Oh My! Shorthanded Bruins Get Crushed by Southern Cal, 66-48
Oh My! Shorthanded Bruins Get Crushed by Southern Cal, 66-48
UCLA was missing both Cody Riley and Jalen Hill tonight against the Trojans.
The casual UCLA fan who tuned in tonight to watch the Bruins’ game against Southern Cal might just have thought that Steve Alford was still the team’s head coach. That’s how bad tonight’s game was.
To be sure, the Bruins were missing both Cody Riley and Jalen Hill tonight. Riley is currently out with an ankle injury while Hill missed the game due to “personal reasons” as the ESPN announcing crew of Dave Pasch and Bill Walton reminded viewers about every ten seconds. And, they needed to do that because the Bruins were playing that bad.
UCLA was able to keep the game close for the first fourteen minutes or so in the first half. Things started off well enough for the Bruins. Johnny Juzang got the first bucket of the game to give UCLA a 2-0 lead, though, the Trojans tied it on the next possession. Jaime Jaquez, Jr. made a layup allowing the Bruins to re-take the an early lead and a Tyger Campbell jumper made it 6-2.
But, then, UCLA ran out of gas.
To be fair, they kept it close for a while and only trailed by three, 21-18, with six minutes left in the half but, when you only score once in those six minutes, your opponent is going to take advantage — and the Trojans certainly took advantage of that situation. Southern Cal knocked out not one, not two, but three three-pointers to quadruple their lead with a minute to go. The Bruins’ only answer was a Mac Etienne layup with 43 ticks left on the clock. As a result, Southern Cal led UCLA 30-20 at the break.
In the second half, the Bruins managed to cut the lead to seven points three different times, but the last time came with 13:11 left when Juzang hit a jumper and was fouled by Mobley. Juzang’s free throw made it 41-34.
Over the final thirteen minutes, the Trojans outscored the Bruins, 25-14, crushing whatever fight UCLA had left.
Juzang was the only Bruin to score in double figures. Jaquez, Campbell and Jake Kyman off the bench each added seven points. Juzang also led the team with 13 rebounds and tied Campbell for the lead in assists. Each player had four.
Meanwhile, Ethan Anderson came off the bench to drill five three-pointers for the Trojans to lead them with 19 points while Tahj Eaddy added three more from behind the arc, finishing with 16 points. The Mobley brothers didn’t score a lot of points for the Trojans, but Isaiah grabbed 11 rebounds while Evan had nine boards with four blocks.
It’s really easy to say that the Bruins lost because they were missing Hill and Riley. But I’ve got to say that the duo may have just made this one less ugly. It was a big reminder that we are still just a little over two years removed from having Steve Alford coaching the squad.
Mick Cronin needs to do a better job of having his team prepared to play with or without Riley and Hill. There really isn’t much else to be said about this one.
Go Bruins.
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It was a shitshow. They better sweep the Washington trip or they'll be in trouble.
UCLA’s record is far better than UCLA’s actual ability. I do think this team has potential to be better than they’ve shown the last month. Even before this game, several players have regressed this season and that’s the real concern for me. Hill has completely given up and doesn’t care. His attitude has shown. Jules try’s hard, but he’s clearly a worse player mid season then he was in the beginning. Singleton has again lost his shooting touch. Tyler’s assist to turnover ratio continues to head in the wrong direction. Juzang is no more consistent now then he was during the rest of his career and yet he’s allowed to shoot 21 shots? Jaquez hustles, but he’s just not quick enough or talented enough.
On defense, the team is still in the mid 70’s in efficiency. That’s shocking for me coming from a typically efficient defensive coach. I guess it’s about as shocking as Steve alford having a poor offensive efficiency team. For all fairness sake, mick is nothing like Steve alford in any way. He’s a solid coach. I’m happy to have him over alford any day of the week.
I still think that mick needs some 5 star players. The current set are never going to amount to a top ten team even with Chris smith there. With 3 and 4 star players you’re going to get massive inconsistency and this is a game that highlights a UCLA teams inefficiencies. UCLA is extremely lucky to have avoided two games with Oregon as they would have been destroyed like the usc game.
Again, I like watching these games more than the alford years. However, I’m still not excited about UCLA basketball. If UCLA don’t land at least one more 5 star for next year, then it will be another year of the same. The recruiting has to get better, or mick will need to be shown the door