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Analysis: Utah outclassed by Oregon, which looks like the class of the Pac-12

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Analysis: Utah outclassed by Oregon, which looks like the class of the Pac-12


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SALT LAKE CITY — Let’s pretend for a moment that you didn’t watch the University of Utah get bulldozed by Oregon Saturday afternoon.

You didn’t watch the Utes, beset by injuries all season, get outclassed; you didn’t watch Bo Nix re-enter the Heisman Trophy conversation at the expense of Utah’s vaunted defense; you didn’t see a healthy number of fans stream out into the West parking lot at halftime.

Since you know nothing of what happened at Rice-Eccles Stadium, you need to get caught up. To get caught up, all you need to know is one simple postgame item.

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Utes head coach Kyle Whittingham compared it to the infamous 47-7 loss to TCU back in 2010. That’s how bad, how one-sided, how shell-shocking Saturday afternoon was.

With ESPN College GameDay in town, with everything still to play for as November looms, in front of the third-largest crowd in the history of the building, Utah looked unprepared to meet the moment. Some of that might have been the season-long injury bug finally taking its toll, but certainly not all of it. More so, this Oregon outfit looked as advertised: the most-balanced, most-capable Pac-12 team of crashing the College Football Playoff.

Whatever you believe these Utes have been, the fact remains they spent two months effectively figuring things out to arrive at Saturday. Instead of continuing on that path, this latest Utah Pac-12 title defense has now been placed on life support after a second conference loss.

Yes, Utah got outclassed

It took just 2:42 of game clock for at least two things to become very apparent. Oregon is not USC, and Utah was going to be in real trouble.

Here is Oregon’s first drive, which began with a delay of game penalty after the crowd brought the noise: Bo Nix to Tez Johnson over the middle for 9, Nix to Johnson for 12, Nix to Troy Franklin for 7, Nix to Franklin for 30 after he beat Zemaiah Vaughn, offsides on Utah, Bucky Irving for a 16-yard rush, Nix scores on a 1-yard bootleg to the left.

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There was no resistance, Nix was precise, and I genuinely can’t remember in three-plus seasons and 41 games of covering Utah where an opposing offense diced up the defense like that. Whittingham later called the game a “mismatch” and “worse than the score indicated.”

Oregon’s third drive was similar, and the fourth drive needed to go just 30 yards after a Bryson Barnes interception on a route where he expected Sione Vaki to be somewhere else. At the 12:29 mark of the second quarter, the Ducks led 21-3, Nix was 11-for-12 passing with two touchdowns, and there was no sign that the Utah offense, prolific the last two weeks with Vaki emerging as a two-way star, was going to able to keep up, even if the defense did manage to settle in.

Oregon came to town ranked No. 1 in the Pac-12 and No. 2 in total offense at 551.6 yards per game. The fact the Ducks totaled just 390 yards on Saturday belies the fact that Utah had no answer. Their final three drives netted just 43 total yards, which gives Dan Lanning something to be mad about come Monday, but by the time those last three drives occurred, the game was already in hand, and Oregon stopped going into the bag with bigger fish to fry down the road.

A few loose thoughts here:

Utah badly missed Lander Barton as Nix was happy to exploit the middle of that Utah defense, and it wasn’t anything fancy, just timely throws off good routes, some of which didn’t see a Utah defender within 3 yards of the receiver.

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Oregon’s offensive line kept Nix upright all day, and the only front-four pressure I can even recall from this game was Van Fillinger getting in Nix’s face just once.

Nix picked on JT Broughton early, which was not a coincidence.

Irving gives Oregon a completely different dimension out of the backfield, one I’m not sure any Pac-12 team has, save for maybe USC with MarShawn Lloyd.

Utah Utes defensive end Jonah Elliss (83) tries to block a pass by Oregon Ducks quarterback Bo Nix (10) in Salt Lake City on Saturday, Oct. 28, 2023. Oregon won 35-6.
Utah Utes defensive end Jonah Elliss (83) tries to block a pass by Oregon Ducks quarterback Bo Nix (10) in Salt Lake City on Saturday, Oct. 28, 2023. Oregon won 35-6. (Photo: Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret News)

Oregon handled Sione Vaki, Utah had no answer

So much of what Utah looked so capable of on offense the last two weeks was because Vaki was able to do so many different things.

