Oregon men's basketball will be without at least four scholarship players for Monday's season-opener
With the Oregon men’s basketball season opener less than a week away, just how drastic is the Ducks’ injury situation?
“We’re not sure if we’re going to have anybody to play on Monday night,” Oregon coach Dana Altman joked during his Thursday media availability.
While the roster isn’t stretched quite that thin, the No. 21 Ducks will certainly be missing some firepower when they open the 2022-23 campaign against Florida A&M next Monday at Matthew Knight Arena in Eugene.
A visibly frustrated Altman said Oregon will be without Lök Wur, Brennan Rigsby, Ethan Butler, and Jermaine Cousinard for the opener. Additionally, 5-star freshman big man Ke’el Ware is “probably gonna be out.”
Couisnard, a 6-foot-4 guard who transferred in from South Carolina during the offseason, will be out “a while” Altman announced during Tuesday’s practice, which was open to fans. The redshirt senior had knee surgery on Monday.
“It affects everything,” Altman said of the injury absences. “It affects practice, mostly. We’re just not getting as much done as we need to. We’ve had a crazy October here — just had a lot of guys out.”
Sophomore center Nate Bittle missed three weeks due to an injury last month, and senior forward Quincy Guerrier missed 10 days. While both will be available on Monday, Altman said they are still playing catch-up.
“(Bittle) is way behind — his conditioning is way behind,” Altman said. “He’s over there sucking air right now. … Practice is important. You take three weeks off like Nate did, or three weeks like Quincy, and it doesn’t bounce right back. We’ve just got way too many guys missing practices.”
Altman praised the contributions of walk-ons Gabe Reichle, Brady Paris, and James Cooper. He said Oregon would not have been able to scrimmage without them this week.
With Wur, Rigsby, Butler, and Couisnard out, the following scholarship players will be available for Oregon: N’Faly Dante and Bittle at center, Will Richardson, Tyrone Williams, Keeshawn Barthelemy and Rivaldo Soares at guard, and Guerrier at forward.
Williams, who led the nation in scoring among JUCO players at Grayson College last season, is also “way behind” according to Altman as he did not join the program until September.
“He missed our workouts in June, July and missed the (preseason trip to Canada) in August,” Altman said. “So, he’s two months behind. He’ll be way behind. He’s making a lot of mistakes. His effort is good; he’s trying. But he’s just way behind everything.”
With so many key players missing, Altman acknowledged that the Ducks will need to lean on Dante, Guerrier, and Richardson during the early portion of the season.
After Monday’s opener with Florida A&M, the Ducks will host UC Irvine (Nov. 11) and Montana State (Nov. 15). On Nov. 20, they will face a difficult preseason test when they host a Houston program that landed at No. 3 in the preseason AP Poll.
“Here early, we’re just gonna have to try to grind some out and get guys going and try to get some timing offensively with new guys. Again, there’s no magic wand. It’s gonna take time — it’s gonna take time in practice. We just haven’t had that time.”
