Oregon starts hot, stumbles late against No. 1 Baylor
Oregon came out of the gates hot and quickly built up a lead, but ultimately fell to No. 1-ranked Baylor 78-70.
The most the Ducks led by was nine but Baylor responded in the final few minutes of the first half to cut into the lead. Oregon led 39-35 at the half behind De’Vion Harmon’s 12 points. N’faly Dante was impressive as well and had seven points and four rebounds in limited time.
To start the second half it was a back and forth game before Baylor went on a 17-2 run to extend its lead all the way out to 12. It was too little too late as the Ducks fought to get back into the game but the Baylor defense started to suffocate Oregon.
Harmon led the team in scoring with 18 points on 7-of-13 shooting. Will Richardson had 16 points while shooting 5-for-12 and dishing out six assists. Overall Oregon shot 54 percent from the field and 44 percent from deep. It was a great showing on the offensive end for most of the game.
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For the first 30 minutes, Oregon looked the part of a team that was ready to not only win its biggest game of the year, but potentially the biggest win in all of college basketball this season.
However, small mistakes and turnovers prevented Oregon from securing a top-tier win.
This game showed that while Oregon wasn’t quite able to close it out, it has the pieces in place for this to be a competitive team heading into Pac-12 play in two weeks’ time. But the pressure is now on for the Ducks as they’ll have to play almost perfectly in Pac-12 play or win the conference tournament if they want a shot to get into the big dance in March.
Oregon drops to 6-6 on the year and its next matchup to right the ship is Tuesday, Dec. 21 against Pepperdine in Eugene at 6 p.m.
