College
On June 29, 2005, Oden and Lawrence North teammate Mike Conley, Jr. announced that they would be attending Ohio State University starting with the 2006–07 season.
Oden had surgery on his right wrist on June 16, 2006, in Indianapolis to repair a ligament injury that occurred late in his senior high school season. As a result, he sat on the bench during the beginning of the 2006–07 season with Ohio State, during which his team was ranked as high as first before losing to North Carolina. He made his college debut on December 2, 2006, against Valparaiso, coming off the bench. He finished the game with 14 points, 10 rebounds and 5 blocks. In December of that year, Steve Kerr described him as a "once-in-a-decade player".
The Big Ten honored Oden with Player of the Week, along with Wisconsin's Alando Tucker, on January 29, 2007. In the previous week he had averaged 18 points and 11.5 rebounds. On March 6, 2007, Oden was named First Team All-Big Ten as well being voted the conference's Defensive Player of the Year. Oden fouled out for the first time in his college career against Xavier in the second round of the NCAA Tournament, and was bothered by foul trouble throughout the tournament. In the Sweet Sixteen, Oden blocked a potential game-winning shot in the final seconds against Tennessee to preserve an 85–84 victory, and went on to lead Ohio State past Memphis and Georgetown to advance to the 2007 National Championship. In the title game, Oden scored 25 points, and had 12 rebounds and 4 blocked shots in a losing effort against the Florida Gators.
On March 26, 2007, Oden, along with Kevin Durant, Arron Afflalo, Alando Tucker, and Acie Law IV, was named to the Associated Press All-American Team. Oden and Durant were the first freshmen voted to the All-American First Team since 1990 and the third and fourth overall. Throughout his high-school and college career, Oden never lost a home game.
Read more about this topic: Greg Oden
Famous quotes containing the word college:
“The mode of founding a college is, commonly, to get up a subscription of dollars and cents, and then, following blindly the principles of a division of labor to its extreme,—a principle which should never be followed but with circumspection,—to call in a contractor who makes this a subject of speculation,... and for these oversights successive generations have to pay.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“In looking back over the college careers of those who for various reasons have been prominent in undergraduate life ... one cannot help noticing that these men have nearly always shown from the start an interest in the lives of their fellow students. A large acquaintance means that many persons are dependent on a man and conversely that he himself is dependent on many. Success necessarily means larger responsibilities, and responsibilities mean many friends.”
—Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)
“Placing too much importance on where a child goes rather than what he does there . . . doesn’t take into account the child’s needs or individuality, and this is true in college selection as well as kindergarten.”
—Norman Giddan (20th century)