Oregon was ready for all of it. No wheel routes, no direct snaps for big gains with Ja’Quinden Jackson as the lead blocker, no handoffs where Vaki kicks it outside for a chunk play, none of it. Vaki finished with five carries for 11 yards and zero catches.

I didn’t think Barnes played terribly, I actually thought he mostly looked confident like he did in wins over Cal and USC, but without Vaki doing much of anything, the offense reverted back to before Cal, when it looked stuck in mud too much of the time. Barnes was 15-of-29 for 136 yards, zero touchdowns and two interceptions. That might have been enough to stomach if the rushing game showed up, but it didn’t.

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Utah’s offensive line, with Spencer Fano back at left tackle, got worked over, which in part led to just 99 rushing yards on 36 carries, an average of 2.8 yards per attempt. That’s not going to get it done against the majority of the Pac-12, let alone Oregon.

Utah’s first drive is worth highlighting, because offensive coordinator Andy Ludwig was rightfully aggressive once Oregon went up 7-0. The Utes converted on third-and-4 from their own 31 after Barnes hit Munir McClain for 14, then had a pass interference on fourth-and-2 from the Ducks’ 47 that set them up at the 34. On fourth-and-1 at the 25, Ludwig called a keeper for Barnes out of the shotgun that went for no gain and a turnover on downs.

Whittingham later defended that play call, while noting they had 8-10 plays for that exact situation, with half of them out of the shotgun. He went on to say his team has had success this season out of the shotgun, but they didn’t block up that play particularly well.

While we’re here, the second drive also helped set a tone in favor of Oregon after Junior Tafuna punched the ball out from Irving to set Utah up at the Ducks’ 27.

Jackson went for 3 yards, Vaki for 2, and then Barnes to Jaylon Glover at the sticks for 7 on third-and-5. On first-and-10 from the 15, there was an incomplete pass on a throwaway, Vaki dropped for a loss of 3, and then Barnes on a scramble for 4 after Glover picked up the blitz to free up Barnes for positive yardage. All of that was followed by a Cole Becker 32-yard field goal. Utah came away with points, but Oregon won the drive, and I’m sure Whittingham would agree.

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Back to Vaki. There were two weeks worth of film for Oregon to look at, and now there is film after this game on how to slow him down. How Utah opts to use Vaki and how much he plays on offense now bears real attention because based on the last three weeks, if Vaki does not produce on offense, Utah hasn’t shown much of a Plan B.

Utah Utes runner Sione Vaki (28) is surrounded by Oregon defenders in Salt Lake City on Saturday, Oct. 28, 2023. Oregon won 35-6.
Utah Utes runner Sione Vaki (28) is surrounded by Oregon defenders in Salt Lake City on Saturday, Oct. 28, 2023. Oregon won 35-6. (Photo: Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret News)

What this season can still be

This Utah-Oregon game between one-loss teams, whether you want to admit it or not in terms of the Utes, was a College Football Playoff elimination game. As far as winning a third straight Pac-12 championship, those hopes dimmed significantly Saturday, but we cannot count that out entirely just yet, because, remember, Utah won the Pac-12 last season after going 7-2, aided by a bunch of chaos to get back to the conference title game.

At 6-2 overall and 3-2 in the Pac-12, Utah will be the betting favorite this week against Arizona State, and likely in the regular-season finale against Colorado. I can’t say with certainty Utah beats Arizona, and I’ve been consistent that a trip to Tucson is no longer the automatic win it once was. Going to Washington on Nov. 11? The Huskies have not looked inspired the last two weeks, but 8-0 is 8-0.

What do we want to go with? 8-4? 9-3? Let’s be optimistic and say 9-3 overall and 6-3 in the Pac-12. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but in a vacuum, if that’s what this season ends up being, you have to tip your hat and call that good work all around given the amount of injuries this team has had to deal with, not to mention an in-season QB circus that just got settled once and for all a week ago.

