Oregon St. survived an elegant Oregon comeback run, and won 69-66 Friday in Corvallis.
The Beavers led 63-51 with less than 3 minutes left. The Ducks hit 4-of-4 3-point attempts in two minutes to make it 65-63 at 0:59, but all-conference senior Endiya Rogers missed a layup that would’ve tied it at 67.
The win raised Oregon State’s record in conference play to 3-5, putting them in 9th place.
Their next six are: At the Bay Area teams, hosting the mountain teams, at the Big 10 teams. The Beavers could be the best 3-11 team in the history of team sports.
I think OSU most charming. They could be 12-20 after the Pac-12 tournament, and I’d lobby for their invitation to another tournaments.
Senior guard Bendu Yeaney’s homecoming transfer from Arizona gave them toughness and experience, to complement sophomore Talia von Oelhoffen’s capability for huge scoring games. Junior Noelle Mannen is a walk-on who worked her way into a scholarship and starter minutes by seemingly making some impact on every play.
Though it’s their post players that slay me.
6-foot-9 sophomore Jelena Mitrovic intrigued me from the moment she arrived, for using her exceptional height to look around for open teammates.
My minority opinion is that teams should employ high-post, pass-first centers — if they can find one. A corner-to-corner, guard-to-guard skip pass is wonderful, but I’d rather a big person distribute from within the middle of the offense. 1976 NBA rookie of the year Alvan Adams specialized in no-look passes to baseline cutters, endearing him to me forever.
Mitrovic has that kind of passing ability, and she’s cultivated the rest of her game — 9 points and 11 rebounds against Oregon — to make her less of a curiosity and more of a presence.
Raegan Beers is frontrunning as freshman of the year. Beers has finesse we’ve never seen in a player with her body type. The most analogous player I could think of — please indulge me here — is Akeem Olajuwon.
Olajuwon was near seven feet and built like a truck, but he had footwork and grace to belie his stature. The reason for that was that he picked up basketball long after soccer — what sets Beers apart from Olajuwon is that she’s a basketball player first.
The background story on Beers — which will be repeated endlessly for as long as she’s an effective player — is that she acquired the skills of a small player by working around bigger big brothers.
Imagine Beers goes on to Hall of Fame WNBA career. I’m not predicting one, I’m just asking that you imagine so.
Coach Summitt popularized the idea of young women practicing against men, but the idea only goes as far as women’s college basketball.
Say Beers somehow cultivates the media exposure of a Paige Bueckers. I know this is impossible because Bueckers was the top prospect in the nation and went to play for hot airbag Auriemma, but once I introduce the science fiction of likening Raegan Beers to Akeem Olajuwon, the sky’s the limit.
Imagine Raegan Beers goes on a Wheaties box. The effect of that would be girls’ high school and club coaches embracing the idea of boys playing with girls that Coach Summitt introduced to the women’s college environment.
It would be good for women’s basketball, and basketball, period.