Pac-12 basketball is finishing the first week of its last season. We’re wondering what other Pac-12 College Wire sites have to say about their teams. Two Ducks Wire writers gave their keys to success for Oregon men’s basketball, along with their main concerns for UO this season.
Don Smalley: How quickly this team jells and gets healthy. Several players are hurt, again. And let’s include how quickly point guard Jackson Shelstad acclimates to the college game.
Zachary Neel: I think the key to success and the main concern for this team has to be health. Player availability killed them last season, and it doesn’t look to be going any better this year with several key pieces already missing a lot of practice or out until mid-December. The pieces are there for this team to be pretty good in the Pac-12, but they have to actually be healthy enough to play.
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As you can see from this link, at least four Oregon players missed the first week of games, including Friday against Montana. Jackson Shelstad was mentioned above. Mookie Cook and Michael Rataj will miss a few more games. Elite big man N’Faly Dante didn’t play against Montana on Friday. However, the Ducks are 2-0 with a level of resourcefulness we didn’t see the previous two seasons.
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