Colorado (12-2, 1-0 Pac-12) this afternoon at 4 p.m. hosts the Oregon State Beavers at the CU Events Center in Boulder. The last time these two teams met, in the second round of last season's Pac-12 Tournament, the Buffs emerged victorious, 73-58.
Prior to that, OSU left Boulder on Jan. 31, 2019 with a 76-74 comeback win over the Buffaloes.
To get a feel for this visiting Beavers squad, CUSportsNation reached out to Brenden Slaughter, managing editor over at BeaversEdge.com, the Rivals site providing daily coverage of Oregon State athletics.
Follow Brenden on Twitter @b_slaught and BeaversEdge @Beavers_Edge
Q: At 10-3 and having recently dropped its Pac-12 opener to Utah, what's been your assessment of this Beavers team thus far in 2019-20?
Brenden Slaughter: "It's early and a lot of things can still happen but if I were to pick a word(s) right now, it’d be ‘slightly concerned.’
Oregon State had a relatively easy non-conference schedule and the losses that they did have — Oklahoma at Moda Center in Portland (79-67 loss on Nov. 12), a game they arguably could have won.
The Texas A&M (loss, 64-49 on Dec. 21) really stings because Texas A&M is not a super great team and OSU just flat out didn’t play well in that game. Then you go back to Utah the other night, and maybe it was just Utah having a great shooting night, which they did, got to give them credit, but they took it right to Oregon State and OSU was expected to be a better team than Utah.
They have more experience, more depth and I was listening to the basketball broadcast after the game and hearing (Beavers) head coach Wayne Tinkle say, ‘we have to get tougher and play more together’ — hearing that, with a bunch of seniors, is intersting to say the least.”
Q: What is OSU's mindset coming into this game, knowing that games in the recent past vs. CU have been close?
BS: “Colorado had a huge, huge win earlier this week against Oregon. That was impressive. I thought Oregon was a little over ranked heading into it but nevertheless, the Buffs did what they do. Tad Boyle — ton of respect for what he’s built with that program. He’s put a ton of guys into the next level, too.
He has a knack for winning those kinds of games in Boulder and it’s why Boulder is such a tough, tough place to go and win a basketball game.
For Oregon State, they lost to Utah, but I don’t think their mindset changes. When you have Tres Tinkle, you’re always going to have a chance. The Beavers can be their own worst enemy at times. They have all the talent an all the pieces, but from my perspective, it’s just been a struggle putting it all together.
We haven’t see that complete game performance from them yet this season. Colorado is flying high after a hug win, I expect the Beavers to come in and play tough, but the Buffs real tough team to beat in Boulder.”
Q: On the note of Tinkle, what's it been like watching him as a senior? He's averaging 20.3 points and 7.2 rebounds per game while shooting .520 from the floor. How good is this guy?
BS: “He’s been around, this is his fourth year and he showed glimpses of being able to do this and Beaver fans have seen Tres Tinkle be Tres Tinkle for many years now.
That’s why he has a legit chance to catch Gary Payton in all-time scoring at Oregon State. He’ll go down as one of the better Beavers to ever come through the program and the only thing that’s really missing from his resume is postseason NCAA tournament success.
That’s what the Beavers are chasing this year. What I like most about Tres Tinkle is that after last year, he flirted with the NBA Draft a little but. He decided to come back to school because one of the bigger knocks on him was that he wasn’t a great three-point shooter. He showcased god three-point shooting, but not great.
He comes back and what does he do? Comes back this year shooting 47% from three-point range in addition to averaging 20 points, seven rebounds and a handful of assists (per game), as well. He’s turning himself into a legit NBA prospect...he’s good enough to win you a game on any given night.”
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Q: Give me a taste of the Beavers' supporting cast aside from Tinkle and Ethan Thompson?
BS: Beavers would certainly like to see Ethan Thompson and Kylor Kelley give them more scoring than they have so far, they’ve been a little inconsistent so far this year. That’ll hopefully come for the Beavers in town, but it’s been the lack of consistent guys stepping into those roles that’s ben the Beavers’ Achilles heel in some of those games where Tres Tinkle doesn’t have a great game.
A guy who has really stepped up this year has been (6-foot-5 junior G) Zach Reichle, a guard coming off the bench. He’s known as more of a three-point specialist. He’s not shooting a great clip yet but he’s started to play better the last few weeks. (6-foot-5 junior G/F) Sean Miller-Moore, (6-foot-3 freshman G) Jarod Lucas and (6-foot-6 junior F) Alfred Hollins are all going to give you solid minutes. The Beavers have several guys who can go off for 10 points off the bench, it just varies based on matchups and a little bit of unpredictability but that’s what comes with the OSU offense.”
Q: Defensively, what do the Beavers like to do? Man, zone or both?
BS: “They’ll do a mix of both. Wayne Tinkle prides himself on being able to play man to man, but the Beavers can definitely mix in both. I would expect them to probably use a mix at both heading into Colorado...in the sense of what the Beavers do well, they know they have a lot of length and some long, lanky forwards in Tres Tinkle and Alfred Hollins that can guard multiple positions.
Kylor Kelley is an extremely mobile 7-footer, so they can do a lot of different things (on defense). When they went down to Utah the other night, they even played a little 1-3-1 half court trap, so their versatility allows them to wear a lot of different hats on defense and that really hasn’t been the art of the floor that’s been inconsistent. They’ve been generally solid on defense.”
