“In my 43 years of coaching this team, this is probably the stupidest thing I have ever done.”
That was none other than head coach Greg Kampe after his Golden Grizzlies team fell to 0-3 by way of a 90-67 loss on the road at UC Santa Barbara. That defeat came less than 20 hours after an 81-63 loss at the hands of the Stanford Cardinal.
On Friday, Oakland struggled to make shots. The Golden Grizzlies went just 3-of-17 from three, making it hard to keep up the upset bid. It was certainly a bid for a while though, with Oakland trailing by just one in the early stages of the second half, and single digits until the final four minutes.
Oakland was able to stay within striking distance for as long as it did in large part because of Chris Fields Jr. Fields has been Oakland’s best player through three games, averaging 18 points and nine rebounds. Against Stanford he went an efficient 9-of-12 from the floor for 23 points, pulled in six rebounds and had two steals. He followed that up with his second double-double of the young season with a 13 point and 11 rebound game at UCSB.
“As we get deeper into this thing we are going to rely on Chris a lot on offense,” Kampe said in a postgame interview over the weekend.
After the Stanford game ended around 9pm Pacific Time, Oakland left the arena about an hour later. The bus drove for over three hours before stopping at the hotel. Then, a 90-minute drive was left to UCSB in the morning for a 1pm Pacific Time start. The combination of that travel, a quality mid-major opponent that is in the top 100 in the country per Kenpom, and a team that doesn’t quite know who they are yet yielded a rough outing.
Oakland came out hot from three to stay close early, trailing 27-25 with under four minutes left in the half. But a rough close to the half pushed the deficit to double figures at the break. While Oakland was able to play a fairly even first eight minutes or so of the second half, UCSB used a school-record 18 threes to push the lead to 66-49 at the under eight media timeout. Kampe used that time to get the entire bench some run, and the final score was decided.
“I was actually pretty pleased with our effort today,” Kampe said. “I mean, I’m exhausted and I don’t even play. Our bodies were not where they should be.”
Nassim Mashhour led Oakland in scoring at UCSB with 19. Despite shooting under 30% from the three-point line, Mashhour has managed to put together 14.7 points per game in the first three contests.
While the travel and continued large point spreads are certainly going to be viewed as valid reasons for a slow start to the season, it is fair to wonder where the points will come from outside of Mashhour and Fields. Kampe has been filling the court with what seems like dozens of lineups trying to get a feel for who can play and who can’t. Until you start to see some consistent patterns in the rotation, we will have to watch together to see who begins to separate themselves as main characters on the team.
It may take a bit longer to start seeing real positive signs on that front, however, as Oakland now heads to Tuscaloosa to play No. 18 Alabama after another cross-country flight on Monday, then travels back out west to face 2-0 Boise State out of the PAC 12.
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