1. Last night Oregon welcomed back sophomores Dominic Artis and Ben Carter from suspension, as both made their season debuts after sitting out the first nine games. And, while Jonathan Loyd has come to earn plenty of well-deserved respect around the conference, we were reminded that, oh yeah, Artis is pretty darn good himself. Artis got penetration on the regular on one end of the court, then showed his ability to be a completely annoying pest on the other, and then surprised everybody as the 6’1” guard also grabbed eight rebounds in the win. Carter wasn’t bad himself, showing himself to be a solid inside-outside stretch-four for the Ducks, although his offensive production didn’t come easily. As for folding these guys back in with the already established players, Loyd for one continues to look good, although his minutes were hampered by fouls. Meanwhile, guys like Joseph Young and Jason Calliste saw their shot attempts drop ever so slightly, but it looks like in the long run these guys are going to be meshed back into the rotation with ease.
2. Tomorrow night Kyle Anderson returns home as UCLA travels to New York City to face Duke at Madison Square Garden. Anderson is a native of a community in New Jersey that is part of the NYC metropolitan area, and he’s watched his fair share of games at MSG over the years. Not only does he get to go home (where he’ll have to deal with distributing tickets to his friends and family), but he’ll get to renew his competition with a somewhat familiar foe in Chicago native, Jabari Parker.
3. Oregon State’s game tonight is their last game on the mainland before the Beavers head out to Honolulu to take part in the Diamond Head Classic on Sunday with an opening round game against Akron. As it is, they’re not the only Oregon State team headed to Hawaii for the holidays, as the Beavers’ football team is also going to paradise. They’ll be facing Boise State on Christmas Eve in the Hawaii Bowl and it just so happens that the Diamond Head Classic features a perfectly coincidental off day. Roberto Nelson and company will not only get a nice trip to the islands for the holidays, but they’ll have a chance to support their fellow OSU athletes.
4. Colorado doesn’t play again until Saturday against Oklahoma State, but when the team does it will have to lean heavily on sophomore forward Xavier Johnson, who has done a great job helping to fill in for the departed Andre Roberson. As Terry Frei of The Denver Post writes, while Johnson is getting plenty of help from freshman Wesley Gordon, he’s made big strides in shifting his game from that of primarily a perimeter player to one who is expected to make major contributions in the paint as well.
5. Lastly, while things seem to be going smoothly for Sean Miller and Arizona, the head coach is not about to let his precocious young ‘Cats rest on their laurels. Last year at this time (and weeks into the future), his squad also remained undefeated only to get off to a bumpy start in conference play from which they never truly recovered. He’s using that experience to teach his current team to keep its focus, avoid distractions, and keep improving.

AMurawa (999 Posts)

Andrew Murawa Likes Basketball.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 18th, 2013 at 10:01 am by Andrew Murawa and is filed under microsites, morning 5, pac 12. Tagged: arizona, ben carter, colorado, dominic artis, hawaii bowl, Jason Calliste, jonathan loyd, joseph young, kyle anderson, oregon, oregon state, sean miller, ucla, Xavier Johnson. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.