The Oregon Ducks were 0-10 in Boulder, Colorado; 0-8 in the Pac-12 era entering Thursday night’s contest. They broke that curse and notched their first win at the Coors Event Center, defeating the Colorado Buffaloes by the final score of 66-51.
It was a tale of two halves, really. Colorado trailed by just one point going into halftime and it actually looked like they had a shot to win the game.
It was short-lived.
Oregon outscored Colorado 30-16 in the second half propelled by a 19-4 run. Jacob Young scored a game-high 21 points for Oregon, shooting 8-of-17 from the field. Will Richardson chipped in 13 points on 6-of-12 shooting.
Those two accounted for 51% of Oregon’s points.
Buffs guard Keeshawn Barthelemy played a key role in Colorado keeping it close early on. He scored 16 points on 6-of-7 shooting the first half. Kee was held scoreless in the second half, going 0-for-4 from the field.
Turnovers were yet again a main concern for the Buffs. Entering play Thursday night, Colorado averaged 14.2 turnovers per game. They continued the trend and coughed up the ball 19 times in the loss. The Ducks capitalized and scored 23 points off of those turnovers — the difference in the game.
Buffs freshman guard KJ Simpson accounted for six of Colorado’s 19 turnovers off the bench; Evan Battey had five himself.
Colorado didn’t help themselves out at the line either, going 8-of-16 on freebies.
Jabari Walker tallied another double-double, scoring 11 points and hauling down 12 rebounds. The forward was shaky from the field however, shooting just 4-of-12 while going 1-of-4 from three. Jabari went 2-for-5 from the charity stripe.
Colorado has now lost 6 of their last 8 conference games, falling to eighth in the Pac-12 standings with a 5-7 conference record.
The Buffs host the Oregon State Beavers Saturday afternoon at 6PM EST.