Drew Wiley left for Boise State. Matt Humphrey decided to leave town. Josh Crittle said enough was enough and bolted, too.

So what does this mean?

PANIC!

Just kidding.

I really will miss Matt Humphrey, but he could have been so much better.

The way I see it, as much as I liked Humphs,  and as much I loved seeing Wiley run from three-point line to three-point line (read: sarcasm), this doesn’t hurt for next year, and it’s actually a good thing for the future.

If no one transferred, there would be 10 juniors next year. No wonder Ernie Kent was only successful once every 3-4 years (among other things).

Even worse, not a single one of those 10 players is an all-Pac 10 quality player. Sure, Oregon might finish eighth or ninth instead of dead last, but in the long run, who cares?

This team was still going to suck next year no matter what.

With a new coach coming in – one of these days, or years – it will be his job to clean house and get the players that fit his system, before the Ducks can start climbing the conference ranks.

Honestly, outside of the possible exception of Jamil Wilson, there’s not a single player on this team that’s a blue-chip quality player.

Michael Dunigan? No post-up game whatsoever, lacks competitive fire, and outside of an exciting block or two per game, not a difference maker. Averaging nine and five for a sophomore McDonald’s All-American just doesn’t cut it.

Lekendric Longmire? Shot 41.6% this year as a junior. Yuck. Teondre Williams disappeared in conference play. And sorry, Portland kids, Garrett Sim is just not good. I don’t care that he was a demigod at Sunset High School.

Jeremy Jacob, E.J. Singler and Malcolm Armstead are all role players on a good team.

George Schroeder of the R-G nailed it yesterday when he wrote that the new coach shouldn’t be burdened with high expectations right away.

Fortunately, three players left, so now the new coach will have a chance to possibly bring in a couple of his recruits this year, and if not, more next year, to start building his team.

(Quick side note: Girard High School (Philly) combo guard, and McDonald’s All-American nominated Torrell Candaleria wants to be a Duck and is without an offer. ESPN rated him an 80 out of 100. More on him to come later, but you can check him out here for now.)

Don’t think the new arena will bring success right away, because let me tell you, this team is going to flat out stink next year.

All you should care about, aside from enjoying Matt Court – it truly is amazing – are signs of improvement.

Which young guy will step up next year? Can they run a coherent offense and make a stop on D?

It will be the ultimate building year.

So no, losing Wiley, Humphrey and Crittle is not the end of the world. It’s not time to press the panic button. It doesn’t mean the athletic department is falling deeper into embarrassment.

The fat needed to be trimmed.

The cycle of having 10-player recruiting classes and then nothing every four years needed to end.

Hopefully Pat Kilkenny can get his guy soon (although, who he should get is an entirely different topic), find a couple of freshman – the Terrences‘? – and begin to turn this thing around this year. Go .500 the year after that and make the tournament in Year Three.

Baby steps.

That may soon more like giant steps, but in reality, Oregon has too many resources to stay in the cellar for long — just look at the baseball team.

Once Oregon can prove its headed in the right direction, it will pick up steam and be back in contention soon enough.

I promise.

(fine print: student-bloggers can not be help responsible for no such promises. if the team fails, it is entirely and utterly their fault.)

Follow me on Twitter: @UOSportsDude

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There aren't any other good basketball pictures, but you'll probably enjoy this more anyway. ESPN ranked them the most distracting cheerleaders in college basketball. Smart choice.

If you go to Kansas, Kentucky or Syracuse, football season couldn’t have ended fast enough.

Why bother suffering through the endless Mark Mangino fat jokes when you could support a different sport in which the national media has doled out 62 first place votes?

Kentucky already has accounted for more wins on the hardwood in one month than they did on the football field since last October. I think fans in the Bluegrass State are much happier watching the most exciting player the country, freshman John Wall, instead of freshman quarterback Morgan Newton struggle his way to a 55.4 completion percentage.

And Syracuse, well, they were so desperate for basketball season that they stole Duke’s point guard to be their quarterback.

So if you’re a Duck fan, I hope you relished every second of the football regular season because after the Rose Bowl, it’s a long way back until football season. It hurts to say, but the most exciting sport during the winter in Eugene is football recruiting. But hey, at least we’re doing well at that!

Alright, maybe I’m being a bit too harsh. Or maybe not.

I had a chance to take in today’s game against the St. Mary’s Gaels and the team is clearly much improved from last year. It won’t take until February to win the first game of conference play. But the same crutches still remain: Turnovers, forced shots, missed free throws and the complete lack of a half court offense.

And what do you know, those exact reasons led to a fourth quarter collapse against a beatable St. Mary’s squad (I think they were the first team in the history of D1 basketball to start five white players, especially one with a 6-1 record).

The Ducks led most of the game, controlling the tempo and letting their superior athleticism bail them out in transition and on the glass. But late in the second half, Oregon started slowing the pace, trying to control the clock. And here’s a shocker – the Gaels started creeping their way back into the game.

In short, Oregon looked more lost running the half court set than when Bambi realized the hunter had made dinner out of his mother.

First of all, earth to Michael Dunigan: A screen doesn’t work just by running to a certain spot on the floor and standing there.  You actually have to make contact with the defender. And secondly, didn’t you learn in elementary school that after you set your “screen” you roll to the basket?  You don’t just lollygag at the top of the key with your hands in your pockets waiting for the play to end so it’s a shorter run back on defense.

I don’t get why Ernie Kent would force his team into an uncomfortable style of play that he KNOWS they aren’t good at, when the only reason they were winning in the first place was because they managed to completely avoid running a half court set the entire game.

Ernie Kent, dance with you brung you.

If you haven’t figured out yet, Oregon basketball is my whipping boy for Duck athletics. I can shamelessly say that I never get tired of Joevan Catron fat jokes or “fire Ernie Kent” talk.

