CORVALLIS – When Colorado and Oregon State last met in Boulder on Jan. 26, Buffaloes coach Tad Boyle sat all five of his team’s typical starters, replacing them with five reserves who had made two combined starts.
Boyle said it was “not an indictment” of his starters, but a reward for reserves who “deserved” the opportunity. Regardless of the public rationale behind the move, it served a clear purpose for an underachieving team with NCAA Tournament aspirations that started conference play 0-7.
CU pulled away for an 85-78 victory and has won five of its last six after entering that matchup with the Beavers as one of three Power Five conference teams without a conference win.
Oregon State (4-22, 0-13 Pac-12) is the only team left in that category entering a Thursday night rematch against Colorado (15-11, 5-8) at Gill Coliseum (6 p.m., Pac-12 Network). While the Beavers’ external preseason expectations were nowhere near their next opponent’s, OSU coach Wayne Tinkle indicated Tuesday he wished he had the depth to utilize a similar move to help jumpstart his team during the season.
“If you don’t focus, you’re not going to play,” Tinkle said. “That’s a key ingredient we haven’t talked a lot about, at least publicly. But behind closed doors, coaches talk about having the hammer and if a guy isn’t defending the way you want, you pull him out and he doesn’t play and then he figures it out. … That’s one of the things that’s really hurt this year’s team.”
After not landing all offseason recruiting targets, the Beavers chose not to fill all of their 13 scholarship spots. They have since become thinner due to injuries and other departures. Now Oregon State is hoping to avoid what would be the first 0-18 season in league play since they last did so in 2008.
The roster could get even thinner Thursday.
Sophomore starting center Gligorije Rakocevic wore a sling to practice Tuesday, the result of a fall on his right elbow that occurred in the final minutes of a 78-60 loss at UCLA on Sunday. X-rays were negative but Tinkle said it was “not looking good” for Rakocevic to play.
If he cannot go, Oregon State will have seven available scholarship players, plus one-year options Tanner Sanders and Daine Muller.
Tinkle said the team is unable to cover as much as the coaching staff would like to in practice, using less than all available hours restricted by the NCAA in to keep bodies fresh. Given that the roster is primarily made up of freshmen and sophomores, the depth of opposing scouting reports has been scaled back for a team that is still adjusting to the college ranks.
The staff has tried different approaches to get gameplans through to the team but has yet to see that successfully implanted for a full 40 minutes.
“We’re trying to be creative, but I do feel a little like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day,” Tinkle said. “… We’ve just got to keep pushing and hopefully at some point it’ll click. When that’ll be? We’re not sure right now, but we know it will happen.”
If OSU’s youth and minimal depth has hamstrung practice plans and scouting reports, it may also be an impendent to getting in the win column in the regular season’s final three weeks.
Top remaining OSU players Stephen Thompson Jr. (36.9 minutes per game), JaQuori McLaughlin (35.3 mpg) Drew Eubanks (33.8 mpg) and Kendal Manuel (32.0 mpg) are all playing more than 30 mintues per conference game in addition to significant non-league minutes.
In the long term, the Beavers believe the collection of freshmen and sophomores carrying the load at such an early point in their careers will be beneficial once experience builds and depth arrives with future recruiting classes and the eventual return of injured leading scorer Tres Tinkle. But in the short term, those minutes may be adding up.
Eubanks acknowledged the season was “wearing on us a little bit” and McLaughlin said his body was “beat up a bit.” Neither player would use minutes as an excuse, but playing that many minutes for the first time is undoubtedly uncharted territory.
“It’s definitely different, especially going from the high school level and getting here and not playing at all and then jumping right into it,” said Manuel, who sat out last year with a broken leg. “I’m in pretty good shape I feel like. … But I definitely have felt that, ‘Dang, this is a long season and it feels like it’s not going to stop.'”
The “freshman wall” is far from exclusive to Oregon State. Washington guard Markelle Fultz is out with a “sore knee” and Arizona forward Lauri Markkanen has failed to reach double figures in four consecutive games. Both are likely NBA lottery picks.
Yet it will be another hill to climb for essential parts of the OSU roster in search of a Pac-12 win with five games to play before the conference tournament in Las Vegas next month.
“If we go and get a win right now, that can go and get us some more motivation going into the Pac-12 tournament,” Manuel said. “We can make something happen there, too.”
— Danny Moran
dmoran@oregonian.com
@DannyJMoran
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