Greg Hansen: Deep in the woods, Arizona Wildcats confront new, dark reality

EUGENE, Ore. —

The tremor was Allonzo Trier under suspension. The earthquake was Sean Miller under suspicion.

Hello darkness, my old friend.

In three seismic days, an Arizona program that for 30 years has been the standard by which West Coast basketball is measured had its legacy shredded.

And that has nothing to do with Saturday’s 98-93 overtime loss to the Oregon Ducks.

Early in the day, ESPN referred to Sean Miller as a “crook.” Late at night, a pitiless crowd at Matthew Knight Arena serenaded the Wildcats with boos and chants of “cheaters.”

People in Tucson are dumbfounded, almost grief-stricken, caught in a no man’s land between basketball’s Road to Hell and Road to Redemption.

Some believe Miller betrayed the school. Others say they’ll wait for the process to play out. Hurry up and wait.

This isn’t the beginning of the end for the UA’s basketball empire. It’s more like the beginning of a legal gridlock that could keep Arizona at a standstill for several years.

On Saturday, the UA’s top recruit, Shareef O’Neal, politely chose to rethink his decision and probably play elsewhere. There has been no arrest since last fall, but it’s as if the Wildcats are now in handcuffs.

Ultimately, nothing was lost Saturday at the arena built by Nike money. Psst. That’s a shoe company. Arizona can still win the Pac-12 championship by sweeping Stanford and Cal at McKale Center this weekend.

The odds of that? Get the ladder and scissors ready.

Before they play basketball, UA president Robert C. Robbins must make one of three choices with Sean Miller.

Fire?

Suspend?

Defend?

No hurry, guys. It’s not like it’s almost March.

Last February, Ram Krishna of the Arizona Board of Regents signed off on a contract extension that would tie Miller to the school through 2022 and somewhat innocently asked “Can he take us to the Final Four?”

Innocence? That’s now as lost as Arizona’s chances to get back to the Final Four.

In Saturday’s loss, the UA had a different body language than it’s typical grit-your-teeth-and-play defense posture. The Wildcats were more animated and played with more freedom. They also forgot to play much defense.

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“They beat us up,” said UA guard Parker Jackson-Cartwright. “We didn’t play hard tonight.”

As good as Deandre Ayton was for the game’s first 30 minutes, with 28 points, the Ducks’ Elijah Brown outscored him. Brown finished with 30.

Arizona somehow shot 57 percent and lost. That happened only because the UA’s defense lack such commitment that Oregon committed four fouls in more than 70 possessions.

There’s little doubt that Miller’s missing presence changed things. The UA played with freedom but also without its typical discipline. Rawle Alkins got a needless technical foul as the momentum switched to the Ducks. Assistant coach Mark Phelps got a technical for shouting at referee Gregory Nixon.

No way Phelps would put himself in harm’s way if Miller’s shadow was anywhere near.

The attention will now spin to Robbins and athletic director Dave Heeke, who lacked transparency during the Rich Rodriguez firing and appear to be following a similar strategy. They made no statement Friday and Saturday when Arizona basketball was the No. 1 story on ESPN and on the ships at sea.

Routinely, the postgame scene at Arizona’s locker room at Matthew Knight Arena has been me, my colleague Bruce Pascoe and maybe one Oregon writer. On Saturday night, as Lorenzo Romar spoke, there were 22 people crushed into a small area, including a man from ESPN and a woman from Sports Illustrated.

That’s how big this story has grown.

Romar predictably offered little or no insight into the process that put him in charge. What should he have said: “I’ll wait for the attorneys to brief me?”

Instead, he said “we didn’t finish the game.” That’s coach-speak in a game that, over the whole season, doesn’t mean much.

Romar did not bite when asked if he thinks he’ll continue to run the show.

“Sean Miller is our basketball coach and he’s one of the best in the country,” Romar said. “I don’t have a whole lot to say; I don’t think it’s appropriate for me to say anything.”

You can only imagine what the previous 24 hours were for the Wildcat players, at the downtown Hilton Hotel, in a cocoon, wondering how they got into this mess. For his part, Jackson-Cartwright had some good answers.

“Tonight had nothing to do with the outside,” he said. “We have games to play, practices to go to. I’m here to play basketball.”

Last summer, Robbins, in his first weeks as school president, reacted to the possibility that Ohio State might attempt to hire Miller to replace the Buckeyes’ departing Thad Matta.

Those were viewed as fightin’ words, by the president and by UA fans everywhere.

“Over my dead body,” Robbins responded.

Now who knows?

Maybe a reported $100,000 phone call will prompt Robbins to declare Miller dead, at least in a professional sense.