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Sports Editor Hank Hager hankhager@dailyemerald.com Friday, January 23,2004 -Oregon Daily Emerald SPORTS Best bet NCAA basketball: Louisville vs. Tennessee 4 p.m. Sunday, ESPN Oregon takes first win at ASU since 2000 Oregon pulls out the 83-76 victory against Arizona State in Tempe with five Ducks racking up double figures in the win By Jesse Thomas Sports Reporter Oregon seniors Luke Jackson, James Davis and Jay Anderson finally got what they have been WIEN'S BASKETBALL waiting for the past three years; a win in Arizona State's Wells Fargo Arena. Oregon (9-4 overall, 4-2 Pacific-10 Conference) pulled out the 83-76 victory over the Sun Devils for its first win on the road in Tempe since the 1999-2000 season. The Ducks did everything they needed to from the very beginning and held off the Sun Devils when they made a strong run later. "It was a huge win to come down here where we haven't had a lot of success," Oregon head coach Ernie Kent told KUGN (590 AM) radio after the game. "They exe cuted perfectly in this ball game." Oregon's game plan was to contain Ari zona State's Ike Diogu, who entered the game as the conference's leading scorer with 23.1 points per game. In the first seven minutes, Oregon dou bled down on Diogu whenever he touched the ball and forced him to play defense. Diogu got two fouls early and had to sit on the bench for almost three minutes. It wasn't until the 6:30 mark in the first half that Diogu got his first two points. By that time, freshman Mitch Platt, who fin ished with a career-high 13 points, had his game going and Oregon led 28-16. It looked as if Oregon was going to pull away at one point, but Diogu managed to get his shots to fall. Alter 20 minutes, Oregon had a 34-28 lead and Jackson looked to be on his way to his third triple-double of his career with 10 points, nine assists and five rebounds. "In the first half we were outstanding," Kent said. In the second half, the teams matched points throughout as Arizona State made its mn. The Sun Devils had managed to pull off a win in the second half after over coming a 14-point deficit for the 100-85 win against USC Saturday. Jackson came out scoring eight of Ore gon's 12 points to start the half. He fin ished the game with 21 points, seven re bounds and a career-high 12 assists. Davis then got hot, scoring Oregon's next eight points with two three-pointers, pushing Oregon to the 54-50 lead. Davis finished the game with 15 points and three assists. Arizona State just kept coming. Junior guard Steve Moore hit back-to-back three pointers — one being a four-point play off a foul — for the Sun Devils to give them a 60-56 lead. It was the Sun Devils' first lead since be ing ahead by one point in the first few minutes of the game. Senior guard Andre Joseph came on when he had to. After having a rough game with few looks, Joseph got hot and hit two clutch threes. His second three pointer was under the three-minute mark and put Oregon up, 75-70. Turn to WIN, page 6 Late run gives 'Cats another win over Ducks The Ducks nearly upset the Wildcats but are done in by missed opportunities down the stretch; Oregon loses its sixth Pac-10 game For the second straight season, a talented Arizona team re ceived all it could handle during its trip to Eugene. at McArthur Court Thursday. Oregon (10-8, 2-6) led by as many as six down the stretch, but the Wildcats grabbed the lead for good when a rebound basket by center Shawntinice Polk put Arizona ahead 66-65 with 43 seconds remaining. The basket was Polk's only field goal of the second half. Hampered all night by double teams and foul trouble, last sea son's Pac-10 Freshman of the Year was held to seven points on 3 of 8 shooting in 23 minutes. "They were running people at me all night," Polk said. "But the thing I don't understand is people think that if they shut me down, they shut the Arizona team down. As you can tell, I sat out most of the game and we still pulled out the victory." The Ducks had plenty of chances down the stretch to put the game away, but missed free throws and hesitant offensive play led to their doom. Oregon shot 2 of 7 from the line and By Jon Roetman Sports Reporter WOMEN'S BASKETBALL And for the second straight season, Oregon came up just short. Arizona (15-4 overall, 7-1 Pacific-10 Conference) used an 11-1 run over the game's final 4:38 to pull out a 70-66 win over Oregon in front of 3,633 fans Turn to RUN, page 6 Danielle Hickey Photo Editor Andrea Bills had 16 points and nine rebounds