Arizona 70 vs. Oregon 57 Recap

by joenewby4040 on Feb 12, 2010 5:31 AM PST in Basketball Comment 2 comments

Arizona beat Oregon on Thursday night 70-57 at the McKale Center in Tucson. It was just another upward swing in this roller coaster season for the Cats. After losing both games in the Pacific Northwest to Washington and Washington State, the Cats rebounded by extending a 36-28 halftime lead into a 52-33 lead within the first 6:00 of the first half.

Derrick Williams scored 11 of his 20 points in the first 3 1/2 minutes of the second half and the game was seemingly out of reach for the Ducks at after that point. Williams was 8-10 from the floor, scoring 20 points and grabbing 6 rebounds. Nic Wise had 10 points and 4 rebounds with only 2 assists on the night. Lamont Jones, who has been coming on strong in the last week, had 11 points on 5-8 shooting and also had 6 rebounds.

I wonder how long this is going to go on? The Pac-10, obviously weak this year, continues to beat up on each other round after round and any night is anybody's game. Arizona missed their opportunity to break away from the Pac last week in Washington but has a chance to try to get on a roll again by beating Oregon State on Saturday.

Coach Miller thinks that the beginning of the 2nd half was the best basketball we have played all year:

"The way we played at the beginning of the second half really was as well as we've played all season. We did very well at converting from defense to offense. We were very unselfish. That run at the beginning of the second half was very exciting, and it was really fueled by our unselfishness on offense and our ability to get some good defensive stops. We consistently got better in the first half, but it was definitely that run in the first four to six minutes of the second half that set us apart."

Lamont Jones sure has been playing good as of late. I wonder what lit a fire under him to step up and get it done?

Next up: Arizona vs. Oregon State. McKale Center, 8:00 Eastern.

Quick Stat: Freshmen scored the first 32 of Arizona's 34 second half points.

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Didn't get to see this one...

Getting too old for that 10:30 EDT tip.

Good to see the kiddies taking care of bidness at home. The Cats won, but more than that they put a lesser team out of its misery it sounds like.

Two things we’re learning as the year goes on:

1. These Cats are learning how to grind it out. They hung around at Wazzu for a long time. Considering how often they just kept shooting themselves in the foot it was telling. It’s a different kind of tough than we’ve been accustomed to.

2. These Cats have a knockout punch. It looks different than Lute’s teams. You don’t so much get the 18-0, 22-3, explosive runs that just come from nowhere. Rather, when they’re right, these Cats soften an opponent up with “blows to the body” posting D-Will. Then they put you away with dagger threes. They can go from +4 to +12 and it doesn’t seem like the opponent quite realizes it. That’s how the ASU game felt.

"Those who fear disorder more than injustice inevitably produce more of both." -- Rev. William Coffin

by dcrockett17 on Feb 12, 2010 8:25 AM PST reply actions

there's a lot of good things going on

Last night there was a whole lot of unselfish play going on, guys were finding other ways to contribute. Fogg couldn’t find the buckey, but penetrated and dished better than I have ever seen him do so. Same was true with Wise and Horne, shotting touch was gone, but they kept breaking down the Duck D and ended up having DWill make a lovely series of dunks. Even Kyryl got involved with it. The D showed more signs of progress or perhaps it was a case of same D different refs but the whistles were mostly quiet last night and it was good to simply watch the team play.

MoMo is showing signs that if we don’t sign a PG in the next class that not all is lost. He’s playing under more control now and Hill and Parrom give us guys who can grind it out, handle the ball and board and make some mid range shots when they are available. Miller’s ability to adjust and coach have also been evident where the Ducks kept it close in the 1st half but had no adjustments to the Cats tweaks in the 2nd half.

Now if they can get it done against the Beavers, I’ll be happy to have watched them hold serve this weekend. The beavs match up well with us, like Wazzu does, so it will be interesting to see how motivated they are to put together a good game after that missed opportunity in Corvallis.

I used to be disgusted, now I try to be amused....

by piratedan7 on Feb 12, 2010 1:53 PM PST reply actions