ASU unable to fend off late run from Oregon State in loss
Arizona State men's basketball brushed off a sloppy start but was unable to withstand a late Oregon State run in a loss on Sunday.
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TEMPE — Arizona State men’s basketball brushed off a sloppy start but was unable to withstand a late Oregon State run in a 78-75 loss on Sunday.
ASU held a double-digit lead with eight minutes left, but a scoring drought for 4:31 allowed the Beavers to claw back in it and end the game on a 21-7 run.
Moe Odum had two big free throws after a timeout to bring ASU’s lead back to three with 2:47 left, and it stayed a one-possession game the rest of the way.
Oregon State guard Isaiah Sy hit the go-ahead 3 with 1:11 left after the Beavers had been trailing the entire second half. The team’s offensive rebound on the ensuing possession put ASU in a deep hole, hoping for the right kind of break.
Head coach Bobby Hurley characterized the rebounding disparity in his postgame remarks (29-19 in favor of Oregon State) as something that’s haunted this Sun Devil team and was disappointed the team was unable to reach double-digit nonconference wins when expectations were so low coming in.
"Overall, we've had a pretty solid nonconference with the wins we've had, but this game hurts."
Bobby Hurley on ASU's missed opportunity vs. Oregon State to reach double-digit wins before Big 12 play starts: pic.twitter.com/kRcpdWGnAB
— Arizona Sports (@AZSports) December 21, 2025
Massamba Diop recovered a loose ball with 12 seconds left giving the Sun Devils a chance to respond, but he had it ripped away.
Free throws then gave the Beavers (7-6) a three-point lead with 6.9 seconds left, and Odum lost the handle on his final possession.
“I was gonna stop for a 3, I just lost it. I just gotta be better,” Odum said postgame. He said the loss was rooted in effort, and that there have been too many times where the Sun Devils play like they don’t care.
ASU (9-4) is now 2-4 when it doesn’t reach the 80-point mark and 7-0 when it does.
How did Arizona State pull ahead after slow start?
Santiago Trouet keyed a 10-2 run to start the second half with ASU’s first made 3 of the game and a block on 7-foot-2 center Noah Amenhauser, a Goodyear native who also traveled early in the second half, boosted the ASU run.
The Sun Devils had missed all eight of their 3-point attempts in the first half.
They were very sloppy to start, shooting 3-for-13 over the first nine minutes with Diop making both of his early shots to account for two of the makes.
As a result, Oregon State built an early double-digit lead with their own 7-for-9 start.
ASU benefitted from an Oregon State assistant getting called for a technical foul, but it didn’t result in much of a momentum swing as the Beavers scored on their ensuing possession and ASU turned it over its next time down.
The Sun Devils’ chaotic defense and propensity to get to the free-throw line (they entered the matchup top 40 in the nation in attempts per game) showed up later as ASU finished on a 20-11 run to take a two-point lead.
ASU shot 16 free throws in the first half to Oregon State’s five (16-8 advantage for the Beavers in the second).
Shooting guard Bryce Ford returned to the starting lineup after missing the previous two contests with a lower-body injury. The rust was visibly there as he shot 1-for-5 from 3 with a few of the misses falling short.
“It looked like (one), he was tired and I don’t think he was committed to the shot,” Hurley said. “After he missed the first one, I think he was a little unsure of himself.”
He entered the contest shooting 43.9% on 4.1 deep attempts per game, the best percentage among Sun Devils with at least 10 attempts.
Trevor Best was also active and played two minutes after exiting the last game at UCLA with a lower-body injury.
Allen Mukeba left the first half with a lower-leg injury that Hurley said didn’t initially seem like something serious.
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Comments
8 Comments
Problem is who wants it? No talent, no NIL (especially since football just sucked all the shekels possible from the valley), no tradition, no facility for another 4 years at least. I'd get on the Mullet train and buy an ASU sweater.
Just now? I thought that shoulda been about 3 years ago.
"No-one thought much of us.." Exactly Play-in, you'll be blessed to win 6 games the rest of the year. You just lost to the #166 team at home. Get some tickets to Storrs, wipe off the advisor chair and occupy early.