SPORTS FRIDAY, JANUARY 12, 2018 1B FOLLOW US ON TWITTER @EOSPORTS Men’s College Basketball Prep Football Ducks stun red-hot Sun Devils OSAA changes could affect local schools Oregon hands Arizona State fi rst home loss By JOHN MARSHALL Associated Press TEMPE, Ariz. — Payton Pritchard scored 18 points and hit two free throws with 13.8 seconds left, helping Oregon hold off No. 11 Arizona State 76-72 on Thursday night. O r e g o n (12-5, 2-2 Pac-12 Pac-12) used a late spurt to go up eight points Oregon and hit four free throws in the fi nal 32 seconds to earn its biggest win of the season. The Ducks #11 Arizona St. dominated the paint, outscoring Arizona State 38-16 inside and scoring 15 second-chance points on 15 offen- sive rebounds. Elijah Brown had 18 points and hit two free throws with 32 seconds left for Oregon. Arizona State (13-3, 1-3) went through a few rough patches offen- sively in its fi rst home game since Dec. 22. One came with about 5 minutes left in the second half when the Ducks pushed their lead to 68-60. The senior trio of Tra Holder, Shannon Evans II and Kodi Justice tried to bring the Sun Devils back in front of a rowdy Wells Fargo Arena crowd that included former Sun Devils star James Harden and Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey in the front row. Evans hit a corner 3 with 17.5 seconds left to pull Arizona State within 74-72, but Arizona State got no closer to lose for the fi rst time in nine home games this season. Justice had 21 points, Evans 19 and Holder fi nished with 14. Oregon was coming off a 76-65 loss to rival Oregon State after allowing the Beavers to shoot 53 percent and go on a 12-1 second- half run. Arizona State, a team that can go on runs in a fl ash, had a similar stretch against the Ducks in the fi rst half. Forcing tough shots and turnovers, the Sun Devils got their OSAA football ad-hoc committee trying to level the playing fi eld 76 By ERIC SINGER East Oregonian 72 AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin Oregon guard Victor Bailey Jr. (10) shoots over Arizona State forward Romello White (23) during the fi rst half of Thursday’s basketball game in Tempe, Ariz. up-tempo game rolling after a shaky start, going on an 11-0 run to go up 31-18. The Ducks fought their way back behind Brown, closing the fi rst half on a 14-2 run and pulling even at 41-all on his buzzer-beating 3-pointer. Pritchard kept hitting long- range shots and the Ducks got a lift from forward Roman Sorkin in the second half. Arizona State kept pace behind Holder, Justice and Evans. Oregon used a short spurt to build the lead to 68-60 with 4 minutes left Arizona State tried to fi ght back out of a timeout, with Justice hitting a 3-pointer and Evans See DUCKS/3B The football landscape within the OSAA will likely look much more different than expected come this fall. The OSAA’s ad-hoc football committee has spent the past two-plus months taking a closer look at the issues that face the sport in the state, such as declining participation and player safety. Over the course of its fi ve meetings, the committee has developed a set of recom- mendations that will likely be presented to the Executive Board in February that would be imple- mented for the 2018 season. The most notable recom- mendation is giving schools that meet specifi c criteria the option to play down a classifi cation to help level the playing fi eld. The specifi c criterion outlined by the committee is for schools with a four-year Colley win percentage of 22 percent or lower or has played 12 and fewer in-classi- fi cation games during the last four years, or any school with a two-year Colley win percentage of 22 percent or lower. According to the committee’s early research, 48 schools across the state meet that criteria, which include local schools McLoughlin, Riverside and Pilot See OSAA CHANGES/3B Men’s College Basketball Beavers continue strong play, but can’t hold off No. 17 Wildcats By BOB BAUM Associated Press TUCSON, Ariz. — Tough defense ignited enough offense for No. 17 Arizona to get the Wildcats a bounce- back victory over Oregon State on Thursday night. Allonzo Trier scored 15 of his 21 points in the second half