Altman will be bald soon unless he stays in the locker room until the first ten minutes of the games are over. The first two buckets the Ducks made were harder than the first half dozen or so misses. They seem to love digging a hole and made it ten points deep by half time. Whatever speech he delivered, probably very empathically, during half time he might think about delivering before the opening tip.
Playing against the team with the 5th best turnover rate in the country ... well they slipped a little in the standing before the game was over ... Oregon made it look like it was no intimidating factor to overcome. A team averaging 9.4 of them per game almost doubled that with slightly more than half of them, I think, coming in the second stanza. Oregon can play defense, yet not quite up to the coach's standard if you read between the lines during the post game interview with Williams.
I will say the Ducks have been working on their three point shots. In hindsight, their problems up to now might be related to all of the summer practice opportunity they didn't get. My guess is not many of them have regulation hardwood courts in their back yards, or access to any nearby ones during the shutdowns. Without having seen stats yet, I'd think they shot somewhere near an average game they played last season.
Duarte, almost the new Richardson, led those as he did in just about any way you might look at. He is clearly the best player on the roster while Williams pulled at least nose to nose with Omoruyi who sat more minutes than he played. Not sure what went on with that but it's between him and the coach. William dumped in 19 points and I'm guessing double digit rebounds. Duarte won conference player of the week last week and unless somebody else had a great week he could repeat with 27 and 25 point games which are only the most visible of his contributions. He leads the conference in steals and has had a half dozen 20 point games. I'd like to see where he stands in shooting percentage both from inside and outside the arc but I'm, as usual, too lazy to look.
In a nice contributing role Hardy showed reason why he was accepted as a transfer. If he can keep it up, Oregon will have yet another threat teams have to prepare for. As it is, there is no single player the Ducks seem to set up to make plays for, including Duarte. Franck Kepnang made his first appearance and, though I am sure he has a lot of talent, we can see why it has taken him a while to get on the court. I might be wrong but it appeared he was in the wrong spots on the floor more than on the right ones. It didn't take long for Altman to quietly replace him during a called time out. He was a freshman playing his first minutes of college hoops and they were likely a valuable lesson for him.
I could be wrong but I think Oregon is about to Jell. They clearly have read the memo that they need to play better defense. The second half result, beating the team they trailed by double digits after twenty minutes by an even larger double digit number, drove the point home. Improvement in shooting and shot selection, which should continue, makes this begin to look like typical Oregon late season Altman product. The time is right with the 'Zonas and the SoCals next on the schedule. UCLA and the Trojans are improving though I am not sure what is going on with the Wildcats and Devils. We'll see soon.
oregon.rivals.com
oregon.rivals.com
