The Ducks dropped their first game in Eugene this season Saturday night against the Oregon State Beavers, 75-64. The game marked Oregon’s first since Jan. 9, as COVID-19 testing results and contact tracing forced the team to take a two-week hiatus from playing.
Before the break, the Ducks had won nine of their last 10 but this game was a different story.
Oregon came out in the first half looking dismantled. The long break mixed with a lack of two of the top four scorers in Chris Duarte and LJ Figueroa forced head coach Dana Altman to roll out lineups that hadn’t played a lot together.
The lack of cohesion amongst the players were reflected in a plethora of airballs, turnovers and bad shots.
Oregon State on the other hand continued its hot play from downtown in the first half by shooting 38%. In the Beavers two-game winning streak leading into Eugene, they’d shot over 40% from deep.
With just a minute left in the first half, the Beavers looked in control with an 11 point lead. The last 60 seconds of the half, however, were huge for the Ducks as they went on a 5-0 run led by Eugene Omoruyi, who had nine first-half points and 15 points total.
The Beavers still led at halftime, however, 34-28 with Jarod Lucas setting the tone with eight points from 3-of-6 in the field.
Despite the strong ending to the first half, Oregon couldn’t keep the momentum going. The Beavers continued their hot shooting and began to incorporate their size advantage to dominate in the paint and on the boards hugely due to Warith Alatishe.
Alatishe finished with 14 points and 16 rebounds, maintaining his Pac-12 lead in rebounds.
The minus 19 differential on rebounds marks the worst in Altman’s tenure as head coach at Oregon.
“We got killed on the boards,” Altman said. “I didn’t think we’d get out-rebounded like that, but they took it to us tonight.”
The consistent shooting mixed with strong play in the paint helped the Beavers grow the lead back to double digits with nine minutes left in the game.
Oregon made multiple pushes in the last nine minutes to cut the lead, but the offense failed to ever establish any sort of flow.
“We took quick shots, and bad shots,” Altman said. “We took too many threes and had some questionable possessions on offense.”
Players like Chandler Lawson and Amauri Hardy, who were expected to step-up without two starters, had their struggles. The two combined for six points on just 2-of-11 shooting.
Oregon State turned to its leader, Ethan Thompson, to lead the team in crunchtime. The senior finished with a game high 19 points including multiple clutch free throws to lead the Beavers to victory.
The win moves Oregon State to 8-5 on the season and marks its first road top-25 victory since 1985.
With the loss, the Ducks fall to 9-3 and three games back of UCLA, the leader in the Pac-12. The Ducks will return on Jan. 28 in Los Angeles to take on the Bruins hoping to avoid a second straight loss.