Friends in the Den looked up at me as they walked out of Pauley Pavilion, people texted me, everyone wanting an answer to the same question.
How did that happen?
How could the beloved Bruin basketball team fall in its very first game, to lowly Cal State Fullerton?
OK, so the language wasn’t always that pretty. But the idea was the same ““ there has to be some secret reason why the Bruins are so bad right now.
Everyone’s trying to wrap their heads around this loss, and I guess they thought the Daily Bruin basketball columnist knew the secret.
Here’s my answer: The secret doesn’t exist.
This isn’t a great mystery. There’s no single player to blame. Coach Ben Howland is not guilty of some hidden gaffe.
The Bruins are not a good basketball team right now. They are trying desperately to improve. So far, their efforts have been completely unsuccessful.
The best question is, how will they respond?
Every single player on the team faces adversity today, the first day of practice since the loss to Fullerton. UCLA needs every player on its team to improve.
Start with the backcourt, sophomore guards Malcolm Lee and Jerime Anderson. Both struggled badly against Fullerton.
The release point of Anderson’s shot looked off. He couldn’t sink his free throws. He finished 1-11 from the field. Zone defenses will have a much easier time against UCLA if he can’t occasionally drain a jump shot. He really needs to work on that.
Lee just tries to do too much. It’s almost like he drinks too much Red Bull before the game. Maybe it’s the pressure of the shooting guard position and of being the top scoring option on this team. Before the season I thought he could blossom like former UCLA guards Russell Westbrook and Arron Afflalo. I still think he can, but he needs to play more under control, and concentrate on finding the right moments to shoot instead of jacking up 23 shots like he did against Fullerton.
Speaking of jump shots, did anyone count how many front rims Nikola Dragovic hit against Fullerton?
I wish I’d kept track. It seemed like every time Dragovic fired one up, the ball fell a few inches short and clanged off the front of the rim. That’s exactly what happens to jump shooters when they fatigue and lose strength in their legs.
Dragovic is a senior so it’s surprising that he would play so poorly. He hit only two of his 14 field goal attempts against Fullerton, an abysmal 14 percent rate.
The Bruin freshmen, on the other hand, just need to eliminate their rookie mistakes.
Freshman forward Reeves Nelson played well Monday, but he made a couple careless errors that really seemed to irk Howland. On one play in the first half he threw a careless inbounds pass, straight to a Cal State Fullerton defender. He wasn’t even supposed to inbound the ball on that play, Howland said.
Howland also yelled at Nelson after he committed a bad foul going for a steal near half-court.
Guard Mike Moser, the only other freshman who played Monday, also needs to clean things up. He committed a quick turnover almost immediately after entering the game.
Howland said he should have played the freshmen more, but it’s hard to justify the minutes when the game is close and they are liable to make mistakes like that.
Then there’s Michael Roll.
The crazy thing is Roll actually played really well Monday. He created open looks for his teammates, and knocked down clutch shots to keep the Bruins close.
But the senior couldn’t seal the deal.
He missed a crucial free throw in regulation that probably would have clinched the game, and then missed the last shot in the second overtime.
Afterward, he was the first Bruin to show up at the press conference. He didn’t really look for an excuse.
“I messed up,” he said.
He then promised he would be practicing free throws more in practice the next day.
He was speaking for himself, but he could have said the same thing for his entire team.
Right now, the Bruins need to stop trying to explain their horrendous first weeks of the season. They just need to get better.
E-mail Allen at sallen@media.ucla.edu.