With Gill filled to the gills, Beavers zap Zags
The students stormed the court to celebrate with players after Oregon State’s victory over the 16th-ranked Bulldogs (courtesy Dominic Cusimano)
Updated 1/19/2025 8:15 AM
CORVALLIS — Somehow, Michael Jackson’s “Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’” popped into my head as I watched the seismic scene on Ralph Miller Court at Gill Coliseum Thursday night after Oregon State’s rousing 97-89 overtime victory over Gonzaga.
The Beaver Dam broke as time expiring, hundreds of OSU students spilling onto the floor to celebrate with the players after one of the most important regular-season victories of the Wayne Tinkle era.
Could this be the Beavs “Startin’ Somethin'“ moment of the 2024-25 season?
Time will tell, and there is much of the season yet to be played. But Oregon State is 14-5, 4-2 in West Coast Conference play and perhaps in position to find a way to the postseason for the first time since the 2021 run to the Elite Eight.
The Beavers handed Gonzaga (14-5 overall, 5-1 in WCC play) its first conference loss and snapped the Bulldogs’ 11-game road winning streak. The Zags came in ranked No. 16 in both polls but were 10th in the all-important NET rankings. Oregon State was 58th. (Gonzaga dropped one spot to No. 11 and OSU climbed four spots to No. 54 after Thursday’s game; evidently the NETsters weren’t much impressed.)
The Beavers are now 26-2 against Gonzaga through the years, including 14-0 at home. The Bulldogs haven’t beaten Oregon State in 93 years — the last meeting of the rivalry was in 1991, with Gonzaga’s last win coming in 1932. That all happened, of course, well before Mark Few took over as head coach in 1999, before Gonzaga was truly Gonzaga.
The school located in Spokane has been the gold standard in Northwest college basketball for decades. The Bulldogs reached the Final Four in 2017 and ’21 and are the only program in the country to make the Sweet Sixteen in each of the past nine seasons. They have won in the first round of the NCAA Tournament 15 straight years. And though some consider this year’s team a step below the norm, the Zags were the decided favorites Thursday night.
“They outcoached us and outplayed us at times,” Tinkle said afterward. “But one thing they didn’t outdo us in was with the heart our guys showed. They showed incredible will to win.”
When I asked Tinkle how this one ranked with the biggest wins during his decade-long tenure as Oregon State’s coach, he wouldn’t go there.
“They are all big,” he said. “We didn’t make this game out to be bigger than it was.”
The Beavers had a big win last year when Jordan Pope knocked down a 3 at the buzzer to beat ninth-ranked Arizona, but that was in a season that was going nowhere. This season has a chance to mean something.
Oregon State got the drop on Gonzaga early and led most of the way in a highly entertaining, highly competitive contest. The Beavers were ahead 81-77 with 38 seconds left in regulation and still were in front 83-80 with 16.2 seconds remaining.
The air was sucked out of the building when Gonzaga center Graham Ike, playing the game of his life, nailed a 3-pointer from the top with five seconds left to send it to overtime.
The Oregon State fans in the sellout crowd of 9,301 had to be thinking, was this one going to be a close-but-no-cigar affair for the Beavers?
Michael Rataj made sure it wasn’t, scoring 10 of OSU’s 14 points in the extra session in guiding the Beavers to what TV play-by-play voice Rich Waltz called “a signature win.”
“The guys found a way,” Tinkle said. “They drew that line in the sand and said, ‘Not tonight. We’re going to get it done.’ ”
Oregon State prevailed despite a 41-28 rebound deficit. Gonzaga grabbed 19 off the offensive glass. “They hammered us on the boards,” Tinkle said. The Zags also outscored OSU by nine points at the 3-point line.
The Beavers won it with excellent shooting from the field — .585 on 31 of 53 — and at the free-throw line, making 29 of 37 attempts to 20 of 25 for Gonzaga. Also with some clutch shot-making by Rataj and point guard Demarco Minor, and intangibles provided by sixth man extraordinaire Josiah Lake.
