Beavers try for like result against Bruins
Published 4:00 pm Saturday, March 1, 2014
The quest for .500 continues today for Oregon State.
It’s similar to the situation the Beavers were in the last time they played UCLA, and they’d be happy to get similar results.
The Beavers and Bruins play at 6 p.m. in Pauley Pavilion in a rematch of Oregon State’s best win of the season — 71-67 victory at Gill Coliseum on Feb. 2 that improved its record to 13-8 overall and 5-4 in conference play.
Oregon State has gone 2-4 since that game and has fallen to 7-8 and 10th place in the Pac-12 with three games to play in the regular season.
The Beavers will be at full strength today after the Pac-12 declined to further punish Hallice Cooke for his late-game ejection against USC on Thursday.
Cooke was called for a flagrant-2 foul after appearing to take a swipe at the head of Trojan player J.T. Terrell with 3:15 left.
Oregon State coach Craig Robinson said his freshman point guard was the victim of some baiting after the Beavers took a big lead. Oregon State led by 23 points at halftime before holding on for a 76-66 win.
“When you put a game on a team like we did for the first 33 minutes, they are not going to like it and they are going to do some things that are going to try to provoke you to doing something you shouldn’t do,” Robinson said. “They picked on our freshman and he fell for it. It’s a shame but that’s what happens.”
Cooke had a career-high 20 points in the Beavers’ win against UCLA earlier this season.
The Bruins (21-7, 10-5) will also be back at full strength, with guards Jordan Adams and Kyle Anderson expected to be in the lineup after a one-game suspension kept them out of the game against Oregon on Thursday.
UCLA coach Steve Alford told the L.A. Times the two would start “as long as practice goes well (on Saturday).”
Adams is the Bruins’ leading scorer at 17.2 points per game. Anderson averages 14.9 points, 8.6 rebounds and 6.8 assists.
Even without its two top players, UCLA still took the Ducks to double overtime before losing. Freshman guards Bryce Alford and Zach LaVine got their first career starts and had breakout games. Alford scored 31 points with five three-pointers, and LaVine had 18 points, eight rebounds and five assists.
It’ll be the last road game of the regular season for the Beavers, who return home for a game Wednesday against No. 3 Arizona and then the season finale Saturday against Arizona State.