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Washington (16-8, 9-3) at Oregon St. (15-9, 5-7) at Gill Coliseum at 2:30 PM PST / Fox Sports Net (Nationally) & ROOT Sports / KEJO 1240 AM / KPAM 860 AM (Streamed)
The Huskies and the Beavers meet for the second time this season in a nationally televised game. Both teams come into the game in a bad mood, after unexpected double digit defeats on Thursday night.
Washington was held up in traffic by an accident, and wound up wishing they never made it to the Matthew Knight arena. Oregon ran the Huskies out of the building, winning 82-57. The Ducks shot 57% from the field, and 54% on 3 pointers, while holding Washington under 39%, and just 12.5% from long range.
Tony Wroten led Washington, with 14 points, but C.J. Wilcox, with 10, was the only other Husky with more than 7 points. After 5 consecutive wins, then conference leading Washington at least expected to be competitive in the Eugene. But the Ducks flew away right from the start, dropping Washington back into a tie with California for the conference lead.
Oregon St. gave up a 17-3 run late in the first half, and eventually fell behind by as many as 19 points. It was too deep of a hole to climb out of, despite Jared Cunningham's 33 point night, and Washington St. won 83-73.
Other than Devon Collier's 11 points, the other 4 Oregon St. front court players combined for only 7 points. The Beavers exclusive of Cunningham and Roberto Nelson, both of whom shot 50%, only shot 26% from the field. Meanwhile, the Cougars connected on 52% of their shots from the floor.
When the Beavers visited Seattle back in December, the Huskies were as focused on the Alamo Bowl as they were the Pac-12 hoops season opener, but not so distracted as to not take it to Oregon St. Washington rolled to a 95-80 win on the strength of a 26 point, 9 rebound performance by Wroten, which negated the combined efforts of Burton, who had 18 points, and Brandt, who added 16.
Last year, when Washington came to Corvallis, the Beavers knocked the then Pac-10 leading Huskies out of the top 20 with a 68-56 win, as Oregon St. coach Craig Robinson mixed up his lineup, catching Washington off balance.
Since one of the teams will get swept this weekend, what was originally looking like one of the biggest games of the season has now taken on a pressure-packed, save your season kind of contest.
Here's the place to talk about the game, and the fun that comes (to both teams) from young players.
Andy_Wooldridge@yahoo.com