And missing nine free throws in a five point loss isn’t going to slow me down anytime soon.

But let’s take a second to look at the positives.

With Tajuan Porter and Catron (thank God) sitting out, it gave some of the youngsters a chance to get some extra run. E.J. Singler, Malcom Armstead and Jamil Wilson all look like future quality starters.

Singler brought back Kareem Abdul-Jabar’s famous sky hook, unleashing it against taller defenders  successfully at least three times. He also has an eye for the correct passing lanes, dishing out four assists without recording a turnover.

Armstead will make a solid back-up point guard once Porter returns from his ankle woes. The juco transfer is a physical player who likes to take the ball to the rack and gives his all on D, averaging over 2.5 steals per game.

Wilson, when he isn’t tripping over his own feet, shows flashes of absolute brilliance. The freshman out of Wisconsin has a smooth stroke and a constant motor, always following his own shot and finding a man to box out. Then again, there’s the three for thirteen performance against Missouri last weekend.

But the player to watch this season is Teondre Williams. The sophomore looks like a completely different player than last year – and considering he had a 36.1 FG%, that’s a good thing.

He can shoot, drive, dish, defend, and deliver some rim-shaking dunks. I wouldn’t be surprised to see him make the Pac-10 second team.

Don’t get too excited yet, Duck fans, this team still has a long way to go before reaching even half of its potential. Until they understand the basics, Oregon will be in for a season filled with highs and (even more) lows.

Hopefully, Ernie Kent will soon check his ego at the door and give Mike Dunlap a chance to teach something Kent can’t: The fundamentals.

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Porter is gonna have to do a lot more than hold a towell over his head if Oregon still wants to be playing come March.

It’s basketball season already? Seriously? I’m not ready to move on to a losing sport; it’s still football season, gosh darn it!

At least for now, Oregon Ducks basketball is the University of Oregon’s proverbial red-headed stepchild.

Why anyone would spend time following a team coming off of an 8-23 season, including losses to San Diego, Oakland, and Washington State by 29 points, instead of a Rose Bowl contending football team, is beyond me.

But I guess anytime you have the chance to watch Oregon play a non-conference basketball game against Colorado State in a half-empty 83-year-old stadium in early November, you can’t pass it up.

Ok, you get. We were bad last year. Worse than that actually. Terrible. Putrid. Atrocious. Words don’t do it justice.

It was so bad that we actually rushed the court after our first Pac-10 win in our 15th try, over a less-than-mediocre Stanford team. And as someone who was a part of it, I felt absolutely ashamed and humiliated the second I left my seat and headed toward the sweat-soaked jersey of Joevan Catron.

Well this year, things should be better.

Are we going to be as bad as last year? No. Are we going to be good? Not even close. But will we be good enough where we don’t have to lose our dignity storming the court on our first win of conference play with less than one month left in the season? I can almost guarantee it.

Oh, how I love low expectations.

In all actuality, the Ducks should be much improved this season.

What was an extremely young team last year now has one more full year of experience under their belt, without losing any keys players (although in Catron’s case, it might not have been such a bad thing).

Lekendric Longmire, the energetic 6’5″ junior guard, who finished as the Ducks’ second-leading scorer (9.9 points per game) looks to have taken up a leadership role on the team, a position that was severely lacking last year.

“I think about last season’s record every morning when I wake up,” Longmire said. “Truly, it’s the first thing on my mind. I’m going to do everything I can to not let that happen again.”

Longmire, along with the emergent Teondre Williams, the steady play of seniors Tajuan Porter and (dare I say it) Catron, and gifted youngsters Michael Dunigan, Michael Humphrey and Jamil Wilson, actually form a talented rotation.

The only question is: Will Ernie Kent screw it up?

Entering his 13th season at Oregon, Kent made possibly the smartest move of his career by hiring Arizona assistant Mike Dunlap to take over as de facto head coach.

Kent, who is much better at recruiting, scowling at referees, and looking extremely awkward while crossing his legs on the bench than actually coaching a basketball team, finally realized that in order to save his job, he would have to demote himself to mere figure head of the basketball program.

Hopefully, Dunlap, a former Arizona Wildcat head coach and Denver Nuggets assistant, can get this team to cut down on turnovers, run an actual offense, and play something that moderately resembles defense.

If he can do that, a middle-of-the-pack conference finish and an out-of-nowhere NCAA tournament bid could be in the mix come February.

Kent believes that, just like he said last year, the pieces are in place for the Ducks to play their preferred up-tempo style of play.

Kent hopes to use a 10-man rotation that will create havoc for opposing teams. He expects that added depth will let the Ducks employ a more effective full-court press than it showed last season.

“Even though we had numbers last year, those guys just weren’t physically and mentally strong enough to put that kind of pressure on you,” Kent said. “We are this year.”

Tim Wilson, the newly hired basketball strength and condition coach, put the team through an extensive training program this offseason, and it looks to be paying off already.

Dunigan lost 25 pounds, Williams and Porter packed on muscle, and Catron, well, isn’t as fat.

Kent made a second smart decision this season by loading up the non-conference slate with a list of patsies only Urban Meyer would appreciate. Oregon won’t play a single ranked team this preseason, and it might just be the confidence boost the team needs to get rolling come Pac-10 play.

The only downside? With Montana, Montana St., Mississippi Valley St., Idaho St., and Arkansas Pine Bluff headlining the schedule, the Ducks will have a hard time convincing the selection committee for an at-large bid come March.

Nonetheless, the program certainly looks headed in the right direction, and even though you shouldn’t expect the Ducks to return to the Elite Eight this season, the plan is in place for this team to be competitive.

And that’s something you couldn’t say about them last year.

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