Posts tagged OSU
CU men surge to first Pac-12 victory
Jan 3rd
By B.G Brooks, CUBuffs.com Contributing Editor
BOULDER – The launch of Pac-12 Conference Thursday night at the Coors Events Center sprang very few surprises on Colorado coach Tad Boyle. The biggest might have been 6-10 Eric Moreland and his 11th hour reinstatement, but Boyle’s Buffs eventually adjusted to Moreland’s presence, as well as Oregon State’s 2-3 zone, and earned a difficult 64-58 win.
“Good win . . . welcome to Pac-12 Conference play,” a relieved Boyle said. “Nothing’s going to be easy. Anybody who saw the game saw the talent and skill Oregon State has (and) with Moreland back, they’re a different animal . . . they just keep coming at you with athletes off bench.”
That’s where Moreland, a junior, spent 12 non-conference games, suspended by coach Craig Robinson for a summer violation of team rules. Robinson initially levied a 14-game suspension, but late Wednesday night – on the eve of conference play – announced that Moreland had satisfied whatever was required to return to the court.
The Buffs (12-2, 1-0) had prepped for Moreland’s backup – 6-10 senior Angus Brandt – but CU post Josh Scott claimed Moreland’s unexpected return didn’t surprise him: “To be honest I was kind of expecting him to play . . . I don’t know why I figured it but I just did.”
In three games against CU last season, including a 64-58 win at the CEC that stands as the Buffs’ last home loss (Boyle is 54-7 at home), Moreland averaged 10.2 points and 10 rebounds. But his length and athleticism is typical for the Beavers. Said Boyle: “We’re not going to win a jumping contest with Oregon State.”
And in Thursday night’s first half, the Buffs didn’t win the rebound battle either. Moreland got eight first-half boards (10 total, with two points) as Oregon State (8-5, 0-1) out-boarded the Buffs 21-13, marking the first time this season CU has not had a first-half rebounding edge. But after a “come to Tad” halftime address, the Buffs regained their intensity and out-rebounded the Beavs 21-13 in the second half. That might have made Oregon State’s 37-34 edge for the night a little more palatable for Boyle.
His team held the visitors to 37.5 percent from the field – Oregon State arrived shooting 50 percent – and converted 17 OSU turnovers into 25 points. Those numbers, bolstered by the Buffs’ nine steals, helped them overcome a mediocre shooting night; CU finished 38.2 percent from the field (21-of-55) and hit only five of its 20 3-point attempts.
“The best thing is we won when we didn’t shoot the ball well,” Boyle said.
CU overtook Oregon State with a 13-3 run in the final 8 minutes, but sealed the win by hitting five of eight free throws in the last 1:49 after the Beavers rallied from a 12-point deficit and closed to within four points.
Three Buffs were in double figures – Jaron Hopkins, Askia Booker and Josh Scott, each 13 points. Scott also had 10 of the Buffs’ 34 rebounds. The Beavers got 23 points from Roberto Nelson, the Pac-12’s leading scorer with a 21-point average. Nelson got 16 of his total Thursday night in the second half and was three-of-five from 3-point range.
The Buffs led 28-23 at halftime, but getting that five-point advantage was a major struggle. The Beavers’ 2-3 zone, which reminded Boyle of Syracuse’s traditional defense, made almost everything the Buffs attempted a challenge, most notably shooting and rebounding. Neither team led by more than five points in the first 20 minutes, with Oregon State’s largest advantage being 10-5 on a pair of Nelson free throws at the 13:26 mark.
Moreland entered the game with 16:33 left before halftime and right away collected the first of his eight first-half rebounds. In 13 minutes, he also had an assist and a blocked shot – but his rustiness showed in committing four of Oregon State’s 12 first-half turnovers. Those led to 15 CU points and were largely responsible for the Buffs’ halftime advantage.
The Buffs opened the second half with a steal by Booker that led to an inside basket by Scott to take a 30-23 lead. And the Beavers were about to see more of Scott, who delivered a soft jump hook for the Buffs’ next basket.
After a Spencer Dinwiddie trey put CU up by seven (35-28), Wes Gordon hit one of two free throws and Scott added a put-back to push the Buffs to their first double-digit lead – 38-28 with 16:28 to play. But it wouldn’t last; Oregon State outscored CU 12-2 over the next 51/2 minutes to tie the score at 40-40 with 10:35 left.
