MONTREAL -- Sophomore Nate Bittle scored a game-high 18 points as the NCAA's high-flying University of Oregon Ducks opened their five-game Canadian tour with a 102-48 victory over McGill in men's preseason basketball on Sunday afternoon.

The game was played in hot, humid conditions before a near sellout 648 fans in the 750-seat Love Competition Hall on the McGill campus. Among the faces in the crowd were a number of former McGill players in addition to NBA star Chris Boucher of the Toronto Raptors. Boucher, who was raised in Montreal, previously played for the Ducks from 2015 to 2017.

Haris Elezovic, a management junior from Sherbrooke, Que., paced the Redbirds with a double-double. The 6-foot-8, 240-pound forward tallied 15 points and pulled down a game-high 13 rebounds in 30 minutes of court time. Elezovic, who sat out his freshman year and merited rookie-of-the-year honours as a sophomore in the RSEQ conference, shot 6-for-14 from the floor and 2-for-3 from the line.

Oregon led 24-13 after the opening quarter, 55-21 at the half and 79-38 after three, then outpointed McGill 23-10 in the final stanza.

"I think that our players saw this as an opportunity to be good individually and take our chances to shine but that's not what we needed today," said McGill head coach Ryan Thorne. "We learned from this game that that we need to work better as a cohesive group. That's an NCAA Final Four team in my opinion. They're very solid and have more veterans than the previous teams that we faced earlier this month. And we saw it in their ball movement, their fight and their understanding of how to play as a group."

Bittle, a seven-foot, 215-pound centre who added 16 rebounds, shot 7-for-11, including a 3-for-3 from three-point range. He was one of five Ducks to reach double digits in scoring, along with Kel'el Ware (17), Keeshawn Barthelemy (14), Quincy Guerrier (11) and Gabe Reichle (10).

Barthelemy and Guerrier, both from Montreal, were among three Canadians on the Oregon roster, along with Ethan Butler of Toronto, who tallied six points and four rebounds.

The only other McGill player to break the 10-point plateau was senior Kevin Li with a dozen, including a 3-for-7 effort from beyond the arc. Rounding out the Redbirds scoring was Cameron Elliot (4), Sedami-Habib Djossou (4), Sean Herscovitch (3), Zachary Lavoie-Toure (2) and Matthew Barg (2).

The much taller Oregon lineup had a huge 42-25 rebounding advantage and racked up a plethora of dunks. The Ducks shot a superb 58.7 per cent from the floor (37/63), 40.7 from three-point range (11/27) and drained a near-perfect 17 of 18 from the charity stripe. They had a 17-12 edge in turnovers, leading to a 26-11 margin on the scoreboard.

McGill displayed ineffective shooting, making just 31.3 per cent from the floor (20/64). The Redbirds also shot a tepid 4-for-24 from downtown and made only four of seven from the line.

It marked McGill's first-ever rendezvous with the Ducks, a west-coast team that hails from Eugene, Ore. Oregon began playing basketball the same year as McGill, in 1902-03, and have made 17 trips to the NCAA Tournament, winning once (1939).  Oregon posted a 20-15 overall record last year, with an 11-9 mark in the Pac-12 conference.

McGill went an unblemished 12-0 in RSEQ conference play last season to capture the Quebec league banner for the 12th time and made a ninth lifetime appearance at the Final 8 national championship tournament (in addition to four regional tourney showings).

Oregon (1-0) will now head to the nation's capital to play Ottawa (Aug. 22) and Carleton (Aug. 23), then close out their tour with games at McMaster in Hamilton (Aug. 25) and Toronto Metropolitan University (Aug. 26).

McGill, which dropped to 0-3 against NCAA teams this month, will now get a five-week break to bolster their roster and hold a proper training camp before playing four Canadian opponents to round out the preseason schedule. The Redbirds will host Queen's, a late addition to the schedule,  on Sunday, Oct. 2 at 12 noon. Tickets, which can only be purchased online this year, are available on the team's schedule page.

BOXSCORE

SOURCE:
Earl Zukerman
Sports Information Officer
Athletics & Recreation
McGill University
514-398-7012 (Tel.)
www.mcgillathletics.ca
earl.zukerman@mcgill.ca