Tinkle turns to daughter for pointers

INDIANAPOLIS — Oregon State coach Wayne Tinkle has never been to this point in the NCAA Tournament before, not as a player for Montana in the 1980s, as an assistant and head coach of the Grizzlies in the 2000s.

He hasn’t had to look far for some Sweet 16 advice, though: His daughter, Joslyn, went to three of them with Stanford.

The two of them talk regularly, and dad was recently on Joslyn’s podcast called “Talkin’ Beavers” to discuss the remarkable run by his No. 12 seed team. The Beavers are set to face eighth-seeded Loyola Chicago on Saturday.

“She just said, ‘Your guys looked so relaxed and confident. Keep them that way,’ ” Wayne Tinkle said. “Obviously that’s a big reason they’re playing the way they are. Their minds are freed up and they’re just out there hooping.”

Tinkle’s family knows a thing or two about hooping.

Dad spent a dozen years playing professionally all around the world. His son, Tres, played for him at Oregon State and is now in the G League.

Joslyn was a McDonald’s All-American who led Stanford to 137 wins over four seasons, then played for the Seattle Storm in the WNBA and several clubs abroad. Their sister, Elle, played her college ball at Gonzaga.

Sour seeds: Four of the 16 remaining teams in this most unpredictable of NCAA tournaments are double-digit seeds, but Syracuse may be the best example of a program that throws that number next to its name out the window this time of year.

The No. 11 seed Orange, who already knocked off San Diego State and West Virginia, were also 11-seeds when they reached the Sweet 16 in 2018.

Two years before that, coach Jim Boeheim’s club reached the Final Four as a 10 seed.

“We’d like to be good in the regular season and the tournament,” he said, “but if you’re not as good as you’d like to be in the regular season, then let’s play well in the tournament. That’s what these guys have done.”