If the Bruins want to clinch a bye in the first round of the Pac-12 tournament, they’ll need to pick up some wins down the stretch.
UCLA men’s basketball (13-13, 6-7 Pac-12) will begin a three-game homestand Thursday night when it hosts Oregon State (16-8, 8-4) at Pauley Pavilion. The Bruins will also welcome the Oregon Ducks (15-10, 6-6) Saturday night in their second-to-last home game of the season.
Oregon State is tied at second place in the Pac-12 standings and sits 3.5 games behind first-place Washington (21-5, 12-1), but they hold just a one-game lead over fourth-place Utah (14-11, 8-5).
UCLA lost its first meeting with Oregon State on Jan. 13 after entering the game with a perfect 3-0 conference record. The Beavers led for over 31 minutes in the game and never trailed by more than two points.
With both schools fighting for a playoff position, interim coach Murry Bartow said he knows how crucial each remaining game will be for the Bruins – especially Saturday’s.
“If you look at the first seven or eight games in league, I thought we did some good things, we had some good wins, maybe some losses that we maybe didn’t expect,” Bartow said. “So these next two at Pauley, then the game next week against (USC), these are three important games for us if we’ve got any chance at that last spot (for a bye).”
Despite plenty of meaningful basketball left to be played, the Bruins have been struggling over the past three weeks. UCLA has lost four of its last five games, with the one win coming in overtime against California (5-20, 0-13), which has yet to win a conference game this season.
Bartow admitted the team has not been seeing the results he had hoped for, but added it hasn’t been due to a lack of effort on the players’ side.
“The guys have been great,” Bartow said. “They’ve bought into what we’ve tried to do, they’ve practiced hard, their spirit’s been good but we haven’t won as much as they would have wanted to win or I would have wanted to win to this point, but hopefully we can change some of that this week.”
After watching a 9-point first-half lead turn into a 9-point halftime deficit against Stanford on Saturday, freshman guard Jules Bernard said one way UCLA could get its season back on track is by opening games with more energy and effort.
“(Stanford) hit us early and that kind of hurt us,” Bernard said. “If we can come out early and hit the other teams in the mouth first, l think that will help us a lot.”
Freshman guard David Singleton echoed Bernard when talking about the things he has learned during his first season, and said playing with a constant sense of urgency is key to success at the college level.
“I learned you have to play with confidence, you’ve got to play aggressive because teams are trying to come after you every night,” Singleton said. “You’ve got to expect the unexpected because somebody might have a hot night, somebody might have a cold night, you just gotta be on your game 24/7.”
Every game the Bruins play from this point on will have significant postseason implications. If they fail to come out with the urgency Bernard and Singleton are alluding to, their road to the NCAA tournament will only get more difficult.
UCLA and Oregon State will tip off at 8 p.m. Thursday night.