Oregon sees eight-game win steak end in blowout loss at Arizona

Oregon’s eight-game winning streak came to a screeching halt in the desert Friday night.

The No. 19 Ducks were boat raced by No. 8 Arizona at the McKale Center in Tucson, falling 63-48 and suffering their first loss since Jan. 7.

For a matchup that featured plenty of hype in the week leading up — and plenty of controversy as well — Oregon fell flat and saw its Pac-12 title hopes take a major hit.

The Ducks are now 15-6 on the season and 7-2 in Pac-12 play. They sit one game back of first-place Stanford (17-3, 8-0) and one game ahead of the Wildcats (16-3, 6-3).

“Credit (Arizona) — you can tell they played harder than us and they wanted it a little bit more than us,” Oregon coach Kelly Graves said. “That’s how it came across. … Just disappointed. But we tried to make it as positive as we could in the locker room because we’ve gotta turn right around and play another good team in two days.”

After orchestrating a thrilling comeback win over the Wildcats in Eugene three weeks earlier, Oregon could not re-create the same magic this time around. The Ducks never found their rhythm offensively and were plagued by turnovers all evening.

The game had an announced attendance of 10,413, and the home crowd was very much a factor in the game. The Wildcats turned the Ducks over 21 times and held them to a season-low point total, and the raucous crowd only fed into Oregon’s struggles.

“We talked about sustaining runs,” Graves said. “With this crowd and the way (Arizona) plays, they’re gonna get a couple steals and they’re gonna make some runs. You just try to limit those to, maybe, two baskets. But we just didn’t.”

Endyia Rogers led the Ducks with 17 points and seven rebounds, and Nyara Sabally added 15 points on 6-of-13 shooting.

Oregon trailed just 30-24 at halftime despite turning the ball over 11 times during the first 20 minutes.

But in the third quarter, the Wildcats’ smothering defense became too much to handle.

Arizona outscored the Ducks 21-11 in the third and gave the visitors no easy looks. Oregon shot 5-of-11 in that period but turned the ball over six more times. Meanwhile, the Wildcats got nine points from Sam Thomas during that same stretch.

The Ducks also spent much of the quarter without Sabally, their star forward and leading scorer. She went back to the locker room after feeling light-headed early in the second half.

Sabally returned for the Ducks later in the third quarter, but eventually left and headed back to the locker room again.

Oregon’s charter flight from Eugene to Tucson was canceled Thursday, which meant the Ducks caught a late flight in on Friday. That threw their usual gameday routine into flux, and Graves wondered aloud if the lack of a typical meal schedule may have led to Sabally feeling unwell during the game.

“I think she is just a little under the weather,” Graves said. “It was kind of a tough and a long day for us — I’m not making that as an excuse, but you know this is a long day. It’s just atypical when you have to fly in on game day.

“We literally got to the hotel and watched film and then had a pregame meal, so maybe that had something to do with it. But I think she’s fine.”

Arizona kept its foot on the gas in the final period and Oregon never came close to clawing its way back into the game.

The Ducks can now only hope to salvage the road trip Sunday when they face Arizona State (10-8, 2-3) at noon in Tempe. Oregon topped the Sun Devils in Eugene on Tuesday by a score of 72-58.

On Friday, Arizona State notched a 67-57 upset win over Oregon State.