Oregon State Pulls Off Another Upset, Wins Pac-12 Tournament Title
Oregon State, picked to finish last in the Pac-12, completed its stunning run through the Pac-12 tournament by beating Colorado 70-68 in the championship game Saturday night in Las Vegas.
Oregon State (17-12) earns an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament and captured its first conference tournament title in school history after upsetting three of the four Pac-12 teams expected to get at-large berths in the NCAA tournament.
Oregon State, which finished tied for sixth in the standings with a 10-10 conference record, upset fourth-seeded UCLA in the quarterfinals Thursday, ousted top-seeded Oregon in the quarterfinal Friday and got by third-seeded Colorado (22-8) on Saturday.
"Hell of deal right now," Oregon State coach Wayne Tinkle said.
This will be Oregon State's first trip to NCAA tournament since 2016 and just its second since 1990.
Colorado had won both regular-season games against Oregon State, and the Buffaloes were 8.5-point favorites on Saturday. A major reason that the Buffaloes' six-game winning streak was halted Saturday was that Colorado, the best free-throw shooting team in the country, missed eight foul shots. And the Buffaloes made the one free throw they were trying to miss. .
The Pac-12 will probably earn five berths in the NCAA tournament (Oregon State, Oregon, Colorado, USC, UCLA), with the only question being UCLA, which has a slight chance of being left out but is expected to make the 68-team field.
The Beavers' amazing run through the conference tournament was exemplified by the fact that their leading scorer on Saturday was Maurice Calloo, who scored 15 points. He had been scoreless in five of the eight previous games and had not scored more than five points since Jan. 6.
"On our biggest night he stepped up and was huge for us because of his attitude and his positivity that he has kept through all this," Tinkle said.
Warith Alatishe hugs Maruice Calloo. Photo by Stephen R. Sylvanie, USA TODAY Sports
Oregon State made nine three-pointers Saturday and 29 in their three games in the tournament.
Oregon State also benefited from an unlikely statistic. Colorado, whose 83.1 foul-shooting percentage entering the game was on pace to set a Division I single-season record, missed 8 of its 20 free throws on Saturday. Interestingly, the one free throw the Buffaloes tried to miss is one they made. More on that in a moment.
Oregon State led nearly the entire game and held a seven-point lead when a media timeout was called with 3:40 left in the game.
The Buffaloes got the margin down to three before Warith Alatishe used a slick move to score, giving the Beavers a 66-61 lead at the 1:06 mark.
Mckinley Wright IV and Jabari Walker each made just one of two foul shots to cut the lead to 66-63 with 37.2 seconds remaining.
Jarod Lucas, the top free-throw shooter in the Pac-12, made two foul shots to extend the lead to five with 15 seconds left, but Wright hit a high-degree-of-difficulty three-pointer with 5.8 seconds left to make it a two-point game again.
Lucas made only one of two free throws after getting fouled before the ball was inbounded -- a controversial call -- and Wright went to the foul line for two shots with 2.2 seconds left and his team trailing by three. He made the first, but instead of intentionally missing the second, hoping a teammate could get an offensive rebound and score a game-tying field goal, Wright made the second foul shot, leaving the Buffaloes down by a point. Wright finished with a game-high 18 points, but he made that last free throw by mistake.
"He was trying to miss it," Colorado coach Tad Boyle said. "We asked him to shoot the ball as high as he could, and have it hit the rim and create a long rebound."
The idea was to have a Colorado player tip the missed shot back to a teammate for a three-point shot that would win the game. It didn't happen.
Oregon State's Roman Silva made the second of two free throws with 1.4 seconds left, and Colorado only got off a half-court heave by Wright that did not come close.
Before the Pac-12 tournament began, the odds of Oregon State winning it were anywhere from 22-to-1 to 28-to-1. So if you had bet $10 on the Beavers to win the tournament, you could be taking home $280 now.
Now bubble teams across the country are sweating because some team destined for an at-large berth to March Madness got bumped out by Oregon State.
"Orange Express is back, baby," Tinkle said.
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Wayne Tinkle's postgame interview
.Colorado coach Tad Boyle postgame interview
Cover photo by Stephen R. Sylvanie, USA TODAY Sports
