Here are 3 great Daily Bruin articles on the change happening at UCLA.
Taking the lead - UCLA Coach Ben Howland, right, and assistant Scott Garson celebrate as the Bruins pull ahead of Washington State in the second half Saturday afternoon.(Anne Cusack / Los Angeles Times / January 23, 2010)
For once, UCLA men's basketball is dominating
By Sam Allen
The Daily Bruin
Jan. 25, 2010 at 12:51 a.m.
You could feel it when the Pauley Pavilion crowd roared as time wound down in the Bruins’ 74-62 victory over Washington State on Saturday.
There is still some life in this UCLA basketball team.
Yes, this team is 9-10 overall and 4-3 in the Pac-10, and if you choose to compare it to recent teams in the past, this group falls far shorter.
But no one was thinking about those things this weekend, not while UCLA swept the Washington schools and showed some real signs of improvement.
The Bruins delivered their first dominating performance of the Pac-10 season Saturday against Washington State. They controlled the game entirely. At the offensive end, they effectively and consistently distributed quality shots.
The offensive efficiency showed up in the stat sheet. The Bruins played patiently, making 14 of their 19 field goal attempts in the second half. Reeves Nelson scored 19 points, Nikola Dragovic had 18, and Michael Roll finished with 11. Two others, Malcolm Lee and Mustafa Abdul-Hamid, finished with nine.
The UCLA defense was even more impressive. In the second game in which the Bruins featured a zone defense, they held the Cougars to 36 percent (21-59) from the field. Klay Thompson, who entered the game as the fourth leading scorer in college basketball with 22.8 ppg, was held to only 13 points on 5-17 shooting.
Howland said it was “poor coaching” to not recognize that this team needed to play a zone sooner. Now that they’ve made the switch, it’s paying big dividends. Washington State looked helpless, Thompson couldn’t find anything.
This all comes after a season-changing moment Thursday, when Abdul-Hamid sank a buzzer-beater to beat Washington, 62-61.
Clearly, the Bruins are riding momentum from that win over the Huskies, who were picked to win the Pac-10 this preseason.
Abdul-Hamid had another solid day, again providing a spark of energy for UCLA. The team’s freshmen also played confidently. Reeves Nelson tallied seven rebounds in addition to his 19 points and made seven of his 12 free throw tries. Freshman Tyler Honeycutt had eight points and eight rebounds.
And you could see the buzz on Howland’s face and in his demeanor.
The coach was flying around the court; when his players took charges, Howland leaped out toward halfcourt, clapping in his trademark, shoulder-hunched style.
“I would have jumped through the roof if I could,” Howland said. “I just love to see those guys take charges.”
Howland truly hates losing. I think people lose sight of that amid all the criticism Howland has received this year. They start to forget that Howland is one of the most intense college basketball coaches imaginable.
Abdul-Hamid tells me that Howland is more intense than anyone he’s ever met in basketball – player or coach.
We saw a bit of that Saturday, in what was probably Howland’s best coaching job of the season. Howland was fired up, and his team responded.
The question now is, can the Bruins sustain it?
They now have a golden opportunity, a rare gift from the Pac-10 schedule makers: a trip to Oregon to face the two worst teams in the conference, Oregon and Oregon State.
These won’t be automatic victories, but the Bruins have a definite chance to sweep the road trip, push their win streak to four games, and move to 6-3 in the Pac-10.
It’s hard to see any further into the distance in this crazy conference season, but there’s still a conceivable route for the Bruins to get into the NCAA tournament – if they peak in February and March and streak to a Pac-10 tournament title.
So I guess it’s fair to say one thing for sure – don’t give up on the Bruins just yet.
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Patience key to Bruins’ victories
By Andrew Howard
The Daily Bruin
Jan. 25, 2010 at 12:55 a.m.
Patience on offense.
It’s something that UCLA men’s basketball coach Ben Howland has been preaching to his young team all season long and an aspect the Bruins have struggled with.
In losses to Stanford and USC, Howland lamented how his team had a tendency to force shots early in the shot clock, resulting in low shooting percentages and poor offensive performances.
Yet in the Bruins’ two huge wins this weekend, that patience Howland has implored his players to have was clearly evident.
“We did a good job again for the second game in a row. Something I’ve been talking about a lot is being patient on offense,” Howland said.
In Saturday’s 74-62 win over Washington State in front of 8,349 at Pauley Pavilion, the patience came in the form of the Bruins taking just 19 shots in the second half and making 14 of them.
Senior forward Nikola Dragovic provided a perfect example of the type of offensive play Howland wants from the Bruins.
After struggling from the field in the first half of Saturday’s game, Dragovic rebounded in the second, making five of eight shots, including three of four from 3-point territory. Two of his 3-pointers were part of an 11-0 run that pushed UCLA’s lead from four points to 15 and put the game out of reach.
“Coach told me over the past couple weeks that I need to be patient and wait for the ball and wait for it to come to me,” said Dragovic, who finished with 18 points. “That’s what I did in the second half.”
Asked what the difference was in the second half, when the Bruins turned a three-point lead at halftime into a 12-point win, freshman forward Reeves Nelson was quick to the point.
“Nik started making shots,” said Nelson, who led the Bruins in points for the second consecutive game with 19.
Dragovic said that despite the ups and downs of shooting the ball so far this season, he has remained confident in his ability to make shots.
