Last week, Oregon men’s basketball went to battle with the LA schools in order to keep their tournament hopes alive. This weekend was spent trying to grasp a first-round bye in the Pac-12 tournament.
Those aspirations met a swift death Saturday afternoon in Pullman as the Cougars (18-13, 11-9 Pac-12) dominated the Ducks (18-13, 11-9) 94-74 in an offensive master class.
Washington State trailed 2-1 after 2 minutes of play, but never trailed again against the Will Richardson-less Ducks. Giving up points in the paint was the cause of Oregon’s double-digit loss to Washington on Thursday, but in Pullman, it was the long ball that gave the Ducks problems.
Guard Noah Williams and forward Andrej Jakimovski were the initial leaders in a shooting display Cougars alumni Klay Thompson would have been proud of. The duo shot 6-of-7 from deep in the first half alone. The theme continued down the roster as they had their season-high with 16 made threes.
“I’m really disappointed,” Oregon coach Dana Altman said. “We got out rebounded, gave up 16 3s — you can’t let a team hit 16 3s.”
Five Cougars scored in double-digits. Williams led Washington State with 19.
In the first meeting of the season, Richardson hit a 2-point attempt that proved to be the final blow in a 62-59 win. Today, he was scratched from the lineup late with a head injury. Guard Jacob Young took the reins and was the Ducks’ leading scorer with 21.
“[Richardson] wasn’t feeling good so out of caution, we wanted to make sure we didn’t play him today,” Altman said. “He did get hit in the head against USC. He went through concussion protocol and was fine. The doctors tested him out twice and everything was fine but he just said he didn’t feel good.”
Oregon has had recent practice in games without contributions from its leading scorer. Richardson did start in the previous two contests but failed to record a field goal in either, totaling just 2 points in 66 minutes.
Near-perfect free throw shooting and a spark from the always-energetic Franck Kepnang gave Dana Altman’s team a glimpse of hope.
Then, Washington State freshman Mouhamed Gueye became a spark plug himself. Back-to-back vicious slams got the Cougar faithful back into it as the team pushed the lead back to 33-25 with 5 minutes left in the half.
The Ducks looked depleted as the ninth 3-pointer of the night fell for the Cougs. A volleyball spike block out of bounds capped off the momentum, heading into the halftime locker room with a 46-32 lead.
Washington State didn’t let off the gas in the second half. The Ducks struggled to keep the ball long enough to find open looks, resulting in sloppy fouls in efforts to slow down the onslaught of baskets.
The lead grew past 20 after another errant foul at the rim with over 12 minutes to go. The little energy Oregon had left on their trip up north was now completely gone.
Kepnang was the only other starter to finish in double digits, while the Cougars’ red-hot shooting seemingly never plateaued on their way to the 20 point victory.
One win in their last six games was certainly not what Altman had in mind as his team entered late February and early March. Now, the team waits for the rest of the Pac-12 conference to sort itself out. A first-round bye is now out of the picture for the Ducks, and another 2019-like tournament run will be needed for a return to March Madness.
