by Don Smalley
DSN Contributor
January 5, 2008

I’m never one to say, “I told you so.” I thought Oregon had a really good chance of winning at Arizona after watching the ‘Cats play the Beavers and taking the positives from the ASU loss and hoping the Ducks would build on those.

As it turned out, that happened. Oregon played the game we all know they are capable of playing. They moved the ball around and got the open jumper, just as they did in Tempe. Only in Tucson, those shots went down. The Ducks exploited Arizona’s unwillingness to move on defense. They pushed the ball after an Arizona made shot and caught the Wildcats off-guard.

But in the world of sports, you just never know what will happen. Arizona might have figured out that you need to hustle on the defensive end in the Friday practice and apply that on Saturday. They might have figured out to take the open shot instead of dribbling into the defense and see if they can make the athletic move and incredible shot. Oregon’s three-pointers might have not found the mark … again.

Fortunately for the Ducks, what was on the proverbial paper came to fruition. Oregon was not going to go 2-for-17 from behind the arc again. Instead, they went 10-for-22. Bryce Taylor found his stroke early and Malik Hairston hit some open threes as well. Even Churchill Odia knocked down a few.

But the story of the game was the maturation process I witnessed in Kamyron Brown. He had a rough night at Arizona State. But at Arizona, in the McHale Center, Brown looked solid. He gave what the defense gave him. He was able to slash to the hoop and finish. After one drive, I told my niece that looked exactly like Aaron Brooks. Brown did not force any shots. On one possession, he came down and nobody picked him up. He calmly stepped up to the three-point line and knock down the trey. Brown is not afraid.

Another bright spot was that while Arizona was making a late-game run to pull itself back into it, like we all knew was coming, the Ducks played calm and composed, making the necessary plays they needed to in order to get the 10-point win.

Not many teams will go to Arizona and do that. UCLA might, but that’s it. I don’t see anyone else beating the Wildcats at home. Once Arizona figures it out, they will be dangerous.

But it looks like Oregon has figured a few things out. Now let’s see if they can further improve with two big home games against Cal and Stanford. Mac Court needs to be rocking. I’m sure it will be.

Tags: Basketball, Don Smalley, Ducks, oregon