Point guard Demarco Minor scored 15 points on 7-for-10 shooting, including some big baskets in the second half (courtesy Dominic Cusimano)
From what I have seen this season, Minor — who is shooting .380 from the field and .317 from 3-point range this season — is a money player. He shoots better when the chips are down. The 6-foot senior transfer from Southern Illinois-Edwardsville was 7 for 10 from the field, including 6 for 6 from inside the arc.
“Minor played really well, hit some big shots,” Gonzaga coach Mark Few told the media afterward. “Most of them were highly contested, but he was able to make them.”
The other thing about “Polo,” as Minor’s teammate call him, is that Tinkle has few worries about breaking a press when he is on the floor. He is unflappable against defensive pressure and gets the ball into frontcourt without drama.
Few called Oregon State “a very good team,” but focused more on what he considered poor defense by the Zags.
“We played really good on offense, but our offense wasn’t the problem; our defense was,” he said. “We could not get consistent stops. We came out the second half with a little more energy and had more intensity on the defensive end, but they hit some back-breakers. You have to play almost perfect on offense if you play defense like we did.
“They iso-ed guys, and when we did guard them, they hit some tough shots. We competed and got our way back in after a slow start. But we fouled a lot.”
Ike, a 6-9 senior transfer from Wyoming, collected 26 points and nine rebounds, hitting 9 of 14 shots from the field and 7 of 8 from the foul line. “Graham was terrific,” Few said. “He delivered time and time again, played a high-level game.”
Tinkle made a tactical error that nearly cost him the game. Lake, an .881 foul shooter, was at the line with 16.2 seconds left in regulation, having hit the first of two attempts to give Oregon State an 82-80 lead. Chances were Lake was going to make the second — he did — to push the Beavers in front by three. Tinkle substituted center Parsa Fallah for swing man Liutauras Lelevicius, evidently to defend Ike.
Sixth man Josiah Lake was a key for the Beavers at both ends of the floor (courtesy Dominic Cusimano)
But with a three-point lead, the only thing that could have really hurt the Beavers was a 3-point shot. Tinkle should have kept in a smaller unit that could have better defended the 3-point line. I would make the argument, too, that the Beavers should have intentionally fouled inside the 10-second mark.
But when Gonzaga’s outstanding point guard, Ryan Nembhard, drove the middle, Fallah collapsed down to help defend him. Nembhard — the national leader in assists — kicked it out to the left-handed Ike, wide open at the 3-point line. The big guy, now 8 for 17 from beyond the arc this season, drained it to force the extra session.
Fallah picked up his fifth foul early in overtime.
“When Parsa fouled out, he was upset,” Lake said. “But we all told him, ‘We got this for you.’ ”
Tinkle chose to go small and had the 6-8 Rataj defend Ike, and it was a smart move. Moments later, Rataj drew an offensive foul on Ike, and on the next possession, took him to the well and drew a fifth on the Zags’ big man — and he departed, too.
“We had a tough decision there,” Tinkle said. “A couple of our coaches thought we ought to go big, but I knew with Michael playing any position out there, we were going to be fine.”
And then Rataj took over at the offensive end, willing his team to victory.
“Michael put the team on his shoulders there for awhile,” Tinkle said.
“I just felt like my teammates trust me to make the right plays,” said Rataj, who finished with a career-high 29 points and seven rebounds, shooting 9 for 15 from the field, 2 for 3 from 3-point range and 9 for 10 from the foul line. “I was trying to drive, make a shot, have us win in the end.”
The importance of Lake’s defense, hustle and team play cannot be overstated. The 6-2 sophomore from Tualatin contributed 11 points, four rebounds, three assists and three steals with no turnovers in 34 productive minutes off the bench. He dived for a loose ball at a critical juncture in overtime, stole an in-bounds pass to all but seal the deal in the extra session and helped harass Gonzaga’s No. 2 scorer, Khalif Battle, into a 4-for-13 shooting night. When I asked Tinkle about Lake, he had plenty to say.
