Oregon State on a mission to prove doubters wrong

Oregon State men’s basketball coach Wayne Tinkle wouldn’t call his team’s victory Friday over Oregon the most satisfying of his seven-year tenure. “But it’s a big one for sure,” he said.

Undoubtedly an understatement.

Oregon State (16-12) will play for an automatic berth in the NCAA tournament Saturday. This after securing a 75-64 win over its arch-rival in the Pac-12 tournament semifinals at T-Mobile Arena. The fifth-seeded Beavers will play No. 3 seed Colorado in the championship game. The Buffaloes defeated the second-seeded USC Trojans 72-70 on a rebound dunk by D’Shawn Schwartz with 3.3 seconds left in the game.

Oregon (20-6) will presumably be awarded an at-large bid to the Big Dance as the conference’s regular season champion.

“We were confident this wasn’t going to be our last night here in Vegas,” Tinkle said. “It’s all in the way the guys responded.” Both on Friday — and throughout the 2020-21 season.

Oregon State was projected to finish last in the 12-team league by its media, presumably because of the loss of Tinkle’s son, Tres, a star forward and the program’s all-time leading scorer (2,223 career points).

Tinkle averaged 17.7 points in his career before graduating last spring, but the Beavers filled his void with the likes of senior guard Ethan Thompson (15.6 points per game) and sophomore guard Jarod Lucas (13.0 points per game).

Senior guard Zach Reichle said Friday that the Beavers used the preseason poll as motivation, drawing on it for inspiration throughout the course of the season.

“We know what we’re capable of and we know we don’t need other people telling us where we might end up in the league or anything,” he said. “We know what we can do, so that’s just what we’re doing. We’re coming out and showing it.”

Oregon State finished fifth in the Pac-12 during the regular season, defying the doubters by posting a 10-10 mark in conference play. The Beavers beat No. 4 seed UCLA in overtime in the tournament quarterfinals on Thursday and were even better against the top-seeded Ducks on Friday.

Thompson equaled a career-high with five 3-pointers en route to a game-high 16 points. Reichle and Warith Alatishe scored 12 apiece and Lucas added 11, including a crucial contested 3-pointer with 4:03 to play.

So much for preseason polls.

“We’re a very motivated group regardless of what we were picked. We don’t put too much into that,” Thompson said. “But just seeing what we have done so far and to see that we were picked 12th, it obviously puts another chip on our shoulder and motivates us to go even harder.”

Contact reporter Sam Gordon at sgordon@reviewjournal.com. Follow @BySamGordon on Twitter.