Oregon won the opening tip, but little else in the first 13 minutes of the game.
Missed layups, turnovers and even an airball plagued the Ducks as Oregon State took leads of 7-0, 15-3 and 28-15.
But then Duck guards Luke Ridnour and Freddie Jones knocked home back-to-back threes with five minutes in the first half. The treys sparked the Ducks to a 17-4 run that tied it up at 32 at the half in the Pacific-10 Conference opener.
The rest of the story can be explained with these simple words from Oregon head coach Ernie Kent:
“That second half was obviously the best basketball that we’ve played all year.”
Oregon (10-1 overall, 1-0 Pac-10 ) outscored the Beavers (6-7, 0-1) 21-10 to begin the final half.
The result was a solid 84-66 Civil War victory in front of a sold-out crowd of 9,087 at McArthur Court.
The win continued the best Oregon start in the Kent era and tied the 1996-97 team that also opened up at 10-1. The victory was the Ducks’ 14th win in their past 15 meetings with their in-state rivals and, coincidentally, it also marked their third consecutive 18-point win over Oregon State.
The Ducks were led by senior forward Bryan Bracey, who scored 24 of his game-high 28 points in the second half through a barrage of three-pointers, jumpers and a smooth reverse alley-oop dunk. At one crucial five minute stretch in the second half, Bracey accounted for 17 of Oregon’s 19 points.
“In the first half I was just overshooting the ball and we were kind of startled,” Bracey said. “We were down and I knew I had to help my team. I can’t really explain what was going on. I was just feeling it.”
Oregon also got solid games from Jones and guard Anthony Norwood, who scored 18 and 17 points, respectively. Norwood connected on 5 of 9 three-point attempts, while Jones recorded his third career double-double with his 11 rebounds.
The Ducks shot 54.5 percent from the field in the second half, including 50 percent from beyond the arc. Oregon State, meanwhile, could only convert two of 11 three-pointers in the second half.
“When you talk about playing defense, spreading the ball around and shooting the ball the way we shot it against a caliber of an opponent like an Oregon State team, I was very pleased with that,” Kent said.
Perhaps the biggest turning point of the game occurred when Oregon State’s senior center Jason Heide picked up his fourth foul with 51 seconds left in the first half. The short-handed Beavers never really recovered once the fouls starting piling up. Oregon State’s Adam Masten and Brian Jackson fouled out in the second half.
Oregon junior guard Anthony Norwood prepares to shoot one of his nine three-point attemps against Oregon State. Fifteen of Norwood’s 17 points came from beyond the arc.
“When Jason Heide picked up his fourth foul, I just thought that it was going to be hard to pull our guys out of that,” said first year coach Ritchie McKay, who coached at Colorado State and Portland State before heading to Corvallis. “We went from aggressive to passive and as a result, Oregon became the attacker and we were the attackee.
“We got out of character offensively and fueled their flame.”
Many of the Oregon players admitted that they probably were a little too hyped up during the early part of the game, but were encouraged with the way they fought back.
“We gotta win our home games and I think that’s the biggest key,” Norwood said. “At first we started off kind of slow, but then we started realizing that this was our home and it’s the Civil War, let’s take care of it.”
Oregon’s hoping that its preseason schedule against teams such as Massachusetts, Auburn and Louisville prepared them for the Pac-10 gauntlet.
The Ducks travel down to the Bay Area to take on California Thursday and second-ranked Stanford Saturday in a game that will be televised by ABC.
“This team is going to be a good road team, I can tell that already,” Kent said. “If we can weather this road trip, then that’s going to be huge for us. It’ll take us to another level.”