This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

The Pac-12 clearly is a home-court basketball league this season. So even though there's some shock value in California's 20-point win over Oregon, the bigger development Thursday night may have been Oregon State's 12-point victory at Stanford.  The 62-50 win keeps the Beavers in NCAA Tournament consideration, as they've rejoined in the middle tier of the conference standings at 6-6 – which is good only for eighth place, but OSU is just one game out of fourth.  The immediate problem, of course, is the Beavers to have visit Cal. The Bears were impressive Thursday in an 83-63 dismantling of league-leading Oregon, as they led 42-24 at halftime. Jabari Bird scored 24 points for Cal, which shot 55.7 percent from the field.  Oregon (9-3) one game ahead of USC, but the Trojans (7-3) are even in the loss column as they go into Friday's game at Arizona State, followed by a Sunday game at Arizona. The Wildcats host UCLA on Friday.  Colorado, meanwhile, needed double overtime to outlast Washington State 88-81 in Boulder. The Buffaloes again are tied with Utah and Washington for fourth place. Part of that tie will be broken when Washington visits Colorado on Saturday. The standings: Oregon 9-3, USC 7-3, Arizona 7-4, Colorado 7-5, Utah 7-5, Washington 7-5, California 6-5, Oregon State 6-6, UCLA 4-6, Stanford 4-7, Arizona State 3-8, Washington State 1-11.  – Kurt Kragthorpe