This program is at a point where it should be contending for conference championships every year. That should absolutely be the reasonable, rational goal on an annual basis, but in this particular case, how reasonable and rational that may be is certainly up for some discussion. Be that as it may, Utah entered Saturday with that goal still on the table, and to be fair, it is not technically off the table.

If you’re choosing to remain an idealist after watching Saturday, just know there is a road for Utah to return to the Pac-12 championship game, but it includes winning out. Again, there is a trip to Washington mixed in there.

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Other things on my mind

  • Utah’s lack of a pass-catching tight end has been just crippling, especially given the QB situation and the need to really keep Barnes comfortable with what he’s being asked to do. This, after the tight end was such a profound piece of the offense in 2021 and 2022.
  • If you line up Oregon and Washington right now for the second time, the Ducks are the betting favorite. It’s a bit jarring where those two programs have gone after they staged an epic in Seattle earlier this month.
  • We’re going to get into this deeper in the next Utes mailbag Tuesday, but those of you clamoring for Brandon Rose at quarterback, you’re going to have to get over that.
  • Kyle Whittingham taking two timeouts with him into halftime was inexplicable. That drive wasted some seconds after first downs, which could have been avoided, and could have been used to take at least one extra shot at the end zone.
  • Seven catches on 10 targets for 80 yards from Devaughn Vele will go by the wayside. He played well, even hauled in a couple that Barnes sailed on him.
  • I thought Utah was going to get more out of Indiana transfer Emery Simmons at wide receiver.
  • What Utah has been able to do at home should not be overlooked. The Utes had won 18 straight at Rice-Eccles before Saturday, and if you don’t want to count the COVID loss to USC in 2020, they hadn’t lost at home since Sept. 2018 against Washington. Teams do not walk into Rice-Eccles and win, let alone embarrass Utah.
  • Give me a good reason why Nix should not be the leading Heisman Trophy contender right now, and no, telling me the East Coast voters don’t care about the Pac-12 isn’t good enough.
  • The Utes ran more plays and won time of possession. Two turnovers that led to 14 points negates both of those things.
  • The absence of Micah Bernard has been a totally under-discussed storyline that has gotten lost in the middle of a handful of other personnel-related things. Same goes for Brant Kuithe if we’re being very honest.
  • Utah showed itself well this weekend with GameDay in town, complete with The Pat McAfee Show Friday, taking place at Presidents’ Circle. Cam Rising was on set for both shows, as was Whittingham and, well, if another head coach in the future shows up to be on McAfee’s show riding a motorcycle, I’ll be surprised.

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Josh Newman is a veteran journalist of 19 years, most recently for The Salt Lake Tribune, where he covered the University of Utah from Dec. 2019 until May 2023. Before that, he covered Rutgers University for Gannett New Jersey.

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Sanctuary state Oregon rolls out program to help illegal migrants thwart ICE: ‘Do not open the door’

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Sanctuary state Oregon rolls out program to help illegal migrants thwart ICE: ‘Do not open the door’


The lefty attorney general of Oregon has rolled out a new program to help illegal migrants in the sanctuary state thwart ICE ahead of President-elect Donald Trump’s promised mass deportations.

Ellen Rosenblum’s recent new guide, titled the “Sanctuary Promise Community Toolkit,” offers advice to illegal immigrants on what to say and do if ICE or other immigration authorities show up.

For the question, “How do I prepare myself and my family for encounters with ICE?” the answer includes legal guidance from the American Civil Liberties Union: “do not open the door, ask to see a warrant signed by a judge, tell them you do not consent to them being at your home and tell them please leave.”

Incoming border czar Tom Homan speaks to Texas law enforcement deployed to the southern border. The Washington Post via Getty Images

In answer to the question, “Is there a place I can call to report ICE or other federal immigration authorities active right now in my community?” the Oregon Department of Justice lists contact information for local nonprofits that work to warn migrants about federal operations.

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There are also multiple sections on how to report anyone who is suspected of violating Oregon’s sanctuary law and working with federal immigration authorities.

One section advises locals that they can sue any state or local agency that they suspect of violating sanctuary law.

