Oregon State
UCLA
UCLA Overtakes Beavers In Second Half
January 27, 2000 | Men's Basketball
Jan. 27, 2000
CORVALLIS, Ore. - What Ray Young started, UCLA's defense finished.
Young came off the bench to provide the scoring that kept UCLA close in the first half, then the Bruins shut down Oregon State midway through the second half in an 85-74 win in Pacific-10 men's basketball Thursday night at Gill Coliseum.
Young scored a career-high 22 points - 14 of them in the first half - to help UCLA (12-5 overall, 3-3 Pacific-10) stay within 37-33 of the Beavers (10-7, 3-3) at intermission. After OSU built its lead to 56-45 with 11:00 left, the Bruins began forcing the Beavers into missing shots and that keyed a 31-5 run that put UCLA in control.
"I thought when we started playing better defense, our aggressiveness on defense carried over to better execution on offense," UCLA coach Steve Lavin said. "It all started with our defense creating our offense, and that's usually when you play good basketball."
Oregon State, which is winless at home and unbeaten on the road in Pac-10 play, was led by Deaundra Tanner's 17 points. OSU led for almost all of the game's first 32 minutes.
"We were playing solid during that time," Beaver head coach Eddie Payne said. "Defending, limiting offensive rebounds - basically, we scored enough points to win. We didn't defend and rebound during that stretch when they were scoring."
OSU led 56-45 on a pair of free throws by Brian Jackson with 11:00 to play. But the Bruins outscored the Beavers by 26 points over the next 7:37, they caught Oregon State at 58-58 on a jumper by Young with 8:04 to go and eventually led 76-61 when Earl Watson scored on a drive down the lane with 3:23 to go.
During the surge, center Dan Gadzuric scored nine points for UCLA and forward Jason Kapono had eight. The Bruins shot 58.6 percent (17-for-29) from the field in the second half, while limiting Oregon State to 32.3 percent (10-for-31) after intermission.
"In the first half, we didn't come out strong," Gadzuric said of the Bruins, who spent almost the entire half playing zone defense. "Defensively, we let them just penetrate in the middle and just have open shots. In the second half, we went man-to-man more and that might have been the difference."
Kapono finished with 16 points and five assists while Gadzuric had 13 points for the game. The Bruins wound up with five players scoring in double figures, as Watson had 15 points and nine rebounds and Jerome Moiso had 12 points and 11 rebounds.
"We have a lot of guys who can knock down 3's," Lavin said. "And what we've learned is we're a much better team when there's a balance of inside-outside basketball."
Young, a sophomore guard who was averaging 6.6 points per game for UCLA prior to the contest, was 8-for-11 from the field and that included 5-for-6 on 3-pointers. He also had six assists and a blocked shot.
"I just wanted to be energized when I came into the game," said Young, who hit three straight 3-pointers and a layin at one point in the first half to help the Bruins from a 5-0 deficit to a 15-14 lead. "I think when we get good bench production, we always seem to win the game."
For Oregon State, Jackson had 14 points despite playing only five minutes of the first half due to foul trouble. Jason Heide added 10 points and five rebounds for Oregon State.
