Freshman guard Will Richardson scored a career-high 19 points to go along with five rebounds and three blocks as Oregon rallied from a 14-point, first-half deficit to defeat Utah 78-72 on Thursday night in Salt Lake City.
Paul White added 14 points and Ehab Amin finished with 13 points and three of Oregon's 11 steals as the Ducks (13-8, 4-4 Pac-12) forced 19 turnovers. Payton Pritchard finished with 12 points, including four free throws in the final 33.8 seconds to seal it, to go along with a team-high seven rebounds.
Donnie Tillman and Sedrick Barefield each scored 16 points and Jayce Johnson finished with 11 points and 13 rebounds for Utah (12-9, 5-3), which had its season-best, four-game winning streak snapped.
Timmy Allen added 13 points for the Utes, who dropped their fourth straight game to Oregon at the Huntsman Center.
Utah, coming off its first-ever road sweep of Bay Area schools Cal and Stanford, built a 26-12 lead in the first 10 1/2 minutes behind the 3-point shooting of Tillman, who came off the bench to sink three treys in less than two minutes. Freshman forward Riley Battin also connected on two early 3-point tries.
The Utes led 30-16 after a Johnson layup with 6:42 to go in the half before Oregon ended the half with a 22-4 run, using a trapping 1-2-1-1 full-court press to force 13 turnovers that it converted into 18 points. Richardson had 12 points during the comeback, including a rebound basket just before the buzzer that gave the Ducks a 38-34 halftime lead.
White opened the second half with a jumper to increase Oregon's lead to six before Parker Van Dyke countered with a 3-pointer, snapping an almost nine-minute drought without a field goal for the Utes.
Utah cut the deficit to 42-41 on a drive by Barefield with 14:05 to go. The Ducks then went on a 13-3 run highlighted by seven points by Amin, capping a 16-minute stretch that saw Oregon outscore the Utes 39-14.
A 3-pointer by Amin gave Oregon its biggest lead, 67-53, with 4:04 remaining, and Utah never got closer than four points the rest of the way.
--Field Level Media
Oregon | Utah | |
Will Richardson 19 | Scoring | Sedrick Barefield 16 |
Payton Pritchard 3 | Assists | Sedrick Barefield 5 |
Payton Pritchard 7 | Rebounds | Jayce Johnson 13 |
Paul White 5 | Free Throws Made | Sedrick Barefield 5 |
Ehab Amin 3 | Steals | Parker Van Dyke 2 |
Will Richardson 3 | Blocks | Both Gach 1 |