It was all Oregon State on Saturday night at Maples Pavilion, where they won their third Pac-10 game of the season, 77-62 over Stanford. The Beavers improve to 8-10 on the season with the win.
Oregon State built a quick 16-2 lead in the first five minutes of the game and never looked back. Stanford was able to pull within 4 or 5 in the second half, but whenever the Cardinal went on a run, Oregon State answered.
"They took the momentum at the start and ran with it,'' said Stanford Coach Johnny Dawkins. "And for us, the rest of the game was uphill.''
Calvin Haynes scored a career-high 25 points, and was 3-for-5 from behind the arc. Seth Tarver put up a season-high 19 points and three steals to go along with. Roeland Schaftenaar scored 18 points, and did not attempt a single three-pointer. The jump hooks were falling all night for Roeland.
It's the first time the Beavers have won two consecutive Pac-10 road games in six years, and it's also the first Oregon State Bay Area sweep in sixteen years.
The win caps a excitement-filled week for Coach Robinson, who attended the Presidential Inaguration on Tuesday, beat Cal on Thursday, and beat Stanford on Sunday. All with a team who went 0-18 last year, and that has already won as many Pac-10 games this season as they did in the last two seasons combined.
"The guys in there believe,'' Robinson told the Oregonian. "They think they can be in every game they play now. They think they can win every game they play.''
The Beavers' next test will come Monday against Cal State Bakersfield, a tune up game for Saturday's Civil War. Robinson scheduled the game in the off-season because he felt his team might need a boost in confidence before the Ducks came to town, but now he is the head coach of one of the most confident teams in the conference.
The Beavers, who are now 3-5 in the Pac-10, have as many conference wins as Stanford and Washington State, one more than Arizona, and three more than the struggling Oregon Ducks, who could be flirting with a season similar to Oregon State's 2007-2008 campaign.
The Bay Area sweep comes at a great time for the Beavers, who are looking ahead to four straight home games. They'll play Cal State Bakersfield and Oregon this week, then the Arizona schools will come to town as the Beavers will make their way through the Pac-10 schools for the second time of the season.
--Jake (jake.buildingthedam@gmail.com)