oregon athletics stayed busy during students’ time away from the classroom. The football team won the Sun Bowl convincingly, the men’s basketball team traveled to Nebraska and Michigan and the women’s basketball team visited Cancun.
Football
After finishing the season with a three-game losing streak and having not won a bowl game since 2001, the Oregon football team didn’t let its past performances dictate the result of the 2007 Sun Bowl.
The Ducks came out with the same offensive firepower that it showcased throughout most of the season, beating South Florida 56-21. The Oregon offense operated like the machine it was when senior quarterback Dennis Dixon was at the helm before his season-ending knee injury halted Oregon’s national title hopes.
Knowing the offense was going to lean heavily on his performance, junior running back Jonathan Stewart, mostly healed from a turf-toe injury that plagued him in the final few regular season games, set the Sun Bowl’s rushing record with a career-high 253 yards in what could have been his final performance as a Duck.
Stewart has been asked multiple times about whether or not he will leave school a year early for the NFL and has given no indication as to which direction he’s leaning toward. Oregon coach Mike Bellotti has told Stewart to leave early if he’s assured of being a top-10 pick. Stewart should announce his decision in the coming days.
Bellotti, meanwhile, listened to UCLA about its coaching vacancy during the break before saying “No, thanks” shortly afterward. UCLA then hired former Washington and Colorado coach Rick Neuheisel.
Also during December, Oregon became one of the final schools that remain a choice for Terrelle Pryor, the No. 1-rated prep quarterback on several recruiting Web sites. While he hasn’t scheduled a visit to Eugene yet, he maintains that he’s interested in the Ducks’ football program.
And according to the Register-Guard, three freshmen have already enrolled at Oregon, including Darron Thomas, a four-star quarterback from Aldine, Texas. Also enrolled are Carson York and John Boyett.
Men’s basketball
The men’s basketball team went 3-2 in the month of December, dropping road games at Nebraska, 88-79 in overtime, and at Oakland (Mich.), 68-62, completing their fall from the top-25 and raising serious questions about the team’s ability to contend for the Pacific-10 Conference title, one of the toughest in the nation.
Oregon coach Ernie Kent said that the team’s main problems, in all three non-league losses, were on the defensive end of the floor.
“Offensively, we’ve been pretty good all year long, but defensively we just need to continue to get better,” he said. “It’s a learning process at that end of the floor.”
In the Ducks’ final non-league game, an 81-73 victory over Mount St. Mary’s, sophomore forward Joevan Catron suffered a torn plantar fascia ligament. He will be sidelined for three to six weeks with the injury. Junior transfer Frantz Dorsainvil took Catron’s place in the game and contributed 10 points and two rebounds.
“I had to step up and play big today,” Dorsainvil said. “I have tried to make plays on defense and show I can play out there.”
Defense is the key to Oregon’s success or failure this season, Kent has said on numerous occasions, and while Dorsainvil is an intimidating defensive presence in the post, he can’t do it alone.
“We need to play team defense,” Dorsainvil said. “Not just individual, but team.”
Women’s basketball
Oregon kept its suitcases handy with the entire month of December spent on the road. The Ducks finally returned to McArthur Court to host the Arizona schools last weekend – the first time Oregon had been home since beating Long Beach State on Nov. 29.
The Ducks enjoyed a rematch of last season’s Women’s National Invitational Tournament opponent in UC-Santa Barbara for the Papé Jam. UCSB, playing without injured post Jenna Green, were unable to stop Oregon center Ellyce Ironmonger, who had 17 points and 12 rebounds.
Oregon had the opportunity to measure itself against one of the country’s top programs when the Ducks visited then-No. 10 Baylor. Shooting a dismal 12 percent in the first half, Oregon fell behind 44-11 at halftime and lost 80-45. Taylor Lilley, Oregon’s leading scorer on the season, had only three points on 1-of-7 shooting.
The Ducks flew south for two games in the middle of December in the Caribbean Classic. In the first game, Lilley led three players in double-figure scoring with 14 points in the 68-58 loss to South Florida. A day later, Oregon overwhelmed Tulsa and earned a 67-56 win behind 24 points from Lilley. She made a career-high six three-pointers.
The Cancun trip signaled the end of non-conference play and Oregon jumped into the Pac-10 portion of the schedule with a visit to in-state rival Oregon State on Dec. 29. Oregon emerged from Corvallis victorious, 76-72, behind another big scoring effort from Lilley who had 21 points. Three other players reached double figures in Micaela Cocks, Tamika Nurse and Ironmonger.
Oregon, with the split against the Arizona schools, sits at 8-6 and 2-1 in the Pac-10 with a trip this week to the Bay Area to play California and Stanford, respectively.
