EUGENE — Oregon’s season is going from bad to worse as it is now without its two leading scorers amid the toughest stretch of the year.
Center Nate Bittle is expected to be out for approximately a month with a foot injury and point guard Jackson Shelstad will miss a fifth straight game due to a right hand injury.
It leaves the Ducks (8-9, 1-5 Big Ten) severely compromised entering Saturday’s game with No. 4 Michigan (15-1, 5-1).
“We’ve had some guys that wanted to play more, so here’s their opportunity,” Oregon coach Dana Altman said. “We’ll see how they handle that opportunity.”
Altman said Bittle, who is averaging a team-high 16.3 points, 6.7 rebounds, 2.0 assists and 2.3 blocks, injured his foot on UO’s second offensive possession at Nebraska on Tuesday and tried to play through it. Medical tests on Thursday didn’t show any broken bones, Altman said, but Bittle is out “probably a month, maybe more.”
“In his last year and obviously he’s been the guy we’ve been going through,” Altman said. “Tough break for him and feeling sorry for ourself, it’s a tough break for our team.”
Shelstad is averaging 15.6 points, 2.9 rebounds and 4.9 assists — all career-highs — despite career-low shooting 39.1% from the field, including 31.4% from three. He re-aggravated a preseason right hand injury, which required surgery, and has not played since the Dec. 28 win over Omaha.
“He can’t get it feeling right,” Altman said. “It’s his right hand so dribbling and shooting have been a problem.”
Amid a three-game losing streak and with two more ranked opponents upcoming, Oregon’s struggles won’t become any easier to manage around. It hasn’t been a strong team offensively even with Bittle and Shelstad; without them, the offensive sets UO can run are cut “drastically” as the center position is no longer a perimeter shooting threat and ball handling suffers.
“It’s frustrating for the players,” Altman said. “They came here to win. They looked at 15 years of winning some games and they came here to win. It’s tough on the new guys. It’s tough on the vets that are here. It’s really tough for Jackson and Nate; they’re a big part of what we’ve done here.”
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