Oregon Ducks Give Up Conference Championship

Oregon ended the conference season the way they ended a number of games this year; unable to close it out. Needing only one win in the final week to take their second conference championship since WWII, coming off a bye week, the Ducks got blown out twice by double digits. There is no excuse for the pathetic display of basketball the Ducks put on this week. They got out hustled, out rebounded, and out played in almost every aspect of the game twice. And with that they watched a chance to take the conference championship and the #1 seed in the Pac 12 tourney slip away.

Utah started the game hot, red hot. The Utes made 10 of their first 13 shots from the field in the first 10 minutes of the game. A Dominic Artis 3 cut the Utah lead to one at 21-20, but that is the closest the Ducks would get the rest of the night. Utah rattled off 9 straight points to push the lead back to 10.

Late in the first half Ben Carter would add a spark off the bench and helped cut the lead back down to 6, but after the final TV timeout of the half, Utah made another run to push the lead back to 14 at the break.

Jarred DuBois, Jason Washburn and Jordan Loveridge had anything they wanted all night. DuBois routinely cut through the lane and got shots at the rim on his way to 15. Loveridge was a nightmare for Kazemi to try and keep up with and he hit from inside and outside usually late in the shot clock, and Washburn had a team high 20 on 8 of 10 shooting, most of them right at the basket.

This was easily Arsalan Kazemi's worst game of the year. His 5 steals were overshadowed by the fact that he went 5-11 from the free throw line, 0-2 from the field, only picked up 4 rebounds and had 3 turnovers. Kazemi wasn't alone either. Damyean Dotson finished 0-7 from the field and 0-4 from 3. A late 3 from Loyd with only a minute left and the game already decided was the only basket that kept him from being blanked in the FG column as well. That's 3 starters that essentially went 0 from the field for the entire game. A game that determined the conference championship.

The biggest game of the year and the Ducks just didn't show up. Just like at some of the biggest moments of the year. This is not the way you want to head into the tournaments. This team looked exhausted, undisciplined, slow and unmotivated. What a terrible way to end the year and an even more terrible way to head into the post season.