WSU, Oregon meet in an hour

COUGARS

Not a lot more to add from my morning post , but we do have a couple of pregame notes, so read on.

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• The one thing I’m looking forward to seeing tonight is how smart WSU is in attacking the Ducks’ full-court pressure. Mainly Oregon just wants to make you slow down. The idea is to give you less time to attack in the halfcourt. When the Ducks are in that mode it is crucial to get a good shot. Occasionally, Oregon will hit it harder, trying to force a turnover or two. That happens rarely, though, as the Ducks just don’t have the depth to do it for long stretches. When the pressure picks up, it’s important for WSU to take care of the ball and attack. Make them pay for the pressure. … Oregon will play a mixture of man and zone in the halfcourt so WSU was working yesterday on tweaking its usual man offense. Coach Ken Bone wants something that can be run against both. The old KISS formula. Makes sense for the Saturday game, with just a few hours to prepare. … A lot of teams have been zoning Oregon but I won’t be surprised if the Cougars play a lot of man, just going under more ball screens than usual. That will help them on the glass, and that’s where Oregon’s hurt them in the past – especially Joevan Catron and E.J. Singler. …

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• That’s it for now. We’ll be back at hafltime with our usual post, and on Twitter of course. Until then …