At 9:55 the Buffaloes would take their first lead of the second half with a three, Oregon State would answer back with a three from Langston Morris-Walker to them a one point lead. The Ducks lead the all-time series, 15-9, and they’ve won the last five matchups.
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Over Utah’s last four, the 7-foot sophomore from Austria has scored at least 20 points in each. “It’s a story that, honestly I feel like, it’s better than it gets credit for even. I’m just looking at what they’ve done”. OR is coming off a 76-56 pounding of Colorado, a team it had lost to earlier in the season. On Thursday they had the game in hand in the first half pulling out to a 19-7 lead with a double digit lead to end the first half against a fiesty Colorado team. If we’re going to continue to develop, that’s one of the areas we got to really work on, using our athleticism to get some offensive rebounds. But his 13 points were fewer than the Utes hoped and had a lot to do with OR picking off passes into the post.
The Buffaloes return to their home court on Thursday, Feb. 11 to play the Washington State Cougars at 8 p.m. The game will be broadcast on the Pac-12 Networks. The Utes have five players that are hitting at 40 percent or better from beyond the arc.
Getting swept in OR dropped the Utes to 17-7 overall and 6-5 in Pac-12 play – in a tie with Colorado but three games back of first-place OR and also behind USC (7-3), Arizona (7-4) and Washington (7-4).
Dakarai Tucker has been finding his stroke from three point range lately and against the Beavers he was 3-of-6 from beyond the arc.
Scott is third in blocks (1.9) and fourth in rebounds (9.4) in Pac-12 games. Thompson was fouled on a drive on Oregon State’s next possession and sank both free throws with 28.3 seconds remaining. Then he missed again before Brooks tipped it back in while being fouled. Payton would seal the game as he made both free throws to put the Beavers up 60-56. He had one point and two rebounds in 16 minutes of action on Saturday, and didn’t play in the second half after twisting his ankle.
OSU coach Wayne Tinkle pointed to those two areas as positives. “I don’t know how good we can be or what we’re going to be defined as”. Colorado attempted only one shot, a 3-pointer by guard Josh Fortune with three seconds left, but it banged off the rim. Loveridge hit another jumper and Poeltl scored inside to put Utah ahead 31-30, but Bell dunked and Cook got a layup to put the Ducks up 34-31 with 3:33 left in the first half. We want to be playing our best basketball at this time, or hopefully the end of the season and hopefully we’ve learned from our mistakes. “And not just us”.
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Colorado defeated Oregon State 71-54 in their first meeting of the season, in Boulder, after the Buffaloes led by four at halftime. The only other Beaver in double figures was Stephen Thompson Jr., who added 14 points.
