The Oregon Ducks — who just beat #1 Kansas to advance to the NCAA Final Four — are synonymous with Nike the way Notre Dame is synonymous with the Irish. Nike was born out of the amazing Oregon track & field program back in the 196os. Nike founder Phil Knight was an Oregon track athlete, and he founded Nike with Oregon track coach Bill Bowerman. Knight also studied at Stanford Business School and has donated generously to both great universities, but it’s Oregon — where Nike is located — that has the deepest ties to Nike. It’s been called Phil Knight’s personal team. In 2016 Knight gave the University of Oregon $500 million. And that wasn’t his first gift to the Ducks.
Nike makes all kinds of gear, of course, but nowhere is the Nike imprint deeper than it is in basketball — in 2014 Morgan Stanley said Nike owned 97% of the basketball shoe market. Yet Oregon, a perennial track favorite still, has never had a college basketball team quite as good as this one. (At least not since 1939 — when the Oregon Ducks — then known as the Webfoots — defeated Ohio State to win the first ever NCAA Men’s basketball championship.) The Ducks were a #1 regional seed in last year’s tourney, but they haven’t been as close as this in 78 years. BTW: Webfoots…hmm, that sounds a little like what Nike was after in that first track shoe…
Tonight, @OregonMBB make #FinalFour. 78 years ago Monday, they were 1st nat’l champs, 3/28/1939. @rgsports #RGSports https://t.co/hY4H22O9jJ pic.twitter.com/K9dbdKl2A0
— The Register-Guard (@registerguard) March 26, 2017
