More Trouble For Oregon Basketball
By Alex Miller
The tumultuous offseason for the Oregon Ducks rolls on.
Elgin Cook and Jalil Abdul-Bassit were arrested for shoplifting back on September 12. The two seniors were cited with theft in the third degree (under $100 in merchandise) and given a court date, which has not been released.
Both players were transfers into Dana Altman’s program; Cook from Northwest Florida State, and Abdul-Bassit from North Idaho College. Cook averaged 6.7 ppg and 3.7 rpg last season with ducks and figured to play a bigger role this season.
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Oregon released a statement on the incident: “We are disappointed with these two young men,” Altman said. “We expect our student athletes to conduct themselves as solid members of this community and team. Both are being disciplined internally.”
The Announcement comes on the heels of the sexual assault allegations last spring which led to the expulsions of three other Oregon basketball players. As it turned out, Altman and Oregon knew about these allegations prior to postseason play, yet failed to act in a disciplinary measure.
Quite frankly, Altman needs to get a hold of his team and fast. How is it that this took place, especially considering the sexual assault scandal that just rocked the program? There’s no excuse for the players to not understand that Oregon Basketball didn’t need more bad publicity. If Oregon struggles this year, you have to think Altman’s seat would be getting pretty warm.