Oregon's season of discontent continued unabated Saturday as the Ducks trailed from start to finish in a 64-49 loss to the Golden Bears at McArthur Court.
Once again Oregon struggled to score points - a season long refrain that this group seems incapable of ending - shooting only 34.1% from the floor on 15-44 - including a single digit percentage from behind the three point line.
If any further evidence was needed one only need look at the assists column on the score sheet - Oregon was credited with one. One.
"There were a lot more assists on the floor, we just didn't finish the play," said head coach Ernie Kent. "And that's the problem."
Jeremy Jacob led the Ducks in scoring with 14. Freshman forward E.J Singler was the only other player to reach double figures with 10.
The opening half was at least competitive. The Bears opened up an eight point lead midway through the frame but Oregon rallied back to within one point on two occasions, the last at 23-24 as the teams headed to the half.
California jumped to a quick 10 point lead early in the second stanza, scoring the first nine points after the break.
Jacob's jumper at the 10:32 mark pulled Oregon back to within five points at 41-46, but the Ducks would not make another field goal, netting only eight free throws and the Bears pulled away to the 15 point final margin.
"We've had a lot of stretches like that," said Kent of his teams extended drought. "You are pretty good in there for about 25, 26 minutes of a game. Then you can pick and choose your 12, 13, 14, 15 minutes wherever they are at that you are not keeping pressure on teams with being able to score the ball at a higher clip."
"We left, I would say . 15, 20, 25 points on the floor just not being able to shoot the basketball," said Kent. "We put too much pressure on ourselves when we can't score."
"We played the game, we hung in there, you are down one point at half because we just kind of dug in and really didn't let them get away from us . the first four minutes of the second half got away a little bit. We could have put some pressure on them scoring but we didn't get a chance to do that."
If there is a silver lining to look to it is that Oregon's remaining four conference games are against the teams the Ducks defeated in the first leg of Pac-10 season. A trip to SoCal is followed by the season ending series against the Washington schools.
"Our goal is to gain whatever momentum is possible as we head into the conference tournament," said Kent.
"We have got to score. If we can do that we are going to cause all four of those teams some problems and whoever we match up with in the tournament. If we don't do that the games will look like they have looked."
