Oregon State suffers its worst loss of the season
By Cliff Kirkpatrick
Corvallis Gazette-Times

In theory, rock bottom has been reached.

In actuality, there are 15 more regular season games to see if this season gets better or turns into a downward spiral.

The Oregon State men’s basketball team was dealt its worst defeat of the season, losing a Pacific-10 Conference game to Southern California 91-46 on Saturday afternoon before a crowd of 5,973 in Gill Coliseum.

Name an area of the game, and there were problems: poor shooting, sloppy defense, turnovers, a lack of effort.

“There isn’t much for me to say or offer up,” coach Jay John said. “We were horrible and USC was fantastic. … They were clearly on top of their game and we were not.”

The Beavers (8-8, 0-3) topped their largest margin of defeat this season by one point, and even trailed by 50 late in the game. They lost to Hawaii in the fifth game of the season by 44 points.

It wasn’t the most lopsided loss in OSU history, but close. A 51-point loss to Arizona on Jan. 23, 1997, is the most one-sided defeat.

“With the number of scorers they were able to put on the floor, it was difficult for us to defend,” John said. “They came in and shot it so doggone well it forced our hand and broke us.”

USC (13-4, 3-1) shot a stellar 66 percent from the field, while the Beavers hit only 32 percent of their field goals. The 91 points are the most OSU has given up this season, and the 49 points allowed in the first half is the worst start to a game this season.

Shooting problems affected other areas of the game. USC didn’t defend the perimeter shooters hard because they couldn’t make shots. So that made it difficult to get the ball inside with the defenders packed in tight.

The Trojans then turned 17 turnovers into 28 points. They were dominant inside, outscoring the Beavers in the paint 46-12.

“It always looks so much better when you shoot it well,” USC coach Tim Floyd said. “We shot such a phenomenal percentage today. … We’re not as good as we were tonight. We caught them on their worst game.”

Senior guard Lodrick Stewart continued his mastery over the Beavers, scoring 28 points — 20 of them by halftime. Freshman center Taj Gibson put up 20 points.

Both of them did that in 25 minutes of play and less than 32 minutes into the game. Floyd pulled his starters with about eight minutes to go.

None of the seven players in the regular rotation for OSU produced much. Sasa Cuic had nine points, and Marcel Jones added eight. Reserve Angelo Tsagarakis led the team in scoring with 10 points.

“Hurting, disappointed — there are so many adjectives I could use to describe what’s going on,” Tsagarakis said. “A lot of guys didn’t have a lot left in the tank after the UCLA game (on Thursday). Leading up to UCLA there was tremendous energy in practice. A lot of guys left so much on the court they were not able to recover.”

There wasn’t much to take from the game, John felt. He did play many of his younger players.

It was just another lesson to learn from on the way through a challenging season.

“The thing about this game is, it was a real setback because we had been playing hard and working hard as a team and showing great effort,” John said. “But today, it reverts back. The biggest thing is this can’t become a pattern. We need to come back ready to work and perform. That’s our job. I don’t feel guys quit. They kept trying to do what we are doing. It was one of those days nothing was working for us, and they had tons of things working for them.”