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UCLA Basketball Downs Westmont, 95-59, in Exhibition
Reeves Nelson paces Bruins in exhibition contest with 20 points, 10 rebounds
from The Official website of UCLA Men's Basketball
Nov. 4, 2010
Final Stats
LOS ANGELES - Sophomore Reeves Nelson recorded team-highs of 20 points and 10 rebounds, connecting on 9-of-13 shots, to lead the UCLA men's basketball team past Westmont College, 95-59, in an exhibition game in Pauley Pavilion on Thursday night.
Junior Malcolm Lee finished with 12 points and a team-high seven assists, and sophomore Tyler Honeycutt netted 12 points and four rebounds in UCLA's first exhibition contest of the season.
Thursday's game marked the debut of heralded freshman center Joshua Smith, who collected nine points and four rebounds in the first half before exiting the game with a sprained right thumb.
UCLA never trailed against Westmont, using an 11-0 scoring run to open a 16-5 lead with 15:44 to play in the first half. The Bruins' lead swelled to as many as 29 points by halftime, when UCLA entered intermission with a 54-25 advantage. Nelson led the Bruins with 12 points in the first half.
Sophomore Preston Branson led Westmont with 16 points, and senior Dan Rasp registered 14 points and five rebounds for the Warriors.
UCLA scored 36 points off Westmont's 25 turnovers and held the visiting Warriors to 31.6 percent shooting (18-57) from the field.
The Bruins play their second and final exhibition contest against Cal State Los Angeles on Tuesday, Nov. 9. Game time at UCLA's Pauley Pavilion is slated for 7:30 p.m.
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UCLA men's basketball picks up the pace in exhibition
UCLA rolls over Westmont, 95-59, showing more of a tendency to run.
November 04, 2010|By Ben Bolch | The Interstate 10 Times
UCLA basketball fans might have checked their tickets to make sure they had come to the right place.
The Bruins scored 54 points by halftime. They pushed the pace, their coach loudly imploring his players to move quickly up the floor. They were never in danger of losing.
A 95-59 exhibition victory over Westmont on Thursday at Pauley Pavilion won't exactly send shivers through the rest of the Pacific 10 Conference. But it certainly qualified as an upgrade over the display the Bruins put on this time last season, when they suffered a near-collapse against Concordia.
It also represented a stylistic makeover for a team known for a deliberate offense.
"Everybody's running and it's pass, pass, pass," UCLA sophomore forward Tyler Honeycutt said. "We say we want to be like the Denver Nuggets or the Phoenix Suns but with more defense."
It wasn't a total run-and-gun attack. The Bruins ran off turnovers and missed shots, Coach Ben Howland coaxing them up the floor, but there were also times point guards Lazeric Jones and Jerime Anderson set up a more deliberate search for the best shot.
Sophomore forward Reeves Nelson was a favorite target of his teammates on the break, repeatedly taking passes for dunks and layups. He finished with a game-high 20 points on nine-for-13 shooting to go with 10 rebounds.
Freshman center Joshua Smith also proved to be a force inside before suffering a sprained right thumb midway through the first half. Smith had nine points and four rebounds in eight minutes before sitting out the remainder of the game. He will have an X-ray on Friday.
Westmont slowed UCLA in the second half with some zone defense, though the Bruins still would have easily reached triple digits had they not missed 18 of 21 three-point attempts for the game.
"It's not really a concern," said Honeycutt, who made only one of four three-point attempts. "A lot of it is fatigue and not having legs."
Jones, a junior college transfer imported to Westwood after Anderson's struggles last season, got the start and showed flashes of promise. He had nine points, three assists and two turnovers in 20 minutes, pretty much a push with Anderson's seven points, two assists and two turnovers in 17 minutes.
Junior guard Malcolm Lee might have had the best all-around stat line with 12 points, seven assists, five steals and no turnovers.
"All the minutes he got at the point last year are serving him well," Howland said.
One seat among the sparse crowd was intentionally left vacant and will remain that way for the rest of the season. A bouquet of yellow roses was placed in Section 103B, Row 2, Seat 1 — the spot behind the UCLA bench that legendary Coach John Wooden often occupied before he died in June at 99.
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Bruins pound Westmont, 95-59, in exhbition opener
November, 4, 2010 11:41PM PT
By Peter Yoon
ESPNLA
LOS ANGELES -- UCLA's exhibition opener Thursday night turned out a little better than last year's as the Bruins trounced Westmont, 95-59, at Pauley Pavilion.
Reeves Nelson had 20 points and 10 rebounds and Malcolm Lee had 12 points, seven assists and five steals for UCLA, which was never really in trouble against Westmont, an NAIA school in Santa Barbara.
The same couldn't be said last year, when UCLA nearly lost to NAIA Concordia in its exhibition opener.
"This was a much better game than we had at this time a year ago," UCLA coach Ben Howland said.
Freshman center Joshua Smith played only eight minutes because he sprained his thumb in the first half. He was impressive in his short time, with nine points and four rebounds on three of four shooting.
He was examined by team doctors after the game and will have an X-ray Friday, but Howland said he doesn't think the injury is serious.
"I felt it was better to not chance it and let him get ice on it right away," Howland said.
The Bruins displayed their new transition game, getting many easy baskets. They shot 53.6% form the field and 64.7% in the first half. Most of Nelson's points came on fast-break dunks.
Three-point shooting, a weakness last season, was again a problem, however, as UCLA made only three of 21 shots from long range.
"It's not good," Howland said. "But we had some good looks that we’ll normally make. We’ll shoot better than that."
Howland's big concern coming into the game was defense and he seemed to be justified. Westmont players routinely beat their man off the dribble and the Bruins held a slim 43-36 rebounding edge over the much smaller Warriors.
"We’ve got a lot of things to work on," Howland said. "We’re very very young. We’re going to make mistakes, I understand that."
But, he added, he saw enough to be encouraged.
"This team has a chance to be a very solid team in my opinion," Howland said.
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UCLA BASKETBALL NOTEBOOK: Bruins ring in new year in proper fashion
By Jon Gold,Staff Writer
Long Beach Press-Telegram
Posted: 11/04/2010 10:32:58 PM PDT
Updated: 11/04/2010 11:23:31 PM PDT
One thing is for sure.
Westmont isn't Concordia.
But maybe, just maybe, this UCLA men's basketball team is a little different from last year's version.
The Bruins, whose 2009-10 counterparts barely eked out a one-point win over Concordia in their first exhibition game last season, easily handled this year's NAIA patsy, defeating the Warriors, 95-59, to open the season.
UCLA jumped to a 54-25 halftime lead as the team's much-advertised up-tempo offense paid immediate dividends.
Sophomore power forward Reeves Nelson led the Bruins with 20 points, including 12 in the first half, as he thrived in the passing lanes in his first year at full-time power forward. Nelson had five dunks in the first half as UCLA got off to a good start with 11 first-half assists against only seven turnovers.
Westmont, meanwhile, had 13 turnovers and four assists in the first half.
Bumps and bruises
UCLA freshman center Joshua Smith, the team's most coveted post recruit since Kevin Love, suffered a sprained right thumb in the first half against Westmont and did not play in the second. He finished with nine points and four rebounds in eight minutes.
Triple dribble
UCLA will hold its third annual Dribble for the Cure event Saturday at Pauley Pavilion, with proceeds benefiting the Pediatric Cancer Research Foundation. Last year, with more than 750 participants, the event raised more than $90,000 for research. Registration begins at 8:30 a.m., and the welcome ceremony begins at 10 a.m. at Drake Stadium.
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