Posts tagged UCLA
Buffs Falter In Second Half, Bruins Roll To 92-74 Win
Feb 14th
By B.G. Brooks, CUBuffs.com Contributing Editor
LOS ANGELES – Colorado battled gallantly for a half and a little bit beyond here Thursday night at Pauley Pavilion. But the second 20 minutes were all UCLA as the Bruins overran the Buffaloes 92-74, halting CU’s Pac-12 Conference winning streak at three.
Up 40-36 at halftime, CU was victimized by UCLA’s 3-point shooting in a dizzying 56-point Bruins second half. UCLA (19-5, 8-3) won for the fifth time in six games while CU (18-7, 7-5) lost for a fifth consecutive time to the Bruins and remains winless (0-6) in L.A.
“We weren’t good enough in the second half, obviously,” said CU coach Tad Boyle. “We knew at halftime that we were in the game because we were making shots – we were pretty efficient offensively. Our defense wasn’t good enough all night long, and you guys know it’s about defensive rebounding. When we hit those numbers that we did against Washington the results take care of themselves.”
But in most categories Thursday night, the Buffs lost the numbers game to the Bruins. UCLA finished the game 11-of-22 from beyond the arc, including 8-of-12 (66.7 percent) in the second half. The Bruins shot 56.5 percent from the field for the night while the Buffs finished at 45.9 percent. UCLA also won the board battle by 10 (37-27) and converted 12 CU turnovers into 15 points.
“UCLA just shot the lights out in the second half,” Boyle said. “They executed, we didn’t get stops when we had to, they shot the three-ball well, and our defense wasn’t good enough and we got out-rebounded by 10. UCLA is a good team, and they pose some matchup problems for us . . . but It hurts when you know you played good enough for 20 minutes to win a game, but we have to play for 40. Some of that credit goes towards UCLA, they’re a good basketball team and they played well tonight and they made shots.”
CU had four players in double figures, led by Josh Scott’s 20, while Askia Booker added 16 points and a career-high 12 assists for his first career double-double. Xavier Johnson contributed 14 points and nine rebounds, and Xavier Talton scored 10 points.
Five Bruins, meanwhile, reached double figures, topped by Kyle Anderson’s 22 points and a career-high 11 assists. Jordan Adams (17), Bryce Alford (14), Travis Wear (13) and Norman Powell (10) were UCLA’s other double-digit scorers – but Alford’s second-half productivity separated him from that quartet.
The son of UCLA coach Steve Alford hit 4-of-5 3-pointers – all in the second half – as the Bruins took control in the game’s final 20 minutes. Bryce Alford entered the game having hit only three treys in his last seven games – and all of those came two games ago at Oregon State.
Bryce Alford, the son of UCLA coach Steve Alford (Both shown here) hit 4-of-5 3-pointers – all in the second half of the game
“Kyle Anderson is terrific, and boy Bryce Alford in the second half . . . he was on fire and feeling it,” Boyle said. “That’s what happens, he was oh-fer in our building, I think 0-for-7, but he’s a good shooter, we know he’s a good shooter and you let a good shooter get hot and you’ve got problems. It’s disheartening because this was a winnable game. But I like the way our guys fought, I liked our competitive spirit.”
For a second straight game, the Buffs were without redshirt freshman forward Wesley Gordon, who is still recuperating from ankle/knee injuries suffered when he slipped on ice last weekend. Also absent was true freshman Tre’Shaun Fletcher, who made the trip to L.A. but is not yet fully recovered from the knee injury he suffered at Washington last month.
UCLA, which last month handed CU its only home loss to date (69-56), opened by hitting six of its first nine shots and raced to a 13-5 lead. But the Buffs didn’t crumble; they responded with some of their crispest ball movement to date, launching a 25-7 run that put them up 28-10 with 8:27 left in the half.
During that surge, CU hit two of its four first-half 3-pointers – one by Johnson, the other by Booker, who finished with nine first-half points. The Buffs’ other pair of first-half treys were by Talton, who tied his seasonal high output for a half with those two. CU had made one 3-pointer in the first half of three of its previous Pac-12 road games. The Buffs finished with seven treys – their most in a road game this season.
The Buffs pushed their first-half lead as high as 12 (33-21) before the Bruins buckled down. A 13-3 run brought UCLA to within 36-34, but CU got a buzzer-beating dunk by Scott on an assist by Booker to take a 40-36 lead at intermission. Scott finished the half with 13 points as CU shot 55.2 percent from the field – its second-best mark in a league game this season – with a first-half high 10 assists (17 for the night).
With 48 first-half points in last Sunday’s 91-65 blowout of Washington, CU’s 40 points in the first 20 minutes Thursday night marked the Buffs’ most productive first halves of Pac-12 play this season. But the second half awaited, and no one believed the Bruins would roll over.
They didn’t. After tying the score at 45-45 on a basket by Adams and at 48-48 on 3-pointer by Travis Wear, they took their first lead since 15-13 on a conventional three-point play by Adams, going up 55-53 with 13:12 to play.
Then back-to-back 3-pointers by Bryce Alford shot UCLA ahead 61-53 – and after that 9-0 run, CU looked to be reeling. Alford made sure of it, draining his third trey of the second half’s first 10 minutes and sending the Bruins back to the first of two double-digit leads (68-58).
When CU crept to within seven points, Alford hit his fourth triple and UCLA regained its 10-point advantage (76-66). A three-point play by Scott brought the Buffs to within 76-71 with 6:35 remaining but they came no closer. The Bruins stretched their lead to 18 (92-74) in the final 2 minutes.
