Can Oregon finish at 9-9 or better?

[northbeachsf]

The most amazing part of this is that this year's team is going surpass last year's team in conference wins. This team is playing WAY above their talent level and they have 4 winnable games down the stretch. I think there is a decent shot they finish 9-9 or better in conference. Altman deserves Pac-10 coach of the year......no matter what happens in those last 5 games.

Oh yeah...out rebounded another team with a lot more size.....AGAIN!

[greenyellow]

The most amazing part of this is that this year's team is going surpass last year's team in conference wins. This team is playing WAY above their talent level and they have 4 winnable games down the stretch. I think there is a decent shot they finish 9-9 or better in conference. Altman deserves Pac-10 coach of the year......no matter what happens in those last 5 games.

Oh yeah...out rebounded another team with a lot more size.....AGAIN!

Oregon just wants the ball more than a lot of the other teams. I still wonder if some teams are overlooking Oregon with their lack of size.

As for finishing 9-9, I think it's a definite possibility. I think they split the Bay Area schools when they come up here, beat OSU, and then win against ASU down in the desert. Any other wins would just be gravy. For what he's done with this team, I think Altman is seriously deserving of COY consideration.

[duckgrad99]

They really should beat OSU, Cal and Stanford at home plus ASU on the road. Just to be safe though, I say they finish 3-2 which would mean 9-9 in conference and 16-14 overall. Pretty darn good considering what Altman has had to work with.

[UOducksTK1]

They really should beat OSU, Cal and Stanford at home plus ASU on the road. Just to be safe though, I say they finish 3-2 which would mean 9-9 in conference and 16-14 overall. Pretty darn good considering what Altman has had to work with.

Yeah that's what I'm thinking as well. Beat OSU and ASU, then split Cal and Stanford.

[woundedknees]

16-17 wins in regular season, then maybe 2 wins in the PAC-10 Tourney is actually no longer an unthinkable outcome.

Whodathunkit 2 months ago?

[Phalanx]

I see no reason why Oregon can't rattle off four wins in a row, three at home and one against the worst team in the conference. Yeah, they could have a bad game against one of the Bay Area schools, but given that the ducks beat Stanford and gave Cal everything it could handle down there, I feel pretty good when they come up to Matt Court. How about 10-8 in conference and a fourth or fifth place finish going into the tournament? 17-13, and enough momentum to get into a post season tournament? That would not be a bad season at all.

[woundedknees]

20 wins a possibility?

Hard to believe, given the disarray this team was in at the time Altman took the helm.

"O CAPTAIN! my Captain! our fearful trip is done;
The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won;
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring"

OK, so the rest of Whitman's poem is depressing, but, apparently not the Duck's future.

If this is mediocre, or worse, under Altman, bring it on!

[Zyme]

When this season started, I would have said winning 5 P10 games was the maximum they would be able to do. Altman has done an outstanding job.

The question then is begged, if we are at 17 wins, do we get a NIT invite. Would be at least get a CBI or a CIT invite (3rd tier).

[oregontrack]

I don't think it's possible to qualify for the CBI, you just pay your way in. OSU was at least 3 or 4 games under .500 the year they "won" it. Never heard of the CIT.

NIT is harder to get into now then it used to be, but it's certainly within the realm of possibilities. In the old days we'd be a shoe-in because we could promise a sell out, now we actually have to qualify on merit. How many at-large berths available isn't determined until all the conference tournaments are completed.

[DarronThomas5]

with the NCAA tourney adding 3 spots adn going to 68 that might make it easier for a team like us to sneak into the NIT.

[duckgrad99]

If we finish with a winning record, I think we get an NIT bid. The pac-10 is down, but it's still one of the major conferences. The crazy thing is that if we had taken care of business early in the season against teams like San Jose St, Idaho and ASU, we would be talking about a possibly NCAA tourny bid.

[thomas time]

I think they could win four out of five, and three out of five at worse for 9-9 record at worse. This team is really playing hard together and a great coach like Dana is helping a lot.

[buckmarkduck]

I hate to bring it up with all the good feelings towards this team, but how much better would our record be if Dunningan hadn't taken money from some agent trying to get him to transfer to another school. Personally I think we would have won 4-5 more games right now.

[oregontrack]

That's hard to say (IMO), I don't know if Dunigan would be any more productive than Catron, and I never thought the two of them played that well together. Dunigan needs to be in the paint, and Catron's game has gotten so much better because he's made a priority of playing close to the basket and letting his outside game play off that. I do think Altman would be able to develop Dunigan, don't get me wrong, but our problems early on were based around shooting the basketball.