However, the “Sanctuary Promise” guide admits that state laws can only do so much: “The outcome of a state investigation or a private civil suit does not change a deportation order, or any other decision/action by the federal courts or federal immigration authority to prosecute or remove a person from the United States.”

“Every person has the right to live, work, play, and learn safely in Oregon, period,” said Rosenblum in a statement. Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

“Every person has the right to live, work, play, and learn safely in Oregon, period,” said Rosenblum when her office released the anti-ICE info.

“I asked my Civil Rights Unit here at the Oregon DOJ to do whatever we could to provide the people, businesses, and local governments of our state with easy-to-read materials to help them know their rights and educate others, and I’m so pleased with what they’ve put together,” she added.

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A woman holds a sign that reads “ICE stop hunting people” against Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids. Getty Images

The Beaver State’s top cop said she recommends illegal migrants begin talking with family members to better “understand what protections Oregon’s sanctuary laws provide and what they do not provide, and make a plan for what to do if immigration officials come to your home or place of business.”

“Knowing your rights in advance is essential!” added Rosenblum.

Oregon became the nation’s first sanctuary state in 1987. And in recent years, the state has taken steps to enhance its crackdown on those who violate its sanctuary laws, including with the passage of the Sanctuary Promise Act in 2021 which opened a hotline for residents to report violators.

Trump’s border czar Tom Homan recently The Post that the once and future president may increase the pressure on sanctuary leaders’ efforts to thwart ICE as it works to lock up and deport illegal migrant criminals.

“I’m hoping the president files a lawsuit against them and withholds federal funding,” said Homan.

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However, if that doesn’t work, “then we’ll wait til they get out of jail, then we’ll go out into the neighborhoods and get them,” said Homan.

He added: “If they’re not willing to do it then get out of the way — we’re coming.”



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A Tale of Two Trails: Sharing Indigenous stories from eastern Oregon

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A Tale of Two Trails: Sharing Indigenous stories from eastern Oregon


BAKER CITY — Coyote, the storyteller, has taken up residence at the National Historic Oregon Trail Interpretive Center in Baker City. And he’s using his voice to share a side of history sometimes forgotten.

The 23,000 square-foot facility, operated by the Bureau of Land Management, opened a new Native American exhibit at the end of October.

The displays include a gallery dedicated to the history, culture and languages of the tribes who have inhabited the land along the Oregon Trail for thousands of generations prior to the mass European American migration that began in the early 1840s.

In the language of the Umatilla Tribe, Coyote’s name is spilyáy. His role at the center is to teach visitors the Oregon Trail story from the Native American perspective.

“Great change is coming!” spilyáy proclaims in colorful signs along the center’s main gallery, lined with life-sized dioramas of settler men, women and children, covered wagons, oxen, sheep, horses, Native American men and a howling coyote.

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“I see the storm of your future,” he warns. “The ŝuyápuma (European Americans) will come in greater numbers than in any season past. Their need will be unquenchable. Their wagons bring wonders and comforts, but their ways are not your ways; their friendship brings pain. They are wildfire, consuming the land and all I have prepared.

“Are you listening?”

Coyote’s narrative adds to numerous Native American exhibits already woven throughout the center, including a diorama depicting the importance of trade among settlers and Native Americans, and a display describing contact and confrontation on the frontier, often a result of cultural differences, lack of communication and government inaction.

Baker City resident John Bearinside was one of the first visitors to see the new exhibit at the Interpretive Center and related the plight of the Umatilla, Cayuse, Walla Walla and Nez Perce —who were moved to reservations through the Treaty of 1855 — to that of his own ancestors.

A member of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians, and Apache, Bearinside grew up on the Choctaw Reservation. His great-great-great grandparents were removed from their homeland in Mississippi and forced to relocate to a reservation in Oklahoma.

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Bearinside, who speaks on Native American culture and history, emphasized that not all written accounts of Native American history are accurate.

“It’s amazing to me how much transpired, but it’s not put into books technically, it’s put into books not realistically, it’s put into books in a way to sell the books—bigger than life,” he explained.

“My grandmother would tell us, ‘Read between the lines, of your history books, of your newspapers, your stories, your wanted posters. You know, when they say he murdered 25 people, he might have murdered two people,’” Bearinside said.

