A new era of Oregon basketball dawns on Nov. 2 when an overhauled roster takes the court against Montana in Eugene, Ore.
For the first time since the 2010-11 season, the Ducks will have a different head coach, with Tony Stubblefield serving as interim head coach following Dana Altman’s retirement.
Altman leaves Oregon with a school-record 382 career wins, nine NCAA tournament appearances and a Final Four berth in 2017.
Altman’s teams also won four Pac-12 regular-season titles and four Pac-12 tournament titles. But Stubblefield’s first team has 10 new players, and that showed in a 71-65 exhibition loss to Seattle in which the Ducks squandered a 13-point lead and had 25 turnovers.
“When you have 10 or 11 new guys it can be challenging, because you’ve got to try to get on the same page,” Stubblefield said. “But we’re not the only ones with 10 or 11 guys. There are a lot of teams in college basketball that are in this situation. So we’ll get there.”
Oregon went through a 12-20 season in 2025-26 after 15 straight 20-win campaigns under Altman. Only two regular contributing players returned from that team this season.
Among the newcomers are guard Fred Payne (15.8 points per game at Boston College last season) and forward Andrew Meadow (12.1 ppg at Boise State).
Montana was picked to finish in fourth place in the Big Sky Conference. The Grizzlies have two returning starters (Kenyon Aguino and Tyler Thompson) and a total of five returning players to go with 10 newcomers this season. Thompson set a Montana freshman record with 69 3-pointers.
“I think when you look at this, the biggest thing is that we have work to do and respect to earn,” head coach Travis DeCuire said. “Fourth is about right when you look at the number of returners. I think when you look at the last couple of years, the teams that return the most have been the most consistent and finished the highest, for the most part.”
The Grizzlies are 4-25 all-time against the Ducks, most of those games having been played in Oregon. Montana went 18-16 last season.
–Field Level Media
