Don't Be Surprised if Underdog Oregon Ducks Take Off in Sweet 16

With the top three seeds (and two No. 4s) from each conference advancing to the 2019 Sweet 16, this year’s Big Dance has largely been devoid of Cinderella stories.

Of the teams that remain, only No. 12 Oregon comes close. But, in advance of their game against No. 1 Virginia tonight, the Ducks maintain they are no underdog.

And, considering this is the third time the Ducks have made the Sweet 16 in four years and they are led by a coach (Dana Altman) with almost 650 career wins, they’re at least partially right.

“I don’t look at us as being a Cinderella because we were kind of highly ranked at the beginning of the year,” point guard Payton Pritchard said. “We fell off because we had a lot of injuries. We just went through a lot. We started clicking at the right time but I think this is where the team should have always been.”

Winners of 10 straight after a run to the Pac-12 tournament championship and tournament wins over Wisconsin and UC Irvine, the Ducks are starting to show why they were ranked No. 14 in preseason AP polls.

“I told them right away, when the pairs came out, numbers don’t mean anything,” Altman said. “Cal-Irvine didn’t think of themselves as a 13 after winning 31 games. We didn’t think of ourselves as a 12, going against Wisconsin. We didn’t look at ourself as a big underdog.”

They might not, but Vegas does as Virginia is an 8.5-point favorite to knock off Oregon.