Cougars off to slay their dragon
Washington State is rested. It can only hope that it’s ready.
The 22-4 Cougars, having been off since a Feb. 14 win at Washington, probably will have to call on every reserve of newfound strength to slay the one dragon that has haunted them above all others in recent seasons.
The Oregon Ducks have beaten WSU 12 times in a row, none more painful than the last. Last month in Pullman, the Cougars fouled the Ducks’ Maarty Leunen with just tenths of a second left and allowed Oregon to send the game to overtime on two free throws. There, Oregon won 77-74 and further frustrated WSU.
“We were probably lucky to win the game,” Oregon coach Ernie Kent said.
What’s happened since may seem strange. The Cougars responded to that potentially crushing loss with five straight wins and a march toward the top of the Pac-10 standings. Oregon, on the other hand, has fallen apart in losing five of six.
But as Kent is quick to point out, the Ducks have fallen to 23rd in the polls in part because they had to go on an unusual four-game road trip within the conference. (The win in Pullman was Oregon’s lone triumph on that trip.)
They’ve also been dealing with a slump by Aaron Brooks, who at one point was looking like a lock for Pac-10 player of the year. Now, Brooks and the Ducks (20-7, 8-7 Pac-10) are just hoping to stay in the NCAA tournament picture when things tip off at 8 p.m.
Playing in Eugene, though, Oregon does still have that win streak against WSU to embrace. The Cougars, it seems, do not match up well against Oregon’s four-guard lineup, and winning tonight may mean finding a new formula for victory.
In the first game between these teams, WSU guard Derrick Low went off for 37 points. But that success was offset by the fact that its three front-line starters combined for just five points.
To win tonight, Cougars coach Tony Bennett knows he’ll need more out of Daven Harmeling, Ivory Clark and Robbie Cowgill.
“Can you rely on Derrick Low for (37)?” Bennett asked. “I wish we could, but they’re going to be on him. There will be opportunities for other guys. … We need to get more production. We need to get more balance in this game.”
Although WSU has had more success in the backcourt in many games, the lack of success inside did seem to be more of an anomaly than a consistent thread through WSU’s other contests.
“We’ve all improved a little bit since then,” Harmeling said. “And I think it was a little bit of a coincidence that all three of us had such down games at the same time.”
While the Ducks are playing to better their NCAA tournament resume, the Cougars have a Pac-10 race in mind, sitting just one game behind first-place UCLA. Realizing that, it seems that both teams are expecting that was what good enough for a close contest in January won’t work as well this time around.
“We’re going to have to play a lot better here at our place,” Kent said, “because they’re playing much better and they had a couple of guys that didn’t shoot the ball well in that game that are playing very, very well right now.”