TUCSON, Ariz. “”mdash; In UCLA’s 85-74 loss to Arizona Thursday, the “ZonaZoo” seemed to not be full of Wildcats, but parrots.
Squawking incessantly, Arizona’s student section succeeded in harassing the Bruins in front of a national television audience. Junior point guard Lazeric Jones received a technical foul for an elbow to the face of junior guard Kyle Fogg. And to add insult to injury, UCLA sophomore forward Reeves Nelson received the age old “left-right” treatment as he retreated to the bench after fouling out.
“I just get a kick out of that when they try to do their little chants, so I was just messing with them,” Nelson said after the game.
Coach Ben Howland didn’t get a kick out of Nelson’s antics.
“They were very loud but they were also saying some personal things directed at certain kids that you would think would be inappropriate in some circles. … Reeves was fouling out and they’re going “left-right” which is a little kids’ things and he’s reacting to that and standing up and sitting down,” Howland said. “It’s like, ‘Come on. We’re losing. Just sit down and don’t react to the crowd.’ You shouldn’t be interacting with the other team’s crowd. That’s really immature.”
Howland said he addressed the team after the game about the issue.
“That happened to more than one of our players, which is really unfortunate at this point in the season,” said Howland of his team’s reactions. “They need to be over that by now.”
They’ll need to start acting their age, and fast if the they’re going to avoid leaving the state of Arizona winless for the second straight year.
Saturday’s throwdown in Tempe featuring the Bruins (13-7, 5-3 Pac-10) and Sun Devils (9-11, 1-7) isn’t being written off as a walk-through by UCLA coach Ben Howland.
“They are very capable of beating us tomorrow and that will be very clear to our guys,” Howland said. “They’re 1-7 but they could be 4-4. That’s how close their games have been.”
Arizona State, the Pac-10’s basement dweller, narrowly dropped a 63-61 decision to USC Thursday night and played Cal to a four-point game earlier this month.
The Sun Devils’ starting lineup consists of four guards and a forward, the tallest of which is 6-foot-7-inch Kyle Cain. They make up for this sufficiency in size by playing a disciplined, swarming zone defense.
“This is probably as good a zone as we’ll see,” Howland said. “They do a great job with the zone because they’ve been committed to it since day one.”
That zone defense is allowing 65.4 points per game, smack dab in the middle of the Pac-10.
“There’s some matching up and man-to-man principles,” Howland added. “They double the post which is something we will definitely see when Josh is in there and Reeves is in there.”
On the offensive side, UCLA will look to slow down the trio of senior Ty Abbott, sophomore Trent Locket and senior Rihards Kuksiks. They share the scoring load for the Sun Devils, though Howland highlighted Kuksiks is the Bruins’ main target. Kuksiks has battled ankle and knee injuries this season, averaging only 10.2 points per game, but Howland insists he’s the same player that lead Arizona State in scoring last season.
“He played exactly how I remember him last night,” Howland said. “He hit some big threes in that ‘SC game and they could have won that game for sure last night.”