Bittle, Oregon pour it on in second half to throttle Omaha 80-57

EUGENE, Ore. (AP) — Nate Bittle scored 14 of his 26 points before halftime and Takia Simpkins scored 15 points and Oregon beat used the second half to subdue Omaha 80-57 on Sunday night.

Jackson Shellstead scored 13 points and Sean Stewart grabbed 13 rebounds for Oregon which was coming off a 91-82 road loss to No. 7 Gonzaga on Dec. 21.

The Ducks have won three of four.

Tony Osburn scored 18 points for Omaha.

Oregon (7-6) appeared poised to make it a blow out early when it raced to an 18-5 lead seven minutes into the contest. But Omaha (7-8) responded with a 12-2 run and capitalized on an almost four-minute scoring drought to pull within 20-17.

Oregon stretched its lead countering with a 7-2 run to make it 27-19 on Takai Simpkins' tip-in with 5:57 before halftime. The two were all-but even from there before Wei Lin buried an on-the-run 3-pointer from just inside the mid-court line as time expired to give the Ducks a 39-29 advantage.

The Ducks opened it up shortly after the break with a 17-4 outburst resulting in 59-41 lead with 10:09 left and led by double digits for the remainder.

It was only the second meeting between the two. Oregon won the first game 84-61 on Dec. 8, 2018 in Matthew Knight Arena.

Omaha begins Summit Conference action when it travels to play South Dakota State on New Year's Day.

Oregon will resume Big Ten Conference play when it travels to face Maryland on Friday.

___

Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here and here (AP News mobile app). AP college basketball: https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-basketball-poll and https://apnews.com/hub/college-basketball