Seventh-seeded Oregon routs second-seeded UCLA at Pac-10 tourney

LOS ANGELES – Getting swept by UCLA in the regular season hardly dented Oregon’s belief in itself. Turns out those wins gave the Bruins an overinflated sense of themselves.

E.J. Singler scored a career-high 24 points and Oregon routed second-seeded UCLA 76-59 in the Pac-10 tournament quarterfinals on Thursday night.

The seventh-seeded Ducks (16-16) advanced to today’s semifinals against No. 3 seed Washington at Staples Center.

Tyler Honeycutt scored 19 points to lead the Bruins (22-10), who never dented their double-digit deficit in the second half.

“We really, really laid an egg,” UCLA coach Ben Howland said.

Oregon reached the semifinals for the first time since 2007, when the Ducks won the tournament. Malcolm Armstead added 13 points and Garrett Sim 10 for the lowest remaining seeded team.

“Throughout the whole year we’ve been that underdog,” Singler said. “Coming into this tournament, we just wanted to show the Pac-10 we could play. Our energy for the past two games has been really high and that’s what’s given us the edge.”

Singler keyed an 11-2 spurt with five points midway through the second half that pushed Oregon’s lead to 22 points, equaling their largest of the game.

Arizona 78, Oregon State 69: Derrick Williams scored 22 points and the No. 16 Wildcats (26-6) rode their 3-point shooting to a victory over the Beavers (11-20). The top-seeded Wildcats advanced to play fourth-seeded Southern California in today’s semifinals at Staples Center.

USC 70, California 56: Maurice Jones scored 16 points, Alex Stepheson added 14 points and 16 rebounds in a strong low-post game, and the fourth-seeded Trojans (19-13) advanced with a victory over the fifth-seeded Golden Bears (17-14).

Women

Fourth-seeded Arizona (21-10) will take on top-seeded Stanford (27-2) in a semifinal today after the Wildcats defeated USC 72-61, while sixth-seeded Cal (17-14) will play No. 2 UCLA (26-3) after the Bears topped Arizona State 48-43.