In a season that’s been more grind than glory, Oregon finally found a reason to exhale - and maybe, just maybe, a reason to believe again.
The Ducks snapped a 10-game skid over the weekend with an 83-72 home win over Penn State, and now they’ll look to string together back-to-back victories when they host Minnesota on Tuesday night in Eugene. It’s not the high-flying, top-of-the-conference campaign fans envisioned back in November, but in a year riddled with injuries and inconsistency, every step forward matters.
Oregon comes into the matchup at 9-16 overall and just 2-12 in Big Ten play - a far cry from the program’s recent standard under head coach Dana Altman. But Saturday’s win brought some much-needed relief to a team that’s been carrying the weight of unmet expectations for weeks.
“The guys were feeling it,” Altman admitted. “It had been a long six weeks, that’s for sure.”
And he’s not wrong. The Ducks have been battling more than just their opponents - they’ve been battling the injury report.
Key players have missed time, rotations have shuffled, and rhythm has been hard to come by. Still, Altman knows his players want to compete.
They want to play through it. But when you’re banged up, sometimes desire just isn’t enough.
Minnesota, meanwhile, knows that script all too well. The Golden Gophers, sitting at 11-14 overall and 4-10 in the Big Ten, have also been dealing with a short bench for much of the season. Their latest setback came Saturday in a 69-57 loss at Washington - a game they played without one of their most important contributors, Jaylen Crocker-Johnson.
Crocker-Johnson has been a steady presence for Minnesota, averaging 13.4 points and 6.8 boards per game. Whether he’ll be able to return from a foot injury in time for Tuesday’s game remains uncertain, but his absence was clearly felt in Seattle. Without him, the Gophers struggled to find offensive rhythm and coughed up too many live-ball turnovers - the kind that lead to easy buckets the other way.
“We had a poor shooting night and we had too many live-ball turnovers,” head coach Niko Medved said after the loss. “We have high-character guys.
We just have to regroup. This is what life throws at you.
We have to respond.”
It’s a sentiment that could apply to both teams. This matchup isn’t about seeding or postseason implications - it’s about pride, growth, and salvaging something from a tough campaign.
For Oregon, it’s a chance to build on a win that felt like a release valve. For Minnesota, it’s an opportunity to bounce back and prove they can compete, even when the odds aren’t ideal.
Altman knows the pressure hasn’t disappeared just because the losing streak did.
“Without a doubt, there’s pressure on the guys,” he said. “They know we’re losing.
Our expectations coming into the season were a lot higher than where we are now, which adds a lot more pressure to us. We had a decent run in the last few years and the expectations were to do the same thing this year, and it hasn’t happened.
So, yeah, the guys are feeling it.”
Both programs are looking for something to hold onto - a stretch of strong play, a glimpse of the future, a reason to believe the foundation is still solid. Tuesday night offers that opportunity. It may not be the marquee matchup of the week, but for two teams trying to find themselves amid a storm of adversity, it means plenty.