It was anyone’s game at halftime, with Oregon leading by just one, but the Buffs faltered almost completely down the stretch of the second half, committing countless costly turnovers in the process, allowing the Ducks to cruise to an easy 66-51 victory.

The win was Oregon’s first-ever in Boulder. Dating back to 1960, when the two teams had first played each other in Boulder, the Ducks had been 0-10 on previous attempts.

With the 20 turnovers CU committed Thursday, the Buffs have now had at least 16 in six straight games, during which time Colorado has posted a 1-5 record.

Colorado’s loss marked its third straight at home, the most such since 2008-09, when the Buffs dropped five in a row.

“Honestly, I feel like at the end, we kind of quit a little bit,” Keeshawn Barthelemy said after the loss. “We weren’t playing as hard as we should have been.”

Through the first 17 minutes of the first half, the Buffs had committed just four turnovers, but one by Evan Battey and two in quick succession committed by K.J. Simpson in the final few minutes contributed to Oregon finishing on a 9-3 run to take a 36-35 halftime lead.

Things went from bad to worse a few minutes into the second half, as turnovers mounted and the Buffs’ offense dried up, in large part as a result of the sloppy play.

To put things in perspective, by the 2:45 mark of the final half, at which point Oregon managed an easy second chance layup over the Buffs’ hapless defenders, Colorado had managed just 12 second half points — the exact amount of turnovers they had committed in the second half.

Colorado finished the game with 16 second half points and 13 turnovers committed during that time.

Thursday night, associate head coach Mike Rohn led the Buffaloes for the first time ever, as Tad Boyle was forced to miss the game due to testing positive for COVID-19 earlier in the week.

Suffice to say, a forced change in coaching for the night did little to alleviate the Buffs’ ongoing turnover woes.

“I don’t know if I’d agree with (Barthelemy) that the guys kind of quit,” Rohn said. “I think that when they’re not playing well and they’re turning it over, they kind of get in a little bit of a mindset of, ‘Oh, here we go again. We can’t get out of it.’”

“(Turnovers have) been a common theme and we’ve got to find a way to get out of it. We talked about it in the locker room — the only people who can do it are us, the coaches and the players.”

Barthelemy was the offensive heartbeat for the Buffs early on, as he scored 16 points on 6-of-7 shooting in the first half.

However, he all but disappeared in the final 20 minutes of play, going 0-of-4 from the floor with zero points.

There were without question a few clear instances where Barthelemy was open behind the three-point line later in the game, but his teammates did not feed him the ball.

Barthelemy himself had no answer when asked why his first shot of the second half came without four minutes left in the game.

“I don’t know, honestly. I can’t answer (the) question.”

By game’s end, Jabari Walker scored 11 points and Battey contributed 10.

Walker's 12 rebounds gave him his 10th double-double of the season.

Tristan da Silva returned to the lineup for the first time in two games, scoring four points.

While the turnovers certainly hurt, the Buffs’ collapse was intensified by their 6-of-22 (27%) make rate from the floor. Oregon, by comparison, shot 46% in the second half and 42% on the night.

The Buffs led by as much as five in the first half, when Barthelemy stole the ball from UO’s Will Richardson and promptly dunked the ball on the fastbreak, prompting a timeout by Dana Altman.

At that point, there was 3:28 left before halftime but from there, CU’s turnover woes began to surface.

As the second half got underway, Colorado remained within striking distance of the Ducks, coming within two points following a timely three-pointer from Battey.

For the remaining 13:21 of the second half, the Buffs managed just eight more points.

With a 2-5 record in their last seven games, some soul searching appears to be required of the Buffaloes, who cannot escape their turnover woes.

"We have to address turnovers, we have to practice why we're turning it over and continue to get better at that," Rohn said. "I don't know — we've got to figure out how to fix it."

"...It's the sore right there in front of everybody. Whether we talk about it or not, it's a reality."

Colorado was without senior Elijah Parquet Thursday for the fourth time in six games, due to a lingering lower leg injury.

Parquet first missed CU's home games against USC and UCLA on Jan. 20 and Jan. 22, but then re-entered the lineup for road games at Oregon and UW near the end of the month.

He did not play in the Buffs' blowout loss at Washington State on Jan. 30 and following Thursday's loss to Oregon, Rohn listed him as day-to-day.

"He's dealing with some really bad foot pain," Rohn said. "He's been a warrior for us for a long time, to we've got to respect the fact that it's tough for him right now."

As for Boyle, who is in isolation following a positive COVID-19 test, Rohn said postgame that he expects Boyle for Saturday's game vs. Oregon State.