“He is a young kid but he does everything the right way,” the veteran coach said. “He hasn’t even come out of the cocoon yet. He still has to blossom a little bit and feel like he can be a leader for us, even though he’s a sophomore.
“What he did tonight didn’t surprise me. The kid gives it everything he’s got. He’s all about winning. Nothing individual. Look what he did at the free throw line, with his defense on Battle. He’s locked in.”
Tinkle’s first six players all deserve plaudits, including Nate Kingz, the 6-5 lefty sharpshooter who would be leading the nation in 3-point percentage, but evidently doesn’t quite have enough attempts. (Kingz is shooting .507 on 38 of 75 attempts this season. Bryant’s Rafael Pinzon is listed as the national leader at .481 on 40 of 83 tries. So Kingz must be extremely close to the number of attempts needed to qualify.)
Kingz was spectacular in the first half, dropping 17 points on the Zags on 6-for-6 shooting. Few had guard Nolan Hickman in Kingz’ shorts through the second half and he didn’t score another basket, finishing with 20 points. But his impact early was undeniable.
Fallah battled Ike tooth and nail in the post, hustled with some good help defense and finished with 15 points and five rebounds in 33 hard-fought minutes.
It was a quiet night for Lelevicius, the lithe Lithuanian who was scoreless with one missed shot and four rebounds through 22 minutes going into the final minute of overtime. Then the 6-8 sophomore came through with perhaps the biggest basket of the night, using a 360 move off a drive for a layup that put the Beavers in front for good.
“I told LT, ‘hang in there, your time is coming,’ ” Tinkle said. “What a spin move he made. He had only two points, but he was one of the happiest guys in the locker room afterward.”
Gill was filled to the gill. There was not a seat to be had in the house, and the standing-room-only spots above both end zones were occupied, too. It was Oregon State’s first home sellout crowd in five years, and the Beavers gave the fans plenty to cheer about. A modern-era record student crowd of about 3,500 had started lining up outside when I left Gill to get some dinner about 5 p.m.; by 6:30, the line was past the railroad tracks pushing toward Dixon Recreation Center.
The crowd seemed as hungry for a big-time win as were the OSU players. The late hour — tipoff was at 8:05 p.m and it ended at 10:25 — didn’t dim anyone’s enthusiasm. When it was over, the noise level hit 8.5 on the Richter scale.
“When it went to overtime, I looked at the clock and thought, ‘It’s past my bedtime,’ ” Lake said with a smile. “That was amazing, a cool experience. Our fans helped us win tonight. It wasn’t just us players; it was the atmosphere and the way they treated us.”
The Beavers can’t play all their games at Gill, where they are 11-1 this season. Now they must go on the road Saturday to face a strong San Francisco squad that is 15-5 overall and 4-2 in WCC play. On Jan. 28, they must play Gonzaga in Spokane, where the Zags rarely lose.
Few quietly took umbrage when a reporter asked how a “good team” like Oregon State impacts things in the WCC.
“We have had good teams in the conference for quite awhile,” Few said. “Saint Mary’s, USF, Santa Clara, BYU. …we have dealt with a lot of good teams in the conference.
“But it is great to have Oregon State and Washington State in our conference. They are highly competitive teams, and they act like high-level Division I programs in their athletic departments, which is a breath of fresh air.”
For this year and next, Gonzaga and Oregon State will compete in the WCC. After that, they will be charter members in the new Pac-12.
“We hope we are building this thing to where we can be at or near the top (of the conference) this year, next year, and after that in the new Pac,” Tinkle said. “It’s great not to just compete against (Gonzaga) but to get a win. It’s big for our program. But I don’t want to overplay this. It’s a big win, but we still have a lot of growth to make. This young team is still learning.”
The first big WCC test came Thursday night, though. And In the end, the moment wasn’t too big for the Beavers.
► ◄
Readers: what are your thoughts? I would love to hear them in the comments below. On the comments entry screen, only your name is required, your email address and website are optional, and may be left blank.
Follow me on X (formerly Twitter).
Like me on Facebook.
Find me on Instagram.
Be sure to sign up for my emails.
