Rueck, Team USA Earn Silver in Pan-Am Games
TORONTO, Ontario – Oregon State head coach Scott Rueck and Team USA earned a Silver Medal at the Pan-American Games Monday evening in Toronto. The Stars and Stripes finished the event with a 4-1 record, en-route to the second-place finish.
Rueck joins Beavers Sydney Wiese and Ruth Hamblin, who both medaled at the World University Games earlier this month. Wiese earned gold with Team USA, while Hamblin took silver with Canada. Read more about their accomplishments here.
Team USA dropped an 81-73 decision to Canada in the Gold Medal match of the Pan-Am games Monday evening. The teams entered the break tied at 36, before Canada opened up a double-digit lead in the third quarter. The Americans fought back to get within striking distance in the closing frame, but it was not enough to overcome the host nation.
Connecticut’s Breanna Stewart led Team USA with 17 points and 11 rebounds. Kentucky’s Linnae Harper tallied 16 points, while Connecticut’s Moriah Jefferson finished with 14 points, despite leaving the game briefly in the second quarter with an ankle injury.
The Stars and Stripes went 3-0 in group play, taking wins over Brazil, the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico. The USA would proceed to edge Cuba in a hard-fought semifinal match to earn a spot in the final.
Rueck, who was named an assistant coach for Team USA in April, led the Beavers to their best season in school history in 2014-15, as Oregon State set a school record with 27 wins en route to the program’s first ever Pac-12 title. Along the way Oregon State proved it could beat the nation’s best teams and under Rueck took down North Carolina on the road, swept Arizona State and defeated California. The Beavers were in the national rankings throughout the season, moving as high as No. 7 before ending the regular season ranked 10th. Oregon State ranked in the top 25 in the country in eleven different statistical categories, including fifth in assists per game (18.6), ninth in field goal percentage (45.4) and 13th in field goal percentage defense (35.2). The historic season led to an increase in attendance, as the Beavers averaged a Pac-12 leading 4,167 fans per game, and welcomed 7,652 fans to Gill Coliseum for the Civil War on Jan. 9, the third-largest crowd in school history.
Rueck, who was named Pac-12 Coach of the Year by both the coaches and the media and has earned back-to-back WBCA Region 8 Coach of the year honors, has helped engineer an incredible turnaround in the program, since taking over in 2010. The Beavers earned their first NCAA Tournament appearance since 1996 last season, and made it to the second round of the tourney for the second season in a row this year. Under his guidance, the Beavers led the Pac-12 with three All-Conference honorees this season (Ruth Hamblin, Jamie Weisner and Sydney Wiese), and led the conference with four Players of the Week.
Former Beaver Ali Gibson (2012-15) wrapped up her Pan-American Game run Sunday as a member of the Puerto Rican national team. Gibson finished the event averaging 7.5 points, 3.3 rebounds and 19.3 minutes per contest. Her best performance came against the United States, when she scored 13 points on 4-for-8 shooting.
