UCLA Bruins Drop Opener to Aztecs, 73-58
After tonight, UCLA may not schedule a road game to open the season for another 35 years.
You won’t be able to tell from the final score but UCLA looked good for the first ten minutes of the game. After that, not so much.
During the first ten minutes, the Bruins dominated the Aztecs, jumping out to a quick six point lead in the first minute of play on a pair of threes from Chris Smith and Jaime Jaquez, Jr. That would be the Bruins’ biggest lead of the game, though they reached that mark four times, the last of which they had with just over 14 minutes to go in the half.
Over the next five and a half minutes, San Diego State closed the gap to tie the game, 19-19 with 8:36 to go.
If you turned the game off at that point, you really didn’t miss much other than a complete destruction of the Bruins by the Aztecs over the next 26 minutes, as SDSU turned a tie game into an 18-point Aztec lead.
In a way this might have been the opener that this Bruin team needed as it can serve as a reminder that if they don’t play hard on both ends of the floor, something like this can happen.
In the meantime, all Bruin fans can do is hope that this team doesn’t have a repeat performance of tonight.
Jaquez, Jr. led all scorers with 17 points. He finished 6 of 10 including 3 of 5 from behind the arc. Cody Riley led the Bruins with 12 rebounds while Tyger Campbell had four assists.
UCLA now stays in San Diego to face Pepperdine on Friday night.
Go Bruins.
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Not sure I would even consider this an upset. Pretty evenly matched teams and then we can't get outplayed. Cannot play with that effort if we want to compete against programs like SDSU.
Out coached in this one... but it’s first game. Hope for more focus in the future