The Buffs had an immediate answer in forwards Xavier Johnson and Gordon. “XJ” contributed a pair of tip dunks – the second following a Gordon block – and Gordon hit a short jumper to ignite a 13-3 run that restored the Buffs’ 10-point (53-43) lead.
“I mean, coach preaches defensive rebounding,” Johnson, who finished with nine points and nine rebounds, said of his tip-dunks. “I pretty much just followed Spencer and Wesley up on the shots and was able to get the tip dunks. They were good momentum swings for the team.”
Two minutes later, the Buffs would stretch their lead to 12 (58-46) on a three-point play by Johnson. But the Beavers were far from done. They closed to 60-56 on a 3-pointer from the right wing by freshman Malcolm Duvivier with 2:11 left, prompting a timeout by Boyle.
Dinwiddie hit one of two free throws (61-56) at the 1:49 mark, added two more (63-56) with 41.2 seconds to play and when Buffs guard Xavier Talton chased down a long rebound in the final 15 seconds, the Beavs were done. Johnson hit one of two foul shots for CU’s final point.
Boyle pointed to Talton’s late rebound and “XJ” outdueling OSU’s Devon Collier for a “50-50” ball as the plays of the game. Said Boyle: “Those were hustle plays, the 50-50 balls, the long rebounds, the loose balls that we had to come up with – and we did tonight.”
He’s hoping the intensity remains at a high level on Sunday afternoon. No. 10 Oregon, which remained unbeaten (13-0, 1-0) with an overtime win Thursday night at Utah, visits the CEC. “We need a sellout, we need this place rocking,” Boyle said. “We need a Kansas-type crowd effort on Sunday.”
CU MBB team–Close but no cigar
Dec 23rd
By B.G. Brooks, CUBuffs.com Contributing Editor
LAS VEGAS – Colorado cut a 12-point Oklahoma State lead to four in the final minute here Saturday night, but that’s where the Buffaloes’ rally and their 10-game winning streak would stop. The No. 7 Cowboys held on for a 78-73 win in the second game of the MGM Grand Showcase.
No. 20 CU (10-2) struggled to get timely stops and had just as much trouble finding an offensive rhythm, and when Phil Forte III drained a long trey just under the 3-minute mark Okie State (11-1) had a 73-61 lead. The Buffs were running out of chances and time, but a 10-2 flurry brought them to within 75-71 on a put-back by Josh Scott with 26 seconds to play.
OSU’s Marcus Smart hit a pair of free throws (77-71) with 23.4 seconds remaining but Scott answered with two (77-73) at the 16-second mark. Two seconds later, Forte hit one of two foul shots for the Cowboys’ final margin.
“I take the blame for this loss,” said CU coach Tad Boyle. “As a coach I didn’t do a good job on the sideline. I didn’t have our team ready to play tonight for whatever reason. I’ve got to look myself in the mirror.”
In hindsight, Boyle questioned whether he had the Buffs practice as much as necessary during semester finals week which preceded Saturday’s game. “That’s where I take responsibility as a coach, coming off of finals and we had two practices as a team,” he said. “I thought that at this time of the season we could carry over without those lengthy practices through finals; I want to respect our guys as students. So, as a basketball coach it’s really hard to take that time and back off, and maybe that hurt us tonight. It’s not an excuse, it’s just the fact that we weren’t as sharp and we need to become sharper and the only way you can do that is by practicing.”
Nonetheless, Boyle added, “We have so much room for improvement, we still haven’t put a (complete) game together, and yet we played the No. 7 team in the country to a five-point game on a neutral court and we don’t feel like we played well, at all.”
CU junior guard
disagreed with Boyle shouldering the loss. “I don’t think the blame goes on coach Boyle,” he said. “He’s just tough on himself – just like I am on myself . . . the only thing we maybe could have done better was a have a couple more days of practice.”
The Cowboys’ 78 points were the most the Buffs have allowed this season. OSU shot 61.9 percent from the field (13-of-21) in the second half and finished at 52.1 percent (25-of-48). CU shot only 40.6 percent from the field (26-of-64). The Buffs outrebounded the Cowboys 41-30 and got 21 second-chance points to the Cowboys’ four.
