Men’s Basketball: Beavers Win Exhibition Game vs. Saint Martin’s, 92-76

OSU opens the regular season next weekend (Friday-Sunday, Nov. 10th-12th) with its own Oregon Rain Invitational, a three-day, four-team, round-robin tournament in Gill Coliseum that also features Portland, Southeastern Louisiana and Cal Poly.

Photo: OSU Athletics

CORVALLIS - Five Oregon State men’s basketball players reached double-figures to lead the squad to a 92-76 win over Saint Martin’s on Sunday afternoon at Gill Coliseum. It was the Beavers’ lone exhibition game prior to the start of the 2006-07 regular season.

Junior forward Marcel Jones had 19 points, followed by junior forward Sasa Cuic with 18, redshirt freshman guard Josh Tarver with 14, freshman guard Vojin Svilar with 11 and senior center Kyle Jeffers with 10.

Had it been an official game, Jeffers would have had his first career double-double and would have set a career high with 15 rebounds. He helped the Beavers to a 49-28 rebounding advantage and added three blocked shots.

Saint Martin’s, an NCAA Division II school located in Lacey, Wash., got 19 points from junior forward forward Brendan Campbell and 18 points from sophomore guard Jake Linton.

The Beavers started out shooting extremely well and hit their first seven shots today. Turnovers, however, hounded OSU early and the Saints held a two-point lead at 25-23 with 8:52 to go in the first half after Campbell hit a three-pointer and two free throws.

Immediately after that, however, a 6-0 OSU run that saw a jumper by Cuic, a driving layup by Tarver and two free throws by Jeffers put the Beavers back in front 29-25, and they never trailed again.

Saint Martin’s kept things close throughout the first half and the Beavers went into the halftime break holding a 44-39 lead. OSU’s largest lead of the half was just six points.

With another six-point lead early in the second half, the Beavers took their first double-digit lead thanks to an 8-0 run. Senior forward Michael Johnson hit a baseline jumper, Cuic scored two baskets on a lay-up and a jumper and sophomore guard Jack McGillis knocked down a jump shot. The Saints were held scoreless for about four minutes. OSU went up 59-45 with less than 13 minutes to play, and the lead was never less than 10 points the rest of the way.

OSU took its biggest lead at 78-60 on a Svilar three-pointer with 6:42 to go.

The Beavers shot 53.4% from the field, including 60.0% in the second half. The Saints shot just 37.1% and were held to 30.0% shooting in the second half.

OSU committed 24 turnovers to Saint Martin’s 16, though both teams finished with 18 points off turnovers.

Two players expecting to be regulars in OSU’s rotation sat out with minor injuries: junior guard Angelo Tsagarakis (back spasms) and freshman guard/forward Seth Tarver (knee sprain).

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