ALTERING COURSE?
Buffs hoping to change trajectory of season in showdown against Oregon
The first three weeks of the Pac-12 Conference schedule have been too erratic for a Colorado men’s basketball team still aiming to play a significant role in the league race.
Oregon, much like the Buffaloes, limped into conference play while dealing with injuries to key personnel. The Ducks, though, have been the surprise team of the early portion of league play.
Meanwhile, the Buffs, who dealt with key injuries for more than a month, are hoping playing a second consecutive game with the top seven players of their rotation leads to improved consistency as they attempt to reset their conference trajectory on Thursday night in a key matchup against the Ducks at the CU Events Center.
At 5-0, Oregon is the only Pac-12 team with an unbeaten conference record. At 3-3, the Buffs have performed below expectations so far, but a return to health combined with a win on Saturday against USC that snapped a three-game losing streak has them eyeing what would be a critical win against an Oregon program that has lost 11 of its 12 games at CU.
“I’m glad everyone’s back. Everyone’s healthy. So we’ve just got to get in synch a little bit,” CU wing Luke O’brien said. “I think the first half of USC we were kind of just out of synch. We were able to turn that around in the second half. I think the guys that were playing when people were injured got better, too. So that’s always a plus. With the guys that were injured coming back, we were out of synch a little bit. But we’ll get that back for sure.”
CU goes into the matchup still leading the Pac-12 in field goal percentage (.501), 3-point percentage (.390) and free throw percentage (.766), but it has gotten to the stage of the season in which some of those numbers can be deceiving. The Buffs compiled the bulk of those statistics against overmatched competition at home during nonconference play, while the Ducks are the team that has turned it on since the start of the Pac-12 schedule.
Although it remains a only a six-game sampling for the Buffs within the Pac-12, in conference games CU began the week ranked only sixth in field goal percentage (.452) and eighth in 3-point percentage (.352). Oregon, meanwhile, ranks sixth overall with a .472 field goal percentage and fifth with a .367 3-point mark but, through their first five conference games, the Ducks ranked third in field goal percentage (.479) and second in 3-point percentage (.417).
The Ducks also have shot just .688 this season at the free throw line, ranking 10th among Pac-12 teams. Yet in league games Oregon has posted a Pac-12-best .750 mark.
The Ducks have leaned heavily on a pair of freshmen big men in Kwame Evans Jr. — who has assumed the primary post spot with N’faly Dante sidelined by a knee injury for most of the season — and Jackson Shelstad, who has been one of the most consistent rookies in the conference so far.
“I’ve just seen growth,” CU head coach Tad Boyle said. “They’ve been playing a lot of freshmen. They’ve had injuries, like we’ve had injuries. You just see a team that maybe was really young, with Kwame Evans and Jackson Shelstad and some newer players, who were still trying to adjust to college basketball because they’re freshmen. Now they’re (16) games in. They’re figuring it out. They’re starting to play better.
“They’re well-coached. They know what they do. They do what they do and they do it well.”