Oregon’s men’s basketball team looked terrible in the first seven minutes against Alabama in the Maui Invitational’s first round.
Then something happened. I believe it was the bench play, namely Matt Humphrey to start everything going well. That seemed to ignite the starters, like Michael Dunigan and especially Joevan Catron.
And how about the resolve of this team? Down 12-3 with 13 minutes left, they stormed back. Tajuan Porter didn’t even score until about halfway through the second half, well after Oregon started its 53-33 second-half run that put the game on cruise control.
Here’s the start of the story I filed for Tuesday’s print edition.
Oregon turned a sloppy beginning to the first half into a convincing comeback win over Alabama in the first round of the Maui Invitational Monday night, beating Alabama 92-69.
Oregon found itself down 12-3 with 13:33 left in the first half but a strong run by the Ducks’ bench players, including two three-pointers by freshman Matt Humphrey off the bench, sparked the rest of the lineup and cut the Crimson Tide lead to 14-11 with 12 minutes remaining.
The Ducks advance to today’s 6 p.m. semifinal against No. 1 North Carolina and took an important step in evolution of a young team while doing it in the national spotlight.
“They still make a lot of mistakes but they play with so much energy and passion that you just have to kind of let them go,” head coach Ernie Kent said. “During the course of the game they turned from boys and turned into men.”
For the first seven minutes of play, Oregon couldn’t have looked worse, hitting one of their first six shots with double Alabama’s turnovers during that span. The Crimson Tide used the senior leadership of Alonzo Gee and Ronald Steele to overpower the young Ducks at times, including an alley-oop dunk to Gee in the first five minutes that exemplified all of Oregon’s struggles.
After the slow spurt it seemed to be going all Oregon’s way.
If you want to read more, feel free to check out dailyemerald.com later today.
Another thing: I wish I was in Hawaii, as is another print journalist I know. I’m writing two papers, instead, my finals a week and a half away.
