Wins Few For Huskies, Bender

The wins have been few for Bob Bender, fewer than he expected, since he arrived to take the helm of the University of Washington’s sinking men’s basketball ship.

Struggling with too many defeats and recruiting losses since April 1993, he’s had to keep reminding himself it’s going to take time to rebuild a program that hasn’t had a winning season in the ‘90s.

“Certainly, I don’t think this can be an overnight thing,” Bender said. “I think it’s real important - and I put the responsibility on myself first of all - that I have to remain patient.”

In the third month of his second season as Washington’s coach, Bender has a 10-30 record, including 4-19 in the Pacific-10 Conference. He got victory No. 10 Thursday night when the Huskies beat Oregon State 75-57 in a Pac-10 game before 3,883 fans in Hec Edmundson Pavilion.

In a league with five teams in the Top 25 this season - UCLA, Arizona, Arizona State, Oregon and Stanford - the Huskies are faced with the possibility of not being able to match last season’s 3-15 Pac-10 record. They’re 1-4 in league play this season.

It’s not that the Huskies aren’t improved from last season, when Bender was forced to try to win with the little remaining talent he inherited from Lynn Nance.

“Everybody else in our league is better, too,” Bender said. “As well as I think we’re doing and improving, we don’t have anything easy. We have to remind our kids of that.”

In Washington’s victory over Oregon State, a program that also is struggling, 6-foot-8 freshman forward Mark Sanford scored a career-best 21 points, grabbed nine rebounds and blocked four shots.

Bryant Boston, Washington’s shooting guard, added 15 points.

Boston is the Huskies’ leading scorer with a 14.2 average and Sanford is averaging 10.6 points per game. They’re Washington’s top two offensive threats.

After Sanford and Boston, Washington is a team of role players. Mike Amos, a 6-9 junior transfer from Creighton, is the Huskies’ center, but he’s averaging only five rebounds a game.

Jason Hamilton and Michael McClain, the other two guards in Washington’s three-guard offense, are shooting 32 percent and 29 percent from the field, respectively.

Jamie Booker, a key Washington reserve, is shooting 36 percent.

As a team, Washington is shooting 41 percent and 25 percent from 3-point territory. The Huskies are getting outrebounded by 5.1 a game.

The Huskies have equalled their victory total for Bender’s first season in Seattle, when they went 5-22.

Bender’s goal was a winning season. It’s not likely to happen.

“We’ve got a lot of work cut out for us to do that,” he said.

The Huskies (5-8 overall) play No. 17 Oregon (3-1, 11-2) today. After that, the Huskies play eight of their final 13 games on the road.

Bender, 37, knew he had a tough job ahead of him when he arrived from Illinois State. His final Illinois State team went 19-10 in 1993, but not against Arizona and UCLA.

He’ll have a much better team next season.

Led by Sanford, the Huskies will have all five starters - Amos, Boston, Hamilton and McClain are juniors - returning in addition to Booker, a sophomore, and freshmen Jason Hartman, Alex Lopez and Roberto Bergersen.