“As any shooter, I keep believing in myself, coach believes in myself, my teammates believe in me,” Dragovic said. “I just kept working and getting some extra shots in.”
Abdul-Hamid important to Bruins’ chemistry
The loud ovations began during the customary “Roll Call” by The Den and continued every time he entered the game.
It was quite a weekend for redshirt junior guard Mustafa Abdul-Hamid. The former walk-on shot himself from seldom-used bench player to hero with a game-winning jumper to beat Washington on Thursday.
On Saturday, Abdul-Hamid continued his strong play with eight points on three-of-five shooting in 18 minutes.
At the postgame press conference, Howland said that after back-to-back wins, he believes the team is beginning to come together as a unit and that Abdul-Hamid has played a crucial role.
“I think Mustafa’s come in and really, really played well in these last two games,” Howland said. “He’s definitely earning his keep here now as we move forward.”
For Abdul-Hamid, the most important aspect of this weekend wasn’t the game-winning shot that was the top play on SportsCenter or his increased playing time, but the fact that the Bruins may be starting to turn the corner.
“It feels good more than anything to win two games in a row,” Abdul-Hamid said.
Bruins take charges
Howland was ecstatic, walking out toward mid-court emphatically clapping his hands.
The reason for Howland’s reaction?
A charge taken by senior forward James Keefe.
For Howland, a coach who appreciates defense above anything else, seeing his players take charges stood out clearly.
“Probably the greatest thing of the whole day, beyond the win, is to see James Keefe and Reeves Nelson step up and take charges,” Howland said. “I’m telling you right now, we haven’t done that very well in the last month of these games. That is so big. I would have jumped through the roof if I could.”
Dribblers
The win was the Bruins’ first win on a Saturday this season. The team had lost its previous five Saturday games. ... UCLA improved to 7-0 this season when leading or tied at halftime.
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Momentum of men's basketball picks up after two consecutive Pac-10 wins
Improved defense, efficient offense help men’s basketball sweep Washington schools
By Eli Smukler
The Daily Bruin
Jan. 25, 2010 at 1:06 a.m.
There’s a new feeling making the rounds in Pauley Pavilion’s home locker room. It’s called momentum, and it’s a powerful force.
UCLA (9-10, 4-3 Pac-10) never trailed Washington State (14-6, 4-4 Pac-10) in its largest Pac-10 win of the year, a methodical 74-62 victory at Pauley Pavilion on Saturday afternoon. With their win over Washington on Thursday night, the Bruins have two consecutive conference wins for the first time this season and stand at second place in the up-for-grabs league standings.
After Thursday night’s dramatic buzzer-beating win over defending conference champion Washington, UCLA was looking to ride out the wave of emotion through the weekend.
“A lot of guys were still hyped off that game,” starting freshman forward Tyler Honeycutt said.
Despite using just seven players, the team’s energy was clearly visible in an improved zone defense and efficient offensive rotation, which led to open shots for the team’s primary shooters.
“Our team has to play exactly how we’re playing right now to have success,” coach Ben Howland said.
Freshman forward Reeves Nelson came off the bench to lead the Bruins with 19 points, 15 of which came in the second half, when UCLA finally pulled away from its opponent. As a team, the Bruins made 14 of their 19 shots after the break.
Senior forward Nikola Dragovic, who hadn’t made a 3-pointer in the first two games of the home stand, single-handedly raised the arena volume level in the second half with multiple crowd-pleasing shots from long range. He finished the game with 18 points on 3-for-4 shooting from beyond the arc.
The Bruins stayed in the 2-3 zone that has worked for them in all four of their conference wins and that helped to hold the Cougars to a 35.6 percent shooting average on the day, a season low for UCLA opponents.
“We’ve been practicing it more, especially last week,” Dragovic said of the defensive scheme. “I think we’re a lot more comfortable in it right now.”
Cougar freshman guard Reggie Moore was the exception; he took over his team’s scoring duties for the second straight game, nailing 6-of-10 3-pointers to finish with 24 points.
Washington State’s sophomore guard Klay Thompson, the conference’s leading scorer averaging more than 22 points a game, appeared frustrated at times, making just five of a game-high 17 field goal attempts to finish with 13 points.
Honeycutt completed an all-around impressive weekend, totaling 18 points on nine-for-10 shooting, 16 rebounds, seven assists, three blocks and four steals over the two games. Howland attributed Honeycutt’s play under the basket on defense to better numbers on the boards.
“He’s a long, active pogo stick that goes up ... and gets rebounds,” Howland said. “Being down there along the baseline a lot because of where he’s stationed in our zone really has helped us be a better rebounding team.”
Redshirt junior guard Mustafa Abdul-Hamid, who nailed the game-winning shot against the Huskies on Thursday night, was given a warm welcome by the Pauley fans when he came off the bench in the first half.
He didn’t disappoint the home crowd, giving the Bruins eight straight points in two minutes in the first half with three deep jump shots to beat the rotation of Washington State’s zone defense.
“Mustafa gave us a big lift off the bench,” Howland said.
Washington State, who came back to beat USC at the Galen Center on Thursday night, has now split each of its Pac-10 weekend sets this year going into its rivalry game against Washington next Saturday.
UCLA now heads to Oregon in an attempt to continue its winning streak against the bottom two teams in the conference.
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