Time To Dance! Ducks Win Pac-12 Title

Saturday, March 16

Las Vegas, NV

6:00 PM

University of Oregon

23-11,12-8Pac-12

Colorado

24-10,13-7Pac-12

Oregon

Colorado

Photo by: Ian McFarland/UO Athletics

03/16/24 | Men's Basketball

Box Score

Oregon clinched a berth in the NCAA Tournament after beating Colorado on Saturday in the Pac-12 Tournament final.

By: Rob Moseley

LAS VEGAS — Oregon's lead at halftime of Saturday's Pac-12 Tournament title game was three. The Ducks were 20 minutes away from winning a championship, and clinching a berth in the NCAA Tournament.

In the locker room, the team talked about how to approach the second half of the matchup with Colorado. They wanted to communicate better on defense. They wanted to rebound better. From the din emerged the voice of assistant coach Mike Mennenga, who summed it all up.

"If you're the tougher team," Mennenga said, "you're gonna get what you want."

Little surprise, then, that perhaps an hour later the UO men's basketball was celebrating its sixth all-time Pac-12 Tournament title, and its appearance in the Big Dance next week. The Buffaloes were a worthy foe, but if toughness was to be the deciding factor, a team coached by Dana Altman and led by seniors N'Faly Dante and Jermaine Couisnard wasn't going to be denied.

And the Ducks were not, beating the Buffs, 75-68, to cap a run of three wins in three nights at T-Mobile Arena. A roller-coaster of a season marked by injuries and inconsistent defense ended with Oregon holding UCLA, then Arizona and finally Colorado all under 70 points in Las Vegas, getting the Ducks back to the NCAA Tournament for the first time in three years.

Everybody played a part — freshman guard Jackson Shelstad scored 17 points, versatile wings Kwame Evans Jr. and Jadrian Tracey did a bunch of little things at both ends, Kario Oquendo, Mahamadou Diawara and Brennan Rigsby provided key minutes off the bench. But it was Dante and Couisnard who led the way, with Dante making all 12 of his shots to finish with 25 points along with nine rebounds, and Couisnard providing 14 points with eight assists.

It's said that teams take on the personality of their coaches. Not so, UO coach Dana Altman said.

"I've been doing this for 44 years; my personality doesn't change," Altman said on the T-Mobile Arena floor, confetti strewn around the court as players and staff members cut down the nets at each end. "But our teams have changed, and it's always the personality of your best players. The toughness of this group is from those two guys, and fortunately the others guys picked up on it."

That Oregon led at halftime Saturday was an improvement over the previous two days. The Ducks were down five at the half to UCLA in Thursday's quarterfinal, and down 10 to Arizona in Friday's semifinal. On Saturday, the UO lead over Colorado after 20 minutes was 33-30.

But in truth, the Ducks had just started their comeback a little early — they trailed 20-11 after a 13-0 run by the Buffs that came largely while Dante was on the bench because of two early fouls. It was 26-19 when Oregon went on a 12-2 run that included two buckets from Couisnard, a three-point play by Dante and a three-pointer from Tracey, which created the three-point lead they took into halftime.

Altman knew the Buffs would fight to the end. Like his own team, Colorado had championship mettle.

"We were down the last two games; did we care?" Altman asked rhetorically. "No!"

Indeed, the run by the Buffs would come. Oregon led 50-46 midway through the second half when Colorado used a 7-2 spurt to take the lead. The Ducks surged back ahead and led 61-57 when the Buffs scored five straight to pull ahead by one.

But the last four minutes were all Oregon. Evans made a game-tying free throw, the Ducks got a stop and Shelstad belied his youth with two free throws that put Oregon up for good. Colorado would make just one more field goal, while the Ducks got a reverse layin from Tracey for a 66-62 lead, and then consecutive buckets from Dante to make it 70-64.

With the Ducks up 72-66 in the final minute, the game produced its signature play. Colorado guard KJ Simpson, who led his team with 23 points, had a look at a three-pointer to make it a one-possession game. Out to the arc soared Dante, who blocked the shot, then won a race to the deflected ball and poked it ahead to Shelstad, who was fouled. More UO free throws followed, and the Ducks were Pac-12 Tournament champions.

Dante, who missed a chunk of the first half against Arizona after taking a hard fall, was the tournament's most outstanding player.

"Pain, that doesn't matter," he said. "You've just got to give everything you've got. I wanted to do this. So I got to give everything I got."

Dante was a member of Oregon's last NCAA Tournament team, in 2021, but he missed the Big Dance after a December knee injury. Couisnard was playing at South Carolina then; he also is in line to make his first appearance in an NCAA Tournament game.

"It's everything I dreamed of," said Couisnard, who was named to the all-tournament team along with Dante and Shelstad. "This is something I've wanted all my life, to be able to compete at the highest level."

Saturday's win got Oregon's record to 23-11 on the season, a year in which the Ducks went 12-8 in conference play. They arrived in Las Vegas knowing their résumé likely wouldn't merit an NCAA Tournament at-large bid.

So, they went and earned one automatically, as Pac-12 Tournament champions.

"It's such a wonderful moment, because we went through some hard times with our team throughout this year," Tracey said. "These last few weeks when we were going through it, we knew it was coming — we knew that 'click' was coming. This is a wonderful feeling, man."

And, one of Oregon's leaders made clear, it's a feeling the Ducks would like to hold on to for a while, once the NCAA Tournament field is announced Sunday afternoon.

"It's not done yet," Dante said. "I'm just gonna enjoy this moment for a second, and then lock back in for the next one."