Tucson, Ariz ? Arizona forward Marcus Williams shrugged off his contribution after scoring a career-high 27 points in the 10th-ranked Wildcats’ 83-72 victory over Oregon State on Thursday night.

“I was able to get in the right spot at the right time, and my teammates were able to find me,” Williams said. “I was able to knock some shots down that I’m supposed to knock down.”

And the Wildcats (13-2, 4-1 Pac-10) won a game they were supposed to win, handing the skidding Beavers (8-9, 0-4) their fourth straight loss. Although they played sloppily for stretches in the second half, the Wildcats bounced back from an overtime defeat at Washington State on Saturday.

The game wasn’t pretty, and neither was the aftermath. Moments after the final horn, Oregon State senior center Kyle Jeffers had a confrontation with a fan and briefly was detained by police.

Oregon State coach Jay John followed Jeffers and officers into a room off the court. Jeffers later joined teammates in the locker room and did not speak to reporters. John said his player had not been arrested.

“I am just fighting for my guy,” John said. “I didn’t see what happened. I just saw my player being taken away. I wanted to see what is going on.”

Marcel Jones scored 26 points, and Sasa Cuic added 16 to lead the Beavers, who have dropped 25 straight games in Tucson. The Beavers’ last victory in McKale Center came in 1983, the year before Lute Olson arrived at Arizona.

It was the fourth 20-point game in five starts for Williams, who also had eight rebounds. Thursday night’s outburst gave him the team scoring lead at 17.4 points per game, .6 ahead of forward Ivan Radenovic.

Chase Budinger added 16 points and 10 rebounds. At halftime, Williams, a sophomore, and Budinger, a freshman, had outscored Oregon State 30-27.

“I am not trying to jinx or voodoo on coach Olson and the program, but I doubt seriously they are going to be around for four years,” said John, a former Olson assistant at Arizona. “I was here (at Arizona) when Richard Jefferson was a freshman. At this point, from an offensive standpoint, Chase is ahead.”

The Wildcats improved to 9-0 at home this year. But they had plenty of reasons to be unhappy with the performance.

Arizona, whose 41.2 percent three-point shooting leads the Pac-10, shot only 16.7 percent (3-for-18) from beyond the arc, its lowest of the season.

And Arizona’s bench contributed little, aside from forward Fendi Onobun, who scored a season-high seven points and had three rebounds in six minutes. The starters seemed to wear down in the second half.

No. 15 Oregon 60, Arizona State 55

Arizona's Mustafa Shakur, left, and Oregon State's Marcel Jones battle for a loose ball. Arizona won, 83-72, on Thursday night in Tucson, Ariz.

Tempe, Ariz. – Aaron Brooks scored 11 of his 16 points in the second half, including a pair of game-clinching free throws with 3.6 seconds to play, and Oregon escaped with a victory over Arizona State.

The Ducks (15-1, 3-1 Pac-10) led by as many as 15 points in the second half before the Sun Devils (6-10, 0-5) rallied to cut it to three.

Bryce Taylor also scored 16 for Oregon, 12 in the first half. Arizona State’s Jeff Pendergraph had 18 points on 7-for-8 shooting and grabbed nine rebounds. Derek Glasser added 12 points but was only 4-of-14 from the floor.

Malik Hairston, back after missing five games with a foot injury, scored 13 for the Ducks, who play at No. 10 Arizona on Sunday night.

No. 19 Nevada 72, San Jose State 63

San Jose, Calif. – Marcelus Kemp scored 21 of his season-high 33 points in the first half to help No. 19 Nevada overcome the absence of forward Nick Fazekas and beat San Jose State.

With Fazekas watching on the end of the bench because of a severely sprained left ankle, Kemp took over the scoring load for the Wolf Pack (15-1, 3-0 Western Athletic Conference), who are off to the best start in school history.

Kemp scored on a wide variety of moves, including floaters, put backs, fast breaks, and most effectively on long three-pointers to help Nevada win its eighth straight overall and ninth in a row against San Jose State (1-14, 0-3).

Playing without their best post player in Fazekas, the Wolf Pack relied on the outside shot.

No. 20 Memphis 79, Houston 69

Houston – Chris Douglas-Roberts scored 16 points, Joey Dorsey grabbed 10 rebounds and blocked three shots, and Memphis beat Houston.

Jeremy Hunt added 14 and Robert Dozier had 12 points and three blocks for the Tigers (12-3, 2-0 Conference USA), who’ve won four in a row and six of their last seven.

Memphis is Conference USA’s top-scoring team, but the Tigers beat the Cougars with their defense as much as their offense, holding Houston to 43 percent shooting (26-of-60).

Memphis also dominated inside, outrebounding the Cougars 35-26 and scoring 40 in the paint, to win its first true road game of the season. The Tigers lost at Arizona and Tennessee in December.

Robert McKiver scored 22, but only five in the second half, to lead the Cougars (5-8, 0-1), who’ve lost five in a row and six of their last seven.

No. 22 Washington State 73, California 56

Berkeley, Calif. – Kyle Weaver had 14 points, a career-high 10 assists and six rebounds, and Washington State won playing as a ranked team for the first time in nearly 24 years.

Daven Harmeling had 14 points and seven rebounds and Derrick Low added 11 points and six assists – a big improvement on a season-low four-point performance in an upset of Arizona last weekend. Ivory Clark also added 14 points and Robbie Cowgill had 11 points and six boards in the Cougars’ fourth straight victory and eighth in nine games.

Washington State (15-2, 4-1 Pac-10) ended a four-game losing to Cal and avenged a pair of two-point defeats last season. The Cougars hadn’t won in Berkeley since a 55-50 victory on Jan. 4, 2004, which ended a 31-game losing streak at Cal and 22-game road skid in conference play.