There were many things said after UCLA’s impressive 84-73
victory over the Arizona Wildcats on Saturday.
But one word may have said the most.
Asked whether he was surprised that his No. 14 Bruins are 19-4,
that they sit atop the Pac-10 at 9-2 and that they had just swept
the Wildcats for the first time since 1997, coach Ben
Howland’s answer couldn’t have been any more terse.
“No,” he said.
No?
But that’s the kind of attitude UCLA has displayed all
season. In spite of all the adversity brought about by injuries and
youth, the Bruins continue to succeed.
Just like they thought they would.
“Every season we come in, we expect to play well,”
redshirt senior guard Cedric Bozeman said. “We don’t
want to look at it as a surprise. We want to look at it as
that’s what we should be doing. We’re just taking it
one game at a time and we’re doing a good job.”
UCLA did such a good job Saturday, and Arizona (13-9, 6-5)
looked so inept at times ““ especially in the first half, when
the Bruins built a 50-34 lead thanks to 13 Wildcat turnovers
““ that it’s only natural to ponder a sort of changing
of the guard among the Pac-10 elite.
When Arron Afflalo became Howland’s first recruit two
years ago, he said that he considered Arizona to be the best team
in the conference. Now, with the Wildcats’ streak of 21
straight NCAA tournament appearances in serious jeopardy, that
distinction may lie elsewhere.
“I guess for the past decade or so they’ve been at
the top,” Afflalo said of the Wildcats. “I know UCLA
had been going through their struggles, but that was the challenge
of it all.”
On Saturday, it was Afflalo’s turn to present the
challenge. He finished the game with a career-high 27 points, which
included 13-for-16 from the free-throw line.
Howland said that questions regarding Afflalo’s slump were
emphatically answered by the sophomore guard, who scored 16 of his
27 in the Bruins’ monster first half.
“It feels good,” Afflalo said. “We’re
definitely going in a positive direction. I wouldn’t want to
say tonight’s win or a sweep over Arizona completes anything,
but it’s definitely a step forward.”
For much of Saturday’s first half, it was all UCLA.
Arizona’s leading scorer, Hassan Adams, who finished with 19
points, had three early turnovers and didn’t score during the
game’s first 15 minutes. Arizona coach Lute Olson was called
for a technical foul midway through the half, and the Wildcat bench
was assessed another technical a minute later.
“I guess my eyes are deceiving me,” Olson said.
“I saw their post guy move all the way out of bounds to get
Hassan, obviously a moving pick. You can be half blind and still
see that. Instead Hassan gets called for a hold.
“I did compliment the guy on the technical. It was his
first right call all day.”
A quick 8-0 to start the second half gave UCLA its largest lead
at 58-34, but Arizona crawled back into the game with its stingy
zone defense and the hot hand of Adams.
The Wildcats eventually cut the deficit to 65-58 with 7:51 to
play, but that’s the closest they would get. Afflalo’s
fourth 3-pointer of the night stretched the margin back to 10, and
he hit five of six free throws down the stretch to seal the
victory.
“They had to come back, so they had to make a run,”
Bozeman said. “We withheld it and did a good job.”
“It’s not too much physical. It’s mostly
mental. The mental part of the game is what we’re continuing
to try to get better at, and once we reach that stage, I think we
can go to exceeding heights.”
For many, it would appear that the Bruins have already reached
those heights. As for Arizona, which has now lost three straight
games for the first time since 1992, there are seven conference
games remaining to right the ship.
That’s something that wouldn’t surprise Howland in
the least.
“If you told me right now that Arizona would win the rest
of their games, that they’d really come back and be ready to
go, I don’t think it would shock anybody,” he said.
And while it’s hard to ignore the Wildcats’
struggles, it’s harder still to ignore what the Bruins have
done.
All things considered, some might call it a surprise. But not
Howland.
“That’s what’s so gratifying for me: to see
these kids fight through adversity, to step up, and to continue to
get it done,” he said.