“If a person has a real serious interest and we feel that we can trust them, only then can we tell them our stories.”

The stories of many diverse groups of people whose lives were forever altered by the Oregon Trail are told through photos, films, artifacts and quotations at the Interpretive Center.

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The idea for an Oregon Trail museum began as part of former Gov. Neil Goldschmidt’s “Oregon Comeback” plan following the 1980s recession, said Dave Hunsaker, the Interpretive Center’s original project manager and its first director.

Planning was tied in with construction of several other cultural centers: The End of the Oregon Trail Interpretive Center in Oregon City, the Columbia Gorge Discovery Center in The Dalles, Tamástslikt Cultural Institute on the Umatilla Indian Reservation near Pendleton and the Four Rivers Cultural Center and Museum in Ontario. Each of those centers focused on the way the Oregon Trail affected their region, Hunsaker noted.

“We’re the one that really focused broadly on the Oregon Trail itself,” he said.

The Baker City facility was the first to open, in May 1992, and the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation blessed the building at its grand opening. The original plan focused on six themes, Hunsaker said, one of which was Native Americans, with the goal of expanding that theme later, after Tamástslikt was up and running.

The seed for developing the new Native American exhibit was planted in 2015, said Bobby Reis, curator of collections and exhibitions at the Interpretive Center, but development was delayed due to renovation work and COVID-19. Bobbie Conner, director of Tamástslikt Cultural Institute, was involved in the early planning stages. Tamástslikt opened in 1998 and is the only Native American museum directly on the Oregon Trail, focusing in detail how settlers’ arrival caused diseases, wars, broken treaties and attempts at assimilation, including boarding schools.

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The new displays at the Interpretive Center are a permanent addition and are viewable year-round.

Read more: Tamástslikt museum shows Oregon history through a Native American lens

The National Historic Oregon Trail Interpretive Center’s winter hours are 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Thursday-Sunday; 22267 Hwy. 86, Baker City; free admission in December; Jan. 2-March 31, $5 for 16 and older, $4 for seniors, good for two days with receipt; blm.gov/learn/interpretive-centers/national-historic-oregon-trail-interpretive-center

Another exhibit making the rounds through Oregon highlights the history and resilience of the Wallowa Band Nez Perce, or nimiipuu.

Titled “Nez Perce in Oregon: Removal and Return,” the traveling exhibit was created by the Josephy Center for Arts and Culture in Joseph through a grant from the Oregon State Capitol Foundation, said Rich Wandschneider, director of the Josephy Library of Western History and Culture and a Wallowa County historian. Currently on display at Eastern Oregon University in La Grande, the exhibit will move in mid-January to Blue Mountain Community College in Pendleton before finding a home at the Oregon State Capitol in Salem next September.

Wandschneider consulted with Nez Perce tribal elders in developing displays that interpret the history of the Wallowa Band Nez Perce and how the lives of its people, who had lived in the Wallowa Valley from time immemorial, were changed irrevocably by the arrival of European American explorers, fur traders, missionaries, gold miners and settlers.

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The exhibit discusses settlement and conflict in the Wallowa Valley, starting with the wave of Oregon Trail settlers who edged ever-nearer to Nez Perce territory in the 1860s. Old Chief Joseph constructed stone monuments to keep them out, but after his death in 1871, settlers began flooding in. Although the Nez Perce were friendly toward the newcomers, tensions grew between them.

As the exhibit explains, treaties are part of “The supreme Law of the Land,” according to the U.S. Constitution. In 1877, Young Chief Joseph was forced to comply with the Nez Perce Treaty of 1863—although his father had refused to sign it—and lead his people out of the Wallowa Valley to a reservation in Lapwai, Idaho Territory.

On the way to Lapwai, overwhelming emotions sparked a young Nez Perce man, whose father had been murdered by a settler, to lead a deadly revenge attack on Idaho Territory settlers, and according to the exhibit, “the Nez Perce War was on.”

