Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports
The Oregon Ducks finished last season tied for second place and one game back in the Pac-12 standings. However, they may not even be a top five team in the Pac-12 in the 2013-14 college basketball season.
In a recent power ranking of the conference, ESPN ranked Oregon No. 6.
It makes sense, though. The Ducks are losing many great players. However, Mike Moser will be joining the team and Dominic Artis and Damyean Dotson will be back. Dotson was the second leading scorer on the team last year, averaging 11.4 points per game.
There are other teams in the Pac-12 that will be losing talent as well, which includes the Arizona Wildcats and the UCLA Bruins. However, Arizona will have players coming in to replace that talent and UCLA may not be the same. Both will compete for a conference title, though. With that said, the Wildcats will be the team to beat in the conference.
Losing players is something that happens all of the time in college hoops and Oregon will rebound. Moser will play a huge role in that in the upcoming season.
However, it is crazy to think that Oregon will go from one of the best teams in the conference to sixth place in the standings. Teams ahead of the Ducks in this power ranking are Stanford, Cal, UCLA, Colorado and Arizona.
Colorado and Arizona are easily better on paper and UCLA returns a couple of great players, but will have a new head coach. It will be interesting to see how California does without its leading scorer from last year’s team and if Stanford will compete for a conference title.
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