TUCSON, Ariz. “”mdash; At times this season, UCLA’s defense has struggled to contain athletic forwards. Texas’s Damion James had 19 points and a game-winning dunk against the Bruins in December. USC’s Davon Jefferson exploded for 25 points to help beat UCLA in January.
Sunday, for a half at least, it looked like it might be Jordan Hill’s turn.
Hill, a 6-foot-10-inch sophomore who had been averaging 12.8 points per game for the Wildcats, was extremely effective before halftime. He had 16 points, 4 rebounds and shot a perfect 7-for-7 from the field.
But the problem, according to the Bruins, wasn’t anything Hill specifically was doing. Rather, it was the way their team defense was responding.
“(Arizona) was slipping screens early in the game, (and) they got three or four layups,” coach Ben Howland said. “We started playing screens a little differently, which helped us.”
Throughout the game, Arizona frequently ran screens with Hill to try and create space for guard Jerryd Bayless and forward Chase Budinger. In response the UCLA player guarding Hill ““ frequently Kevin Love ““ would have to briefly help cover Bayless or Budinger, until the player guarding them could recover.
Ideally, another player from the weak side, away from the ball, would help down on Hill until Love could get back. But for much of the first half that didn’t happen, or Love was too slow getting back to defend against Hill, leaving him open for a lot of dunks and short jumpers.
“I was supposed to step out and help on (either) Bayless or Budinger,” Love said. “(Hill) was getting slips on the help-side guy, and I had to get back faster. He was just getting open looks from 15 to 18 feet, and he was making them.”
In the second half the Bruins did a much better job containing Hill. They were quicker getting weak-side help, and Love stayed on Hill more closely. Hill missed his first shot of the half, and made only one more basket the rest of the game to finish with 18 points on 8-of-11 shooting.
“I needed to get back on (Hill) as quick as I could because he knocked down open jump shots,” Love said. “He played great in the first half, but we tried to contain him in the second half as best we could.”
One unintended by-product of the defensive change was that it allowed Arizona’s two leading scorers ““ Bayless and Budinger ““ more space to maneuver offensively.
Budinger in particular thrived off of the added attention the Bruins were forced to pay to Hill. With Love forced to stay home against Hill, Budinger had more room to get open shots, which helped him overcome a 0-for-7 shooting start to finish with 24 points.
“We started going under the ball screen, and when you go under the screen with a player like (Budinger), it’s easier (for them) to fade and get a shot,” Luc Richard Mbah a Moute said. “But we had to do that because we were getting no help from the weak side and we were (allowing) a lot of dunks.”