The fighting retreat sent some 800 Nez Perce people on a nearly 1,200-mile journey across four states, with the U.S. Army close behind. Just 40 miles from the Canadian border, with his people cold, exhausted and starving and most of his chiefs killed in some 13 battles and skirmishes, Chief Joseph surrendered. He and most of his tribe were exiled to Kansas and Oklahoma, and finally sent to the Colville Indian Reservation in Washington, while Chief White Bird and 200 others escaped to Canada.

Charlie Moses, 88, who grew up on the Colville reservation in Nespelem, Wash., and now lives in Vancouver, has close ties to the Nez Perce War. His grandfather and great-grandfather both fought in the war, and his great-uncle was killed at the bloody Battle of the Big Hole.

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“My tribe really is the White Bird,” Moses said, “but after we came back from Oklahoma, my grandfather, Black Eagle, followed Joseph to Nespelem.”

Moses, who retired following a 30-year career with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, has spent much of his time speaking about his family lineage and history in the Nez Perce War, providing that information to the Josephy Center, which created the new exhibit. He’s been involved with the Wallowa Homeland Project since the 1990s and makes regular journeys to Wallowa County to participate in the Tamkaliks Celebration and the Chief Joseph Days Rodeo.

Chief Joseph remained an activist for his people until his death in 1904, and although never allowed to go back to his Wallowa Homeland, he made several trips to Washington, D.C., to plead for his people’s return. In 1879, he summarized his thoughts on the relationship between Native Americans and European Americans:

“Whenever the white man treats an Indian as they treat each other, then we will have no more wars. We shall be alike—brothers of one father and one mother, with one sky above us and one country around us…that all people may be one people.”

“Nez Perce in Oregon: Removal and Return” is viewable 7 a.m.-11 p.m. Monday-Friday, 10 a.m.-7:30 p.m. Saturday and 10 a.m.-11 p.m. Sunday; Loso Hall, Eastern Oregon University; Sixth Street, La Grande; no admission fee. The exhibit will move to Blue Mountain Community College in Pendleton in mid-January and to the Oregon State Capitol in Salem in September; library.josephy.org/the-nez-perce-in-oregon-removal-and-return

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— Kathy Patten, for The Oregonian/OregonLive



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Oregon State MBB Falls To Nebraska In Diamond Head Classic Championship

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Oregon State MBB Falls To Nebraska In Diamond Head Classic Championship


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MORE: Offseason Movement Tracker | Scholarship Chart | Beavers Land Nebraska DL | Beavers Land USC LB | RB Coach Hotboard V1.0 | Beavers Land WVU DB | Analysis: What Are The Beavers Getting In Maalik Murphy?

HONOLULU — — Brice Williams scored 11 of his 25 points in the final six minutes and Nebraska closed on a 6-0 run to beat Oregon State 78-66 on Wednesday night in the championship game of the Diamond Head Classic.

Nebraska claimed its first tournament title since winning the San Juan Shootout in 2000 when the Cornhuskers won three games by a total of four points. Fred Hoiberg also became the first coach to win multiple Diamond Head Classic titles, including his Iowa State squad in 2013.

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After Oregon State tied it at 51-all with 10:20 to go, Nebraska used a 10-2 run to take control as the Beavers went five-plus minutes without a field goal. The Cornhuskers’ lead didn’t drop below four points the rest of the way.

Berke Buyuktuncel banked in a 3-pointer with 1:51 left to extend Nebraska’s lead to 72-63.

Buyuktuncel finished with 16 points and three 3-pointers, and Juwan Gary added 14 for Nebraska (10-2).

Nate Kingz scored 19 points and Damarco Minor added 16 for Oregon State (10-3).

Williams scored 10 points in the first half to help Nebraska take a 34-33 lead at the break. The Cornhuskers shot 50% from the field, including 6 of 11 from 3-point range in the first half.

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It was the second straight year Nebraska and Oregon State met at a neutral site, with last year’s game being played in South Dakota.

Nebraska returns home to play Southern on Monday, when Oregon State hosts Portland.

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MORE: TE Jackson Bowers Commits | Beavers Land Duke QB Maalik Murphy | Beavers Land UCF OL Keyon Cox | Beavers Land Nevada OL



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