No. 10 Oregon State snaps skid with 79-52 rout of Colorado

BOULDER, Colorado -- Oregon State's Aleah Goodman had an inkling it was going to be a special night when she sank a pair of quick wide-open 3-pointers before the first timeout.

Like her shot, she was dead-on.

"After my first two kind of dropped and I was 'OK, let's go. I'm starting to feel it a little bit," Goodman said. "Yeah, I think I did get into a little bit of a zone and my teammates set me up and it was my job to knock them down."

Goodman scored a career-high 26 points and sank a personal-best seven 3-pointers in leading No. 10 Oregon State past Colorado 79-52 Thursday night.

"She's such a competitor," Oregon State coach Scott Rueck said. "She's been for this team whatever it has needed throughout her career. She was Sixth Player of the Year last year in the Pac-12. She steps in and identifies the need and becomes whatever that is in each game.

"Tonight we needed perimeter scoring. That's what they were giving us and she stepped up."

And knocked 'em down.

The Beavers (17-4, 5-4 Pac-12) halted a three-game losing streak, their longest skid since the 2013-14 season, and they did it by burning the Buffaloes (14-6, 3-6) from long range.

They sank 13 of 19 3-pointers, led by Goodman, who was 7 for 9.

"Oregon State is one of the best 3-point shooting teams in the country. We knew that coming in," Buffaloes coach JR Payne said. "We just flat-out didn't guard the way we needed to from the 3-point line."

It's been an ongoing issue. Colorado came into the game ranked 325th out of 348 Division I women's programs in 3-point defense, allowing opponents to hit 35.4% of those shots.

The Beavers sank 68.4% of their 3s on this night.

"It's just who we are," Rueck said. "You take what they give you. In this game we moved the ball so efficiently they pressured the (point guard), which allowed us to move the ball and find open shooters. That's a gamble with a team like us, because we can knock down the shot."

Conversely, Colorado was just 5 of 26 from long range (19.2%).

Oregon State hit five of its first six 3-pointers in jumping out to a 19-4 lead highlighted by back-to-back 3s from Goodman. After Colorado climbed back into the game with an 11-0 run, Goodman sank another pair of 3s and her fifth one gave the Beavers a 32-25 lead.

Mya Hollingshed's 3 pulled Colorado to 32-28, but Oregon State responded with a 19-2 run spanning the second and third quarters to put this one away.

The Buffs, who were led by Hollingshed's 16 points, missed 13 consecutive shots during the drought, and went 10:17 between field goals.

Destiny Slocum added 11 points and Kennedy Brown grabbed 13 rebounds for Oregon State, which got 3-pointers from five different players.

"They are one of the best 3-point teams in the country, but I said the same thing about Utah, and both teams shot 70% from three against us," Payne said. "We need to re-watch the film, but there's times we're not matched up, there's times we're not rotating correctly. If we don't rotate correctly, somebody else has to help, it's a shooter that's open. It kind of snowballs."

SILVER LINING

The Buffs did have one thing to feel good about: they only turned the ball over four times. That's one shy of the program record for fewest turnovers in a game, set against Villanova on March 27, 2008.

That doesn't make up for the 50-27 rebounding edge Oregon State had, however.

"We took care of the ball well, which is fantastic," Payne said. "We weren't rebounding quite as well as we typically do. We got crushed on the glass, which never happens."

BIG PICTURE

Oregon State: The Beavers avoided their first four-game skid since February of 2013. Their three-game slump included a loss to third-ranked Stanford and consecutive defeats to their rival, fourth-ranked Oregon. That marked the first time in the program's history that the Beavers had faced three consecutive top-5 teams.

"It was important" to halt the skid, Rueck said. "I think everybody probably realizes who we've played in those losses and that level of competition, but at the same time a loss hurts. For us to lose consecutive games is a little unnerving. It causes you to question maybe are we on the right track? Are things going in the direction they are supposed to be?"

Colorado: The Buffaloes had played the Pac-12's elite teams tight all season, but not on this night. They've allowed 29 3-pointers in their last two home games.

UP NEXT

Oregon State will be at Utah on Saturday.

Colorado will host Oregon on Saturday afternoon.

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