| Seeing The Forest |
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| Written by Larry Thompson | |||||
| Friday, 21 March 2008 | |||||
 SEEING THE FORESTSmall Ball Ends in "Little Rock" Game For Ducks When you commit to "small ball" or a "little rock" game as a coaching staff you will live and die by the three. Maybe if Maarty Leunen or Bryce Taylor could have just had average shooting games the Ducks may have got by Mississippi State. The Motown guys, Hairston and Porter did their part offensively, but the Ducks were outmanned in the paint as they have been all year. For me, the real hope of having some inside presence both offensively and defensively died for the Ducks when the coaching staff gave up on Frantz Dorsainvil and Ray Schafer. Each should have been playing at least 10 minutes a game all year long (Schafer was injured early in the season but made a full recovery). Mitch Platt had shown for over three years he could not create his own shot inside, could not rebound nor block shots. He did seem to know where he was suppose to go and could set a screen and put a body on a "big" for a few minutes. As a coaching staff, the decision to go with Platt was like raising a white flag in surrender to any inside scoring which Ray and Frantz have the skills to perform and improve upon. But those skills can't be utilized riding the pine. I wish Ray a very successful professional career as I believe that will happen for him (probably overseas) and I would be astonished if Frantz comes back for his senior year. He should immediately look into a transfer to a Division II school where he can at least get some playing time and flourish his senior year. Dorsainvil, when allowed to play, was a fierce rebounder, worked hard on defense and altered opponents' shots, and could create his own shot. It was sad to see his talents wasted. Will the small ball end here? How will the incoming Chicago post players fit in? The future of Coach Kent and his coaching staff will be riding on how these guys develop and perform. You can still play a very uptempo, spread the defense out tyoe of offense with an athletic guy at the "5" or center position. Maybe the new guys will be able to do that. Maarty and Joevan Catron often received the ball in an excellent post-up position, but could not finish against "longer" more athletic defenders. But to be successful, a basketball team has to be able to go inside when the three balls aren't falling. It's called "balance" and this Oregon team never had it this year. It just makes what they accomlished last year that more amazing. The other factor that would have brought more success for the Ducks was point guard play by Kamyron Brown. He had a tremendous game against Arizona in the win at Tucson and seemed to be on his way to possible stardom. It all seemed to decline on the Washington trip which was also the end of the road for Dorsainvil. A death in Brown's family that took him away from the team twice and a stupid decision by Kamyron that resulted in a sprained ankle just killed any momentum he had gained earlier in the year. Brown looked as good at point guard at times earlier this year as any freshman we have seen for the Ducks. Hopefully he can get back on his game befroe the whistle blows for next season.
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