Oregon upsets Arizona, will play for NCAA Tournament berth in Pac-12 tournament championship
Oregon is one win away from the last Pac-12 basketball tournament championship and an improbable berth in the NCAA Tournament. Jackson Shelstad (21 points) and Jermaine Couisnard (20) combined for 30 points in the second half as the No. 4 seed Ducks upset top-seeded Arizona 67-59 in a Pac-12 tournament semifinal Friday evening at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
Oregon (22-11) advances to face No. 3 seed Colorado in the tournament championship on Saturday. You can watch the Pac-12 championship game live with Fubo (free trial), or with Sling (promotional offers, cheapest streaming plans) on Saturday night with tipoff at 6 p.m. PT and a live TV broadcast on Fox.
Shelstad and Couisnard took over amid a 44-26 second half for Oregon, which trailed 33-23 at halftime due in large part to center N’Faly Dante missing more than 10 minutes after landing on his back barely a minute into the game. The Ducks shot just 33.3% from the field, including 8.3% (1 for 12) from three, in the first half but made 50% of their attempts in the second half.
“Kind of lost our composure in the first half when Dante went down,” Oregon coach Dana Altman said. “We talked all night about playing through Dante and going to him early. And he went down in the second, third play of the game. And we did lose our composure, had some bad turnovers, took some quick shots.
“Fortunately they missed some, and we were able to stay in the game.”
Dante had 14 points, 10 rebounds, four blocks and three steals and was a plus-19 in 27 minutes.
Couisnard, who played through a sore left shoulder he suffered in Thursday’s win over UCLA, scored 10 points in the first 7:30 of the second half. He hit a three-pointer that gave Oregon a 43-41 lead with 12:33 to go and added six rebounds and season-high seven assists.
“Jermaine and Dante are our leaders,” Altman said. “And it resonates through the team because of them. Every team I’ve been fortunate enough to work with, at Oregon or Creighton or any place, you kind of take on the personality — they always say the coach — your best players. Your vets.
“When we’ve had good teams it’s because Payton (Pritchard) or Eugene Omoruyi or Chris Duarte or Dillon Brooks gave us a personality. Jermaine is really tough. He was really sore this morning when he got up, and he just fought through it. He played 38 minutes. And Jackson played 36. Dante took a terrible fall there, and they went and took him for X-rays. Everything was negative, but he’s got a bad bruise on his tail bone. So he’ll be a little stiff in the morning. Hopefully by 6 o’clock he’ll be loose.”
In five games against Arizona over the past two seasons, Couisnard averaged 22.8 points, most against any opponent the sixth-year guard faced more than once in his career. Couisnard’s seven assists were his most since March 1, 2022, when he also had seven against Missouri while at South Carolina
“High-level basketball,” Couisnard said. “Big stage. I know everybody’s watching these guys. They’re top, whatever it was, in the country. But that’s just my competitive juice. Just games like this I live for. Always dreamed about playing here. That’s what it was.”
Shelstad scored seven in a row during a 17-3 Oregon run that turned a five-point deficit into a 53-44 lead with 8:12 to go. The freshman went 1 of 6 from the field in the first half, including 0 for 3 from three, but knocked down 6 of 10 from the floor and 3 of 4 from behind the arc in the second half.
“First half, I was missing a couple open looks,” Shelstad said. “My teammates and my coaches do a good job instilling confidence in me, just take good ones and they’re eventually going to drop. A couple of them were big down the stretch. I tried not to lose my confidence there.”
Couisnard and Shelstad each made three three-pointers in the second half, several at the end of the shot clock.
“We probably could go back and hope we would have defended a little better, but those are big-time shots by a big-time player (Shelstad),” Arizona coach Tommy Lloyd said.
Oumar Ballo had 14 points and 12 rebounds and Pelle Larsson had 11 points for Arizona, which went on a 9-0 run to get within 61-57 with 2:40 left but would not get any closer.
Caleb Love was held to just six points on 2 of 11 shooting from the field, including 1 of 7 from three, and went 1 of 4 at the free throw line.
The Wildcats (25-8) shot just 38.3% from the field, including 26.3% from behind the arc, and lost the rebounding battle 38-33 after Oregon won the board by 10 in the second half.
“We just didn’t get it done today,” Lloyd said. “You’ve got to give Oregon credit. They did a great job hanging in that game and dealing with some adversity. It’s unfortunate for them, their best player or one of their better players goes down early in the game. But that kid showed some character and some toughness to come back in. And obviously he was a big difference in the game.”\
Arizona awaits its seeding in the NCAA Tournament on Sunday.
Meanwhile Oregon, which entered the day No. 67 in NET, picked up by far its best win of the season and only its second against a team that will definitely be in the NCAA Tournament. The quest to reach the Big Dance for the first time since 2021 remains an all or nothing proposition for the Ducks, who must win the conference’s automatic berth to secure a bid or head to a third straight NIT.
“We live another day, and we’ll play — we split with Washington State and Colorado got us twice,” Altman said. “So we’re going to have a tough task tomorrow. And we’ll have to play really well again.”
