Game Notes: WOU Exhibition Offers First Look at New Ducks

Oregon opens the 2018-19 season with an exhibition game against Western Oregon on Thursday (7 p.m., Pac-12 Network).

KEY STORYLINES
• 1 – Oregon's 2018 recruiting class was ranked third nationally, which is the highest in program history. The class includes five-star recruits Bol Bol and Louis King, and four-star signees Miles Norris, Francis Okoro and Will Richardson.
• 2 – Young Fresh Fellows. Of Oregon's 13-player roster, 77 percent (10) are either freshman or sophomores. The three outliers are junior Payton Pritchard, senior Paul White and senior grad transfer Ehab Amin.
• 3 – Frontline. The average height of Oregon's post players is 6-10. That includes Bol Bol (7-2), Miles Norris (6-10), Luis King (6-9), Francis Okoro (6-9), Paul White (6-9) and Kenny Wooten (6-9).
• 4 – Payton Pritchard enters his junior year with 312 career assists. That puts him on pace to break Kenya Wilkins' UO career record of 614. Pritchard needs four assists to pass Terrell Brandon for eighth (315, 1989-91).
• 5 – Kenny Wooten enters the season with 92 career blocked shots. That's just one block out of fourth (93, Bob Fife, 1989-93) and 24 out of the top three (116, Blair Rasmussen, 1981-85).
BENCH – Dana Altman comes into the 2018-19 season needing 26 wins to become the school's all-time winningest coach. Additionally, Altman needs just three victories to surpass Basketball Hall of Famer Howard Hobson for second in UO coaching victories. Altman has 210 career victories through eight seasons at Oregon. Hobson won 212 games as the head coach at Oregon for 11 years (1936-47), including the 1939 NCAA Championship. Altman enters the season just 25 wins behind Oregon's current career leader, Ernie Kent, who won 235 games in 13 seasons (1998-2010).

SCOUTING WESTERN OREGON
Western Oregon posted an impressive 31-2 record in 2017-18 and advanced to the NCAA Division II Tournament. The Wolves were picked to finish third in the Great Northwest Athletic Conference 2018-19 preseason poll behind Saint Martin's and Seattle Pacific. Junior forward Riley Hawken, the team's lone returning starter, was a preseason all-GNAC selection. He averaged 8.2 points and 5.3 rebounds per game. WOU's head coach, Jim Shaw, was an assistant coach at Washington from 2004-13.

DUCK MEN AND WOMEN MAKE HISTORY AS TOP PAC-12 PRESEASON PICKS
The Oregon men's and women's basketball teams made history when both teams were predicted to win the conference in their respective preseason polls. It is the first time in conference history that the preseason selections to win the league in men's and women's basketball have come from the same school. The only other time the Duck men were picked first in the preseason poll was 2016-17. Oregon shared the league title with Arizona that year. The Ducks received 288 points and 16 first-place votes in a poll of media members. UCLA was second with 264 points (six first-place votes), followed by Washington (249), Arizona (205) and USC (203).

DUCKS SIGN NATION'S TOP RECRUITING CLASS FOR 2018-19
Oregon's 2018 recruiting class, consisting of five-star C Bol Bol, five-star F Louis King, four-star F Miles Norris, four-star F Francis Okoro and four-star G Will Richardson, was the ranked the highest in school history (No. 3 by 247Sports; No. 4 by ESPN). It is Oregon's third straight top-12 recruiting class.