New-look Wildcats

The Brandons each showed off a new look Thursday.

Brandon Williams teased his Twitter followers earlier in the day by Tweeting “ArmSleeveBWill,” and showed up wearing a red sleeve over his left arm. (UA officials said it was not related to an injury.)

Brandon Randolph, meanwhile, showed up with short braided hair.

And the Wildcats, as a team, wore their copper-on-red “State Pride” uniforms for the first time since they beat UConn 76-72 on Dec. 2 in Hartford, Connecticut.

#armsleevebwill and Arizona Wildcats take early warmups at Gill. pic.twitter.com/DOFKSrYrQT

— Bruce Pascoe (@BrucePascoe) March 1, 2019

Snowpocalypse, Willamette-style

Waterproof gear is always a good idea for those traveling to basketball games at OSU and Oregon, but this week was something else for the locals.

More than 2 feet of snow fell on some Willamette Valley hills Sunday through Monday while the cities were blanketed, forcing closures of schools in Corvallis and Eugene. In Corvallis, schools were closed until noon both Monday and Wednesday so the buses could get around following storms on Sunday and Tuesday nights.

There were still small piles of snow remaining outside Gill Coliseum before Thursday’s game, though the weather was a relatively balmy 41 degrees and roads were fine.

That helped about 7,000 fans show up to watch the UA-OSU game, one of two home games remaining for the Beavers while they make a push to earn one of the four first-round byes in the Pac-12 Tournament.

During his show this week, OSU coach Wayne Tinkle made it clear the Beavers needed fans to show up no matter what.

“If it’s snowing, call us and we’ll get a bus,” Tinkle said. “We need that place going because our guys feed off it and it makes it a really tough environment for our opponents.”

Little snow left to greet fans at Gill tonight. pic.twitter.com/d2vTZYnTYK

— Bruce Pascoe (@BrucePascoe) March 1, 2019

Rush-hour tipoff

But another factor conspired against Beaver fans Thursday: the 6 p.m. local time start on a weeknight.

Because OSU tends to draw many alumni and fans from cities a half-hour or farther away — such as Salem, Eugene and Portland — those fans sometimes simply don’t have the time to reach Corvallis for such an early start.

“With our fans, it depends more on date and time than who we’re playing,” OSU publicist Shawn Schoeffler said.

Because of their success this season, the Beavers are still averaging the sixth-most fans in the conference, an average of 7,630 fans. The Beavers drew a near-sellout crowd of 9,301 fans inside their 9,604-seat arena for their 72-57 win over Oregon on Feb. 16.

“It was like it was back in the ’80s and ’90s,” Schoeffler said.

Historic fixer-upper

Rather than tear down the 70-year-old Gill Coliseum, Oregon State has given the atmospheric place almost constant upgrades in recent seasons.

The latest addition this season was a set of four center-hung video screens, with the ones that face the sidelines spanning 26 feet by 14.5 feet.

Planned upgrades for next season include more bold painting, including black paint over the old murals near the ceilings, which feature coaches and star players such as Armory “Slats” Gill, Ralph Miller, A.C. Green and Gary Payton (the first).

Many of those figures are already honored in the concourses at Gill, including photos of Payton’s famed 1990 “Player of the Year” Sports Illustrated cover next to one of Gary Payton II, who led the Beavers to the 2016 NCAA Tournament … which was (maybe not) coincidentally the Beavers’ first since the first Gary Payton took them there in 1990.

Golf weather

It’s always golfing weather inside Gill Coliseum. pic.twitter.com/no9SCjpSMi

— Bruce Pascoe (@BrucePascoe) March 1, 2019

Rain, snow or shine, playing golf is never a problem inside Gill Coliseum. At least if you’re working on your short game.

One of the oddities of the 70-year-old building is the “Bud and Maxine Ossey Golf Center,” a 2,500-square-foot rectangular room adjacent to the upper concourse that is covered in artificial turf. It opened in 2013 after a construction cost of $600,000.

Before Thursday’s game, an OSU golfer was working on her stroke while basketball fans could peer in to watch through glass windows.

Uh-huh

The Gill Coliseum halftime entertainment included a “quiz” in which a fan was asked on the video board which concession item was not sold in the building: candy, nachos, tacos or popcorn.

The answer was no surprise: tacos, which the fan correctly guessed.

Senior send-off

Even though OSU’s Stephen Thompson Jr. and Gligorije “Big G” Rakocevic won’t play their final regular-season games at Gill until Sunday against ASU, the Beavers’ two seniors were already drawing attention earlier in the week.

Both of them went on Tinkle’s radio show, with Thompson interviewing Rakocevic about what he did as a kid in Montenegro (hunting, fishing and hanging with friends). The Corvallis Gazette-Times also ran a story about the close friendship between the Los Angeles-bred Thompson and European big man.

The two became friends after Rakocevic moved from Europe to work on his game while playing for Cantwell-Sacred Heart of Mary in Montebello, California, east of Los Angeles.

Rakocevic is scheduled to graduate this spring with a degree in visual media and communications, according to the Gazette-Times. Thompson graduated last spring with a degree in digital communication arts and has been working toward his master’s in interdisciplinary studies.

“He’s definitely progressed a lot as a player and a person,” Thompson told the Gazette-Times about Rakocevic. “Just to be able to see his development throughout the course of all these years has been great. A great friend, a great person off the court, so it’s definitely going to be great to share this special moment with him this weekend.”

The big number

7,000

Fans (approximately) watching Thursday’s UA-OSU game.

Quotable

STEVIEEEEE!!!!!WATCH: @FS1 #GOBEAVS pic.twitter.com/hzd3nBkN5P

— Oregon State Hoops (@BeaverMBB) March 1, 2019

“Stevie’s really helped us through some hard times, with the injuries and that sort of thing. We’ve put a lot on his shoulders. I feel he’s responded and he’s had a fantastic year.” — OSU coach Wayne Tinkle on Stephen Thompson Jr.