Three Beautiful Things 01/12/20: Grounded, Hamburger Soup, Thoughts About the U of O Women's BB Team

1. The plan was to drive to the Spokane International Airport this morning and send Debbie off to Portland and then Eugene. We got up. Snow was piling up. Debbie spoke first. "Let's stay home." We bagged it. We'll try again on Tuesday.

2. I finely chopped up an eggplant and put the pieces in the oven to roast. While it roasted, I finely chopped three garlic cloves, an onion, a couple stalks of celery, and a half a red pepper. I threw the garlic into some heated up olive oil. When it became fragrant, I added the onion, celery, and pepper. I cooked these until nearly tender, took the eggplant out of the oven, and added about of pound of ground beef to the vegetables I'd softened. I sprinkled some pepper, Montreal steak seasoning, and oregano over the ground beef. The meat browned. I added the eggplant, a can of fire roasted dice tomatoes, and a quart of beef broth. I brought it to a gentle boil, turned down the heat, and let this soup/stew simmer. A little later, I decided it would perk up this soup/stew if I added Worcestershire sauce. I was correct. Debbie and I both enjoyed this stew/soup for dinner.

3. One purpose a blog can serve is to try out ideas -- tentative ideas or unformed insights.

I'd like to try one out here, but it's based on very little observation and I'm not ready to make an argument about this.

For the first time all season, today I watched the Oregon Ducks women's team play. I only got to see about the last quarter and a half and enjoyed the way the Ducks persevered and beat Arizona, 71-64.

I loved watching last season's Duck women's team and one of my favorite players was Maite Cazorla. I enjoyed how she got the Ducks into their sets, provided calm leadership, and, on occasion, she scored -- but, mostly she facilitated the team's offense and played excellent defense.

Today, I thought the Ducks missed Cazorla -- but maybe they don't -- maybe I miss her (!).

I want to watch more of the Ducks and see what I think. In the off-season, the Ducks landed Minyon Moore, a grad transfer from USC, as a guard for this team. I remember being very impressed with Moore's play at USC last year. I now want to get a better sense of what she brings to the Ducks. I don't expect her to replace Cazorla, but a team with as much fire power as the Ducks needs a solid facilitator to bring out the best in these electrifying players. My hope is that as I watch the Ducks more often, I'll see that Minyon Moore (or someone) will take over this role.

Let me add, there's no doubt that Sabrina Ionescu serves as a facilitator, especially running pick and roll plays with Ruthy Hebard, but the great things she does often happen after the offense has been set up. I thought setting things up was Maite Cazorla's strength and I couldn't tell today if this part of their offense might need improvement.