Washington Cruises 78-67 Against OSU on Senior Night

With a chance to clinch the #6 seed in the conference and playing on senior night there was plenty of motivation for the Huskies. That led to some early struggles trying a little too hard but the Dawgs settled down and dominated against the lowly Beavers and came away with a 78-67 win, the exact same margin by which they beat Oregon on Thursday. Terrell Brown Jr. was unstoppable with 24 points on 14 shots and Nate Roberts had another double double as the Huskies finish the regular season with a 16-14 (11-9) record.

As has often been the case for Washington this season it was a slow offensive start to the game. Jamal Bey threw it away on the first possession and Oregon State pulled up in transition for a 3-pointer. They hit another one a few minutes later and it was an 8-4 Beaver lead at the first media timeout. It could’ve been 11-4 except OSU on review was ruled to be about 0.1 seconds late getting a 3-point make off which resulted in a shot clock violation.

Washington tied it back up at 8 with 14:39 left as Jamal Bey pulled up for a baseline jumper but that would be the last UW made field goal for over 6 minutes. The Huskies looked overeager to force the ball inside and at one point threw it out of bounds untouched or on a pass too hot to handle on 3 consecutive possessions. The Dawgs turned it over an astounding 10 times in the first 10+ minutes of the half and only added a 2/4 performance at the line while falling behind 14-10 with 9:49 left.

A minute later though PJ Fuller banked in a 3-point shot and it seemed to shock the Husky offense back to life. Through the rest of the half the Huskies went on a 28-10 run and didn’t turn it over once in that stretch. Jamal Bey hit a pair of 3’s while Cole Bajema also hit a long range shot in transition. Most importantly though Terrell Brown Jr. took over and managed to repeatedly find cracks in the OSU defense to end up with either open short floaters or wide open lanes to the basket for layups.

Washington ended the half making 10 of their final 11 shots with only a Bey missed 3-pointer as a blemish on the record. The impressive run resulted in Terrell Brown Jr. going into the break with a game high 12 points while Jamal Bey had 8 (on 8 attempts) and Nate Roberts had 7 to go along with 6 rebounds.

Coming out of the half it didn’t look like the Huskies’ momentum slowed down at all. Washington scored on 3 of their first 4 possessions with Bey punctuating the mini-run by nailing a 3-point shot. A few minutes later it was Nate Roberts’ turn to take over as he found a few easy layups and then got a turnaround fade away baseline jumper to bank in off the glass showing he’s still on a hot streak. With 14 minutes left in the game Roberts already had his 2nd consecutive double double. Emmitt Matthews Jr. hit a wing 3 with on the next possession to extend the UW lead out to 58-33 and officially make it a rout.

Oregon State didn’t give up and managed to cut into the deficit a little bit though. The Beavers followed up a 3-pointer with a traditional and-1 basket after a bad foul by Nate Roberts inside. OSU managed to post-up with one of their wings and flip it in to suddenly bring the score back to a semi-manageable mark at 60-44 with 9:51 remaining.

Cole Bajema tried to put the Beavers back away again hitting a corner 3 on a drive and kick by Daejon Davis and then driving to the rim shortly after for a nice finger roll layup. Oregon State continued to fight as their 3-point shot picked up and they made every free throw. Both teams seemed to lose a little bit of defensive intensity as they traded baskets and each team was able to make mostly open shots. Washington consistently led by 13-18 points though as the Beavers weren’t able to cut into the lead any further.

Emmitt Matthews Jr. had a chance for a highlight reel dunk but it hit off the rim though after a missed Bey corner 3 Nate Roberts was able to clean it up with a put back dunk. With 1:20 remaining and a 13-point Washington lead Hop took out all of the starters to allow them a moment on senior night. OSU took advantage as walk-on Noah Neubauer dribbled it off his foot and it resulted in a Lucas 3-pointer which brought the lead down to 10 points for the first time since just before halftime. Walk-on Anthony Igleasia attempted a 30+ foot 3 when he could’ve just dribbled out the clock and OSU took advantage of the ill-advised miss to the get to the FT line but missed the front end of a 1-and-1 to preserve an 11 point UW win.

Terrell Brown Jr. finished with a game high 24 points on ridiculous 12/14 shooting against the hapless Beavers defense. Nate Roberts (13 points and 16 rebounds), Emmitt Matthews Jr. (11 points), and Jamal Bey (15 points) also finished in double figures for UW. Daejon Davis had 0 points on 1 shot attempt as he didn’t look totally comfortable gutting through his shoulder injury but still had 5 assists and 2 steals. Oregon State’s Dashawn Davis came into the game shooting 16% from the 3-point line but was 2 of 3 tonight to lead OSU with 17 points.

With the win the Huskies clinched the #6 seed in the Pac-12 tournament. However, their opponents will be decided later tonight. If Utah loses against Colorado this evening then the Huskies will play the Utes in the 1st round but will instead play Cal if Utah pulls off the upset. Should Washington win that 1st round game they will end up facing the loser of tonight’s UCLA/USC battle who will end up with the #3 seed. The tournament starts on Wednesday and if the men’s side keeps the same schedule as the women’s then the game will be scheduled to tip-off at 8p although that will become official later tonight.

The Dawgs honored 9 seniors during the pre-game festivities including 7 scholarship players (Brown, Davis, Matthews, Roberts, Bey, Sorn, and Lundeen) plus 2 walk-ons (Geron, Neubauer), Only Terrell Brown Jr. and Daejon Davis are out of eligibility. We’ll find out in the coming weeks who will be returning and who decides to either transfer or get on with their professional career whether in basketball or something else. Washington has 3 incoming recruits so at least 1 of the Matthews/Roberts/Bey/Sorn/Lundeen group will need to move on to open up that spot or one of the younger players on the roster would need to transfer. Every additional departure would free up a spot for an incoming player from the transfer portal.

There will be plenty of time to discuss that next week though after the season ends. Until then we’ll have more previewing the Pac-12 tournament once matchups are finalized.

EDIT 9:00p

Utah lost to Colorado tonight which means that the Huskies will play the Utes in the 1st round at ~8:30p on Wednesday night. Winner will play #3 seed USC (who lost to UCLA tonight) at ~8:30p on Thursday.