CU junior guard Spencer Dinwiddie called OSU’s second-half shooting percentage “very disappointing . . . we just dug ourselves a hole.” But the self-burial started in the first half.
Among Boyle’s pre-game goals was to limit the Cowboys’ layups, targeting six as a minimum to give the Buffs the best chance of winning. That was six for the game – not the first half.
But that’s what CU allowed in the first 20 minutes, which helped Okie State roll to a 32-26 lead at intermission. Also contributing were nine of the Buffs’ 14 total turnovers, which resulted in 11 Cowboys points (20 for the game off). Smart, who finished with 18 points, and Markel Brown, who scored a game-best 23, got to the rim unimpeded twice each in the opening half, with the other two layups scored by Kamari Murphy and Michael Cobbins.
The Buffs tightened their interior defense by a couple of clicks, allowing five second-half layups. But the Cowboys’ presented other offensive problems – namely a pair of late, long treys by Forte, who scored 16 points off the bench on four-of-seven shooting from beyond the arc and four-of-seven free throws.
Dinwiddie, who finished with 19 points, called Forte’s treys “timely” and said the Buffs’ first-half turnovers and their porous second-half defense are “never good enough against a good team. Those are probably the three (biggest) things.”
CU got a double-double from Scott – 20 points, tying a season high, and 12 rebounds. Scott hit 10-of-13 free throws and scored 18 of his total in the second half, when Boyle said the Buffs began to focus more on getting the ball inside: “We had 17 paint touches in the first half; we want 50 for the game.”
“If we could get that first half back and play like we did in the second, I think it would be a different outcome,” Scott said, referring more to his team’s nine turnovers and yielding six layups than him not getting more touches.
The Buffs’ largest lead was three points (7-4) following a five-point burst by Booker. That also was CU’s last lead, with four ties following before intermission.
But permitting the six layups undoubtedly wasn’t Boyle’s only beef with his Buffs in the first half. In addition to their nine turnovers, they made a season-low (for a first half) three assists and got to the free throw line just once (Xavier Johnson hit one of two). CU finished the night making 15-of-20 free throws – not close to an average night’s work for the Buffs – while OSU made 23-of-35.
“Coming into this game, we’re eighth in the country in free throw attempts,” Boyle said. “We’re eighth in the country for free throws made; we didn’t get to the free throw line tonight, for whatever reason. Obviously we have to figure out how to score when we’re not getting to the free throw line, but that’s frustrating when you know over an 11 game schedule how many free throws you shoot and that’s a big part of your offensive identity and then you don’t get to the free throw line – for whatever reason – frustration sets in a little bit. We’ve got to get better in that regard, so we have to become a better half court execution team.”
Boyle also said the Cowboys’ zone defense in the second half “got us standing, which is exactly what they want, but we didn’t handle that well at times.”
Also, getting forward Wesley Gordon back after a two-game absence didn’t help CU that much in the opening half. At the 16:06 mark, Gordon was whistled for his second foul and went to the bench with two rebounds and a steal.
He didn’t return (or score) until the second half opened, hitting a foul line jumper – his only points for the night – that brought the Buffs to 34-30. A Booker layup off a steal by Scott cut the deficit to 34-32 half a minute later. But the Cowboys widened their lead to five points (37-32) on one of three free throws by Smart and a jumper by Brown with just over 161/2 minutes remaining.
Okie State’s advantage ballooned to eight (44-36) before Dinwiddie hit a trey from the left corner and one of two free by Scott cut the Buffs’ deficit in half (44-40). The Cowboys went another layup spree, getting three – including a dunk and free throw by Smart – and a pair of treys by Forte to take their first double-figure lead of the night (63-53) with 7:32 to play. At that point, Boyle tried to regroup his troops with a timeout. It didn’t help immediately, but the Buffs kept grinding.
“I love the toughness, and the grit, and the fight in our team, and I have a lot of respect for Oklahoma State and their players,” Boyle said. “t’s just disappointing because we will never have this opportunity again unless were fortunate enough to get them in the (NCAA) tournament.”
The Buffs don’t play again until Saturday, Dec. 28 when they host Georgia at the Coors Events Center. Their first post-Christmas practice is scheduled for Thursday.