in Oregon’s fourth straight loss to Arizona. Oregon ready for first home action of year The Oregon men and women look forward to hosting the start of the dual match season this weekend By Alex Tam Freelance Reporter After successful play last weekend, capped off by transfer Markus Schiller's tournament win, the Oregon men want to see their competition carry over to the home opener of the dual match season. _ The Ducks will match up against Santa Clara at the Student Tennis Center on Sunday starting at noon. DUCK TENNIS Schiller, in only his second collegiate season, de feated all six of his opponents at the Corvallis John and Phil's Tournament in straight sets. The Ducks will look to him to provide quality depth on a young squad that has just one senior, Chris King. Santa Clara is considered the opposite of Oregon in terms of experience. The Broncos can boast three seniors, led by Gernot Fischer, who holds a 13-3 overall record and will play at the No. 1 dual position. All three returning seniors were named to the All-West Coast Con ference team last season. Second-year Broncos head coach George Flu sack said he wants to improve on last year's 9-15 overall record and he feels his team is confident enough to do it. "We have a solid mix of players who believe they can accomplish a lot this season," Husack said. "It's an exciting time and we're ready to get things rolling." After an 8-5 nonconference record last year, Russell said the Ducks will only improve by get ting as much experience possible. "Anytime you get a chance to play matches, you improve individually and as a team," Russell said. "Hopefully by the time we open on Sunday, we'll be chomping at the bit (and) ready to go." Women host opener The Oregon women will take the court for the first time since junior Daria Panova's third straight Pac-10 Conference singles title last week end as they host No. 55 Sacramento State, start ing at 10 a m. on Saturday. The Hornets came in first place in the Big Sky Conference last year and are led by 45th ranked Margarita Karnaukhova and No. 53 Anna Erikson. Oregon head coach Nils Schyllander is aware that their upcoming opponent, who has earned two bids to the NCAA Tournament in as many seasons, will be a difficult challenge. "We are extremely excited to start our dual sea son," Schyllander said. "At this point our main focus is to get healthy and be as prepared as we possibly can be. Sacramento State is a program on the rise with some very talented players on their roster." The Ducks will host Nevada later in the day at 6 p.m. Alex Tam is a freelance writer for the Emerald. Oregon back at Mac for first time in month The Ducks hope the return to McArthur Court will help swing momentum their way this weekend By Scott Archer Freelance Reporter Some home cooking may serve the Ducks well this weekend. It has to be something that can only help the Ducks as they head into their first home weekend wrestling matches in more than a month. Oregon enters Friday's contest against Fresno State and Sunday's con test against No. 21 Cal State-Bakersfield with DUCK WRESTLING some momentum. "We probably had our best performance on the year," Oregon head coach Chuck Kearney said about the Duck's performance in the Aggie Open a week ago. "We were taking chances be cause we were having fun." Oregon isn't coming off a recent win. It has only done that once this year, against Army. Ore gon proceeded to drop its next two matches after its first win of the season. In all fairness, though, Oregon hasn't really wrestled at home. One could count the match against No. 1 Oklahoma State as a home match, but that was against an exceptional team early in the season. The Ducks haven't used many excuses this year. They could have. They are 1-7 overall and 0 3 in Pacific-10 Conference play, which has them searching for that first league win. Injuries and the redshirting of key contribu tors from a year ago have limited the team's progress and made it nearly impossible to see it at its full strength. Yet the Ducks never dwell on or acknowledge those very facts. It's all about the performance on the mat. This time the performances will be in front of family and friends at McArthur Court, friendly to all who call it home. "What we want to have happen is we want what happened (in the Aggie Open) to spill into competition in practice and into this week end," Kearney said. "We will need to have our 'A' game to compete with Fresno State and Cal State-Bakersfield." Scott Archer is a freelance reporter for the Emerald.
