Beavers Take Down Ducks in Eugene, 75-64

The Beavers went into the home court of the #21 ranked Oregon Ducks and came out with a huge win, controlling the pace of the game from the tip off to the final buzzer on the way to a 75-64 win. The Ducks hadn’t lost a game at Matthew Knight Arena since January 24th, 2019, having won 28 games in a row at home. That ended tonight, with OSU notching their third straight win to improve to 8-5 overall, and 4-3 in the Pac-12.

Oregon State struck first with Dearon Tucker grabbing the first two points of the game. Scoring went back and forth for the bit, with a layup from Oregon’s Eugene Omoruyi giving the Ducks their first lead of the game. It would also be their last. Warith Alatishe would give the Beavers back the lead a minute later, and while the Ducks managed to tie the game up a couple times, they would never get back in front.

The Beavers had a balanced attack in the first half, with some solid three point shooting from Jarod Lucas and some good work in the paint from Dearon Tucker leading them in scoring. The best performance of the half may have been defensively, with Warith Alatishe being a huge problem for the Ducks to deal with under the rim. Check out one of his two blocks on the night below.

The Ducks managed to keep things close but couldn’t grab momentum back from the Beavers, and the first half ended with OSU up 6, 34-28. At the start of the second half, it appeared the game was going to change quickly, with Oregon tying the game up with back to back threes from Eugene Omuyori and Jalen Terry.

Warith Alatishe grabbed the lead back for the Beavers with a layup, and a couple minutes later laid down an absolutely monstrous dunk to get the lead back up to six. Another layup from Alatishe and some scoring from Zach Reichle got the Beaver lead up to 11 with 15 minutes left in the game.

Those final 15 minutes turned into the Ethan Thompson show. Before the night began, Thompson was 11 points away from joining Gary Payton as the only Beaver with 1400 points and 400 assists. He made sure he got it done tonight, scoring 13 in the final stretch of the game; most of it at the foul line. Oregon never managed to get things close, as sloppy play led to a lot of fouls and turnovers during the final stretch of play.

Thompson led the Beavers in scoring with 19 points, 2 rebounds and 2 assists. As previously mentioned, he joins Gary Payton as the only Beavers to have scored over 4000 points with 400+ assists. Warith Alatishe had an incredible night, with 14 points and 16 rebounds. That includes 7 offensive rebounds. Alatishe was the putback king tonight. Jarod Lucas also hit double digits tonight, with 13 points and 1 rebound. Lucas was the only Beaver active from beyond the arc, going three for six.

The Beavers remain on the road next weekend, travelling to SoCal to take on USC on Thursday, January 28th, and UCLA on Saturday, January 30th. The rematch with Oregon, this time in Corvallis, will wait until the end of the season.