Postgame Talk: UCLA Lets Off the Gas Pedal in 84-70 Victory Over Idaho State

A bit of a progress check after five games.

Eric Dailey Jr. and Kobe Johnson (Photo credit: @UCLAMBB)

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The easiest way to look at this UCLA game is this: UCLA raced out to a 28-point lead with eight minutes remaining in the game and simply stopped trying, allowing Idaho State to claw its way back to a respectable loss. Really, that’s probably the correct way to look at this, especially against an opponent that the Bruins outclassed and were never a real threat to pull off the upset. UCLA won 84-70, and that score is not indicative of how good the Bruins looked for the majority of it.

The harder way to look at this game is to start to point at some flaws with this current team and wonder if there are fixes. Through five games, UCLA has shown flashes of being a very good, even great team, but there are a lot of consistency issues that are holding this team back. Five games seem like a good time to get an early check on how the various parts are jelling together.

Let me start with the returning players: Dylan Andrews, Sebastian Mack, Lazar Stefanovic, and Aday Mara. I think three of those four look much improved this year, with it being hard to say whether Andrews is improved just due to an injury stunting his start to the season. Mack looks much more confident in a reduced role, showing a better grasp of his defensive capabilities and sounding more like a leader. Same thing with Stefanovic, though he has seen increased play thanks to Andrews’s injury; Stefanovic isn’t being asked to create nearly as much as last year, and he’s thriving in this role. Aday Mara has looked much stronger and in-shape compared to last year, though he is prone to poor play at times still (as we saw in this game which led to only two points). If anything, the play of these four stands as a great recruiting tool for getting players to come in and develop under Cronin and his staff.

Moving on to the new players, the early standouts are Tyler Bilodeau, Eric Dailey Jr., and Trent Perry. Bilodeau does not seem surprising in this aspect; it was no secret that Mick Cronin coveted Bilodeau and his scoring ability, and that has been showcased early on through UCLA’s opening stretch. He’s also playing better on the defensive end, though it remains an open question whether he can hold up playing against opposing posts for an entire season. Trent Perry has the pedigree to be a good player, but it has been a happy development that he already looks ready to be a reliable rotation piece off the bench. Perry has shown heady play during his minutes, not trying to do too much but always making winning plays, which shouldn’t be a surprise given that he came from a winning high school program.

Eric Dailey Jr. has been the biggest surprise on this team. Dailey really felt like a developmental addition to this last recruiting cycle, a toolsy player that was still developing and would get a year of seasoning in before being unleashed on teams in 2025. Instead, he has made himself indispensable in the early going, averaging 11.0 PPG and 6.5 RPG, both good for second on the team behind Bilodeau. He’s also been an excellent defender to this point, and of everyone on the team, he seems tailor-made to be this team’s version of Jaime Jaquez, by which I mean the unheralded incoming player who makes themselves into the most important player on the court by the end of the season.

I’m close to including William Kyle III in this group as well. His first few games were not very good, but he has steadily improved in the games since as he gets more and more comfortable at this level. There was a lot of hype surrounding Kyle in the preseason, and while he has not played at that level yet, you can see the world where he gets to that level. I thought he had a solid game here, with a few mistakes but good effort.

And then we get to the three problems so far. I’m going to start with Kobe Johnson, because in his case he hasn’t been playing poorly, but rather is trying to do way too much on defense and is needlessly gambling, leading to poor team defense as a result. With Johnson in particular, you can see he still has a ton of bad habits from his years playing under Andy Enfield that need to be worked out of his system. This game seemed to be the start of that process, as Cronin hit Johnson with the quick hook repeatedly for his mistakes, and Johnson, who has been the team leader in MPG so far, played only 15 minutes as a result.

Dominick Harris is an easy case. He’s a shooter who isn’t shooting well to start, and his situation meant he’s still getting up to speed with Cronin’s offense and defense. There are moments where Cronin is clearly trying to get him going, such as against Lehigh last week, but in this game, Harris barely saw the court. I think UCLA at his best requires Harris to have a positive impact on each game, so it would be helpful to see him round into form sooner rather than later.

Last, and maybe most importantly, is the continued poor play of Skyy Clark. Clark has been playing a ton of minutes between being named a starter and Andrews missing games with injury, and he has not risen to the moment. Clark has been the weak link on the defensive end, lacking in size and athleticism compared to his peers and is seemingly getting targeted by opposing guards (watching him get bullied by Idaho State in this game was distressing to say the least). On the offensive end, Clark simply isn’t producing enough to overcome his poor defense, let alone justify his large minutes load. UCLA has guards who have been playing much better than Clark (Mack and Perry, with Harris maybe getting there with more consistent time) and I’m wondering just how long Cronin’s love affair with Clark can withstand the net negative he is currently. If Andrews gets back to full speed, I expect we will see a reduction in Clark’s role. In fact, we already started to see this, with Andrews and Mack starting the second half instead of Clark and Stefanovic, which may be an indication of a sea change going forward.

But these are all just thoughts I had rattling around in my head after sitting in Pauley Pavilion for another game against a cupcake. UCLA still has a few more of these games to iron some things out, and if I had my way, you’d see the following changes:

1. Andrews put back in the starting lineup (if healthy) for Clark, with Perry or Mack starting at guard alongside him in place of Stefanovic.

2. Quicker hook for Johnson until he develops better habits.

3. More playing time for Kyle and Mara so they can develop into 20+ minutes a game combined.

4. Play more Harris, if only to see if he can positively contribute.

But, again, the point of these games is to identify problems and start working to correct them before they consume the team in bigger games. UCLA has a higher floor this year compared to last year, so this game was never in doubt, but there are some things to fix.

Go Bruins!