Still good enough
PULLMAN – Six days ago, Washington State played its most complete game of the season and picked up a convincing win over Washington. Last night, the Cougars played anything but its best game – and yet the result against Oregon State was the same.
“It was sloppy at times,” Robbie Cowgill said of WSU’s 70-55 victory Thursday night. “But in this league a win is a win. It doesn’t matter who you’re playing.”
With the victory, No. 20 WSU (17-3, 6-2 Pac-10) has guaranteed itself its first winning season since 1995-96 and is off to its best start since going 18-2 in 1948-49.
Much of the credit for this win goes to Cowgill, who had a career-best 18 points and with 11 rebounds picked up his second career double-double.
WSU trailed for a good portion of the first half, falling victim to its own sluggish play and Oregon State’s physicality underneath the basket. But Cowgill managed to create numerous scoring opportunities by himself, and when his teammates picked up their play, it was too much for the struggling Beavers (9-12, 1-7).
“They battled hard in the second half and I think Robbie Cowgill pulled us (through),” coach Tony Bennett said. “His mobility and quickness is hard sometimes for some bigger guys to guard.”
WSU also got an assist from Oregon State, which fumbled its opportunity by going 6 of 19 (31.6 percent) from the free-throw line.
“Probably, we need to have better shooters in the overall scheme of things,” Oregon State coach Jay John said. “It’s a putt. You’ve got to walk up to the putt and hit the putt. These guys are college guys. They’ve been shooting free throws since they were in grade school. We’ve just got to keep getting fouled. Getting fouled is a good thing.”
Its troubles from the line notwithstanding, Oregon State did do a solid job against a WSU offense that had shredded Washington last week. The Cougars picked up just nine assists on 22 baskets. They also had 10 turnovers, making this the first time since Dec. 16 against Cal State Northridge that they gave the ball up more often than they passed to set up baskets.
Kyle Weaver alone turned the ball over five times, and despite his 12 points both he and fellow guard Derrick Low had to defer for much of the game to WSU’s bigger players, most notably Cowgill.
“Everything about it, offensively, defensively, was kind of sluggish at times,” Weaver said. “You never know who has that night and Rob had a good one for us.”
And as has been the case so often for WSU, its defense made up for offensive miscues. The Cougars blocked nine of Oregon State’s 61 attempts, and Ivory Clark picked up five of them to go with his 11 points and seven rebounds.
“That’s a strength of our defense,” Bennett said. “If someone gets by us in the lane or we can’t get a rebound, that sometimes bails us out. It makes a difference, it really does.”
Notes
This was WSU’s first time playing in Pullman as a ranked team since 1950. Jim Howell, who was a reserve on that 1949-50 team, was in attendance. … Saturday’s game against seventh-ranked Oregon will be the first time ever that WSU has hosted a ranked team while playing as a ranked team.