CU plays at USC on Sunday (6 p.m. MT, ESPNU) hoping to salvage a split on its West Coast trip, and Boyle underscored that game’s importance. “It is, no question (important),” he said. “We have to have a short memory but I don’t want us to put this behind us and forget about it, we’re going to learn from it, we’re going to watch some film, but we have got to bounce back.
“And again, our guys fight and they scratch and they claw and I thought we did tonight. We didn’t get beat because of lack of effort, we got beat because we played a good basketball team that executed better than we did. But, it’s important that we bounce back. USC is hungry right now and they are playing better than their record. We’re going to run into a better team than we saw in the Coors Events Center a few weeks ago and we know that.”
GAME NOTES
• Colorado lost for the fifth straight time to UCLA and remains winless in Los Angeles (0-6); CU is also 0-4 to UCLA in Pac-12 play; Bruins lead the series, 8-1.
• CU drops to 1-4 in Pac-12 Conference road games.
• CU’s 18-7 record is still the best record for CU after 25 games in four seasons under Boyle.
• Only CU’s fourth loss in 30 games when having 15 or more assists in a game under Boyle. Against UCLA: 17.
• First half shot second best FG% of the first half (55.2) … for the game (45.9FG% highest of 5 Pac-12 road games).
• Seven made 3-pointers, most made on the road this season.
Askia Booker
• First career double-double (16 points, 12 assists).
• First player since Marcus Hall to have at least 10 assists in a game (March 13, 2008 vs. Baylor).
• Third game this season where he had at least 7 or more assists in a game.
• Seventh player in school history with at least 12+ assists in a game. Last CU player with that many Joes Winston, 15 vs. Coppin State, Jan. 2 2001.
Xavier Johnson
• Scored 10+ points for the seventh straight game, against UCLA 14 points.
• Fourth straight game with 9+ rebounds.
Josh Scott
• Scored a season-high 13 points in the first half, 20 for the game.
• Sixth game this season with 20 or more points in a game (8th career).
• 11th time he has led CU in scoring this season (16th career).
Xavier Talton
• Made a pair of treys in the first half (tying season high for the first half).
• Has made 10 treys combined over the last four games.
• Scored his third game of the season with 10+ points (UCLA).
Dustin Thomas
• Made his second career start (four points, two steals).
• Season-best two steals.
Andrew Green | Assistant Director Sports Information
Buffs demonic on defense, rebound from UCLA home loss
Jan 19th
By B.G. Brooks, CUBuffs.com Contributing Editor
BOULDER – Any lingering memories of the Colorado Buffaloes’ painful loss on Thursday night to UCLA – their first home defeat of the 2013-14 season – were quickly blocked out on Saturday.
Literally, forcefully, fervently.
Swatting away seven first-half shots and setting a pedal-to-the-metal pace that produced an early 20-2 lead, No. 21 CU slapped Southern California 83-62 at the Coors Events Center.
“This was just what the doctor ordered for this team . . . this was the kind of game we needed,” CU coach Tad Boyle said, noting the timing of the win couldn’t have been better after the 69-56 loss to UCLA and knee injuries last weekend that ended point guard Spencer Dinwiddie’s junior season and shelved freshman wing Tre’Shaun Fletcher for 6-8 weeks. Both players will undergo surgery.
Gordon had a game-high eight rebounds and accounting for five of the Buffs’ blocked shots. He also scored five points, made two assists, got one steal and hit two of his three shots from the field – including his first career 3-pointer.
Continued Boyle: “I’m really proud of our guys, from the end of the bench to the guys on the floor, for the way they responded. We talked about it at halftime; the frustrating thing about the UCLA game was second-chance points (20) and points off turnovers (20 off of 17 CU errors). We had four turnovers at halftime (12 total) and they had two offensive rebounds.
“Our team took what they had not done against UCLA and did a much better job. Obviously it’s one game, we have to move on. I said this after the UCLA game and I’ll say it again, ‘Don’t count this team out.’ These guys have toughness, they have grit, and we can win some games in this league. All you can ask for in life is an opportunity and we have a great one in front of us.”
That would be a Thursday night game at No. 1 Arizona, followed by a Saturday visit to Arizona State – a pair of desert spots where the Buffs went 0-2 last season to begin Pac-12 play. But needing a win Saturday to break a current two-game losing streak and maybe reestablish some of their swagger, the Buffs did both against the Trojans – obviously a right-place, right-time opponent.
Still, junior guard Askia Booker, one of four Buffs in double figures Saturday, kept the 21-point blowout in perspective. “We can’t get drunk off of this win,” he said. “USC is pretty low in the (Pac-12) standings and we’re about to go play the No. 1 team in the country. We have to stay locked in as a team.”
The Buffs (15-4 overall, 4-2 Pac-12) finished Saturday with a season-high 10 blocked shots – six shy of the school record – and held the Trojans (9-9, 0-5) to 36 percent shooting from the field while hitting 50.9 percent of their own shots.
CU outrebounded the visitors by 20 (43-23), with redshirt freshman Wesley Gordon collecting a game-high eight rebounds and accounting for five of the Buffs’ blocked shots. He also scored five points, made two assists, got one steal and hit two of his three shots from the field – including his first career 3-pointer.
“I loved the pace of the game,” said Boyle. “Our interior defense was good, blocking shots was good (and) getting off to a 20-2 lead was a confidence builder for our guys.”
Booker called the Buffs’ shot blocking “very important . . . blocked shots lead to transition baskets and that’s where we’re at our best. We’ve got big guys who run and finish.”
USC, said Booker, was noticeably frustrated with having its early shots contested and rejected: “Without a doubt . . . their No. 10 