Arizona, Oregon face similar storylines with Pac-12 Tournament approaching

EUGENE, Ore. — Oregon State is aiming for a first-round Pac-12 Tournament bye, and preseason conference favorite Oregon is trying to make up for lost time to maybe play its way into the NIT, if that is something anybody actually cares about.

Both the Beavers and Ducks are saying home-court goodbyes to seniors this weekend, too, giving even more incentive to their games with Arizona.

“It’s March, so every game is huge, but this one is really big,” Oregon senior guard Ehab Amin said after the Ducks crushed ASU on Thursday. “We can’t let anything slip.”

OK, then. But what’s in it for the Wildcats?

Even after an upset win at Oregon State on Thursday, and regardless of what happens against Oregon on Saturday, Arizona is still likely to play in a first-round Pac-12 Tournament game, still likely to need to win the entire thing to get an NCAA Tournament berth and … still unlikely to do that with a four-game run in Las Vegas because of their relative lack of depth.

The best thing the Wildcats can probably hope for at this point is that their first-round Pac-12 Tournament matchup is against Stanford, a team they have beaten 19 straight times.

But on a deeper, less tangible level, there are things such as momentum and pride to play for, the kind of things UA coach Sean Miller is talking a lot about these days.

Miller said Friday he sees the same thing in Oregon, a team that has often been fighting Arizona for first place in recent years.

“Oregon’s a lot like us,” Miller said. “They’re a team that’s used to being in the postseason. I’m sure part of what they’re trying to do is what we’re trying to do, and that’s play the game, practice hard and be playing our best basketball when we go to Vegas and see how the whole thing works out.”

Who knows?

In what Miller is probably telling, or will tell the Wildcats, is that they might get to Las Vegas and benefit from a surprise, too.

In 2011-12, Arizona was seeded fourth after losing at ASU in the regular-season finale, but beat No. 5 UCLA in the quarterfinals, then had a chance to face Oregon State — not top-seeded Washington — in the semifinals because the Beavers upset the Huskies in another quarterfinal.

“And the next thing you know, we’re in the championship game against Colorado,” Miller said. “They went to the tournament (by beating UA 53-51) but that’s the thing about the conference tournament, if you’re looking at it from our perspective. That’s what you’re hoping for.”

Individually, the Wildcats have a lot to play for, too. Among them:

Randolph shot just 23.9 percent from the field in the five games prior to Sunday against Stanford, but went 4 of 10 against the Cardinal and 7 of 8 against Oregon State on Thursday.

In short, he’s starting to look like the guy who posted three 20-point games through the first month of the season and still leads the Wildcats in scoring.

“The coaches always tell me, keep my confidence, they believe in me and they just told me to do what I do,” Randolph said after the OSU game. “Coaches tell me to work hard and just keep believing in them and I believe in them.”

Miller credited Randolph for sticking with it and playing hard, taking shots only that OSU gave him Thursday. But Miller also indicated that Brandon Williams’ return from a six-day absence against Stanford may not be coincidental to Randolph’s recent uptick.

“I think it really takes a lot of pressure off (Randolph) having another ball handler in the game,” Miller said. “Brandon Williams has a way of finding teammates, Justin Coleman does as well. Those two guys, that’s really the thing they do well.

“And when one shot goes in, it’s amazing how all of a sudden you look a little different when you take those next shots. I think against Stanford his world opened back up.”

Well, not really. It just turned out that way, with Doutrive’s buzzer-beating rebound basket at Oregon State.

The truth, though, is that Doutrive has been playing for a permanent role in the Wildcats’ rotation, for this season and beyond.

The springy 6-foot-5 freshman didn’t play at all in two Maui Invitational games and four others this season, but has gradually impressed Miller with his offensive skills and improving defense to where he’s been more often on the floor during important moments.

Doutrive wound up on the floor in the final seconds Thursday after Williams and Ryan Luther had both fouled out, but he’s making a case that it’s probably a good idea to put him out there anytime a crucial second-chance bucket might be needed.

Or just a big play, at anytime.

“He made more plays than just the game-winning offensive rebound,” Miller said at OSU. “He had a great drive, played with a lot of confidence. That’s what you hope with young players, that they keep working and at some point, it really clicks and they can have that success. He’s come a long way from where he was when he first checked in last summer.”

By all accounts, Arizona treated Williams gingerly when his right knee flared up following a trip to Los Angeles in January, sitting him out six games before working him back Sunday against Stanford.

Miller has described Williams’ situation as an ongoing issue that all parties will continue to have to watch carefully. But at the same time, Williams is also trying to prove he can keep playing at a high level with it — something he’ll eventually need to show professional scouts that he can do.

The better he does it, of course, the more the Wildcats benefit. Even with Williams scoring just four points against Stanford and fouling out at OSU with two assists and two turnovers, Miller has spoken repeatedly about the impact Williams has made.

“He’s missed so much time that the fouling is something that takes a little bit of game experience to settle into,” Miller said. “He picked up his third on the last play in the first half, when you just almost want to get out of the way, and then picked up his fourth on a play that he gambled on and he didn’t need to.

“I will tell you, though, it’s a big difference to have him out there, and everybody sees that. He just gives us another scorer, makes us much more durable. You know you can play through foul trouble, you can play through fatigue, because you have another quality player.”

The UA’s two grad transfers have just two regular-season games left as collegians, giving both reason to have a sense of urgency.

Luther has taken 40 3-point shots over his past six games, being nudged a bit from his unselfish ways when Miller told him he simply had to start taking all his open 3-pointers or he would be hurting the team.

Also a sometimes reluctant scorer, Coleman has scored 24 points in his past two games and made 5 of 12 3-pointers. He missed a difficult 16-footer in the final seconds at OSU Thursday, but left barely enough time for Doutrive to put it back in for the game winner.

Lee’s high-powered motor has never been in question, maybe more so than any Arizona player. But lately it has translated more and more often into solid production.

Lee had a season-high 15 points and five rebounds against Stanford and, after taking just one shot while committing two fouls in the first half Thursday at OSU, turned around to hit all four shots he took over 15 minutes in the second half.

Without Lee’s second-half production at OSU, coming at a time when Chase Jeter bruised his knee and  Luther fouled out, Doutrive wouldn’t have even had a game-winner to make.

“His second half against Oregon State was maybe the best overall half that he’s ever played,” Miller said. “He did it on defense, he had great second shots, made big plays. What’s interesting is he had a subpar first half … (but) he put that behind him and had a big second half.”