and the Wildcats, coming off a road loss at Colorado, pulled away from a sluggish, close game in the fi nal 7 1/2 minutes to beat the Beavers 62-53. “I am happy with our defensive effort,” Arizona coach Sean Miller said. “That’s as hard as we’ve played. It’s not really my opinion. You look out and see things happen. Guys are really helping each other, pressing the ball.” Deandre Ayton had 14 points and Pac-12 Oregon State #17 Arizona 53 62 10 rebounds and Rawle Alkins scored 11 points, nine in the second half, for the Wildcats (13-4, 3-1 Pac-12). “The best offense is good defense,” Alkins said. “Defense-to- offense, we had a lot of great plays.” Tres Tinkle scored 18 points and Stephen Thompson Jr. had 14 for the Beavers (10-6, 2-2), who have won just once in Tucson in the last 35 years (2010). “It was a physical game. You saw that down the stretch,” Beavers coach Wayne Tinkle said, “and we weren’t able to make plays.” Oregon State led the entire fi rst half and was up 22-21 at the break, the lowest-scoring half for Arizona this season, and the lowest-scoring for a Beavers opponent. “We felt like we should have had a little more of a lead,” Tinkle said, “then they did what they did.” The Wildcats outscored the visi- tors 24-14 over the fi nal 7:33. “Our defensive effort and the consistent effort broke the game open,” Miller said. It took quite a while for Arizona to fi gure out how to get anything against Oregon State’s match-up zone defense. “You can practice, prepare,” Miller said, “but until you get in the game you don’t realize the size they have, See BEAVERS/3B AP Photo/Rick Scuteri Oregon State guard Stephen Thompson Jr. (1) drives against Arizona guard Allonzo Trier in the fi rst half during Thursday’s basketball game in Tucson, Ariz. Sports shorts Nowell’s 20 points help Washington pull away from Cal for 66-56 win SEATTLE (AP) — Jaylen Nowell scored 20 points, Noah Dickerson added 12 points, and Washington continued its promising early start to conference play with a 66-56 win over California on Thursday night. The Huskies (13-4, 3-1 Pac-12) overcame a sloppy and unattractive fi rst-half fi lled with fouls and turn- overs to pull away from the Golden Bears over the fi nal 15 minutes. Nowell carried Washington in the fi rst half with 11 points and he got Nowell help from his supporting cast in the fi nal 20 minutes. Nahziah Carter was a big contributor with 10 points off the bench. David Crisp also fi nished with 10 points, all in the second half for the Huskies. Justice Sueing led California (7-10, 1-3) with a career-high 27 points. “I don’t know where it kind of went wrong or what happened. We’ve got to try to pick it back up and fi nd it.” — LeBron James The Cleveland Cavalier said after the team suffered its most-lopsid- ed loss of the season, a 133-99 defeat at the hands of the Toronto Raptors on Thursday night. Army challenging nickname of NHL’s Las Vegas franchise ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — The U.S. Army has fi led a challenge opposing the application of the NHL’s newest franchise to register the trademark “Las Vegas Golden Knights.” In a claim fi led Wednesday with the U.S. Trademark Trial and Appeal Board in suburban Washington, the Army claims it will be damaged by registration of the marque and says it has acquired exclusive rights that predate any rights claimed by the NHL team. The Army says it has used the Golden Knights nickname since the late 1960s for its parachute team, public relations and recruiting, and claims it owns “common law rights” for the color schemes that combine black and gold and yellow and white. THIS DATE IN SPORTS 2012 — Dwight Howard breaks Wilt Chamberlain’s nearly 50-year-old NBA record for most free throw attempts in a game, making 21 of 39 in the Orlando Magic’s 117-109 victory over the Golden State Warriors. Chamberlain shot 34 for the Philadelphia Warriors against St. Louis on Feb. 22, 1962. 2017 — Fresh off his victory on Maui, Justin Thomas becomes the seventh player to join the “59 Club” on the PGA Tour when he makes a 15-foot eagle putt on his last hole at the Sony Open for an 11-under 59. Contact us at 541-966-0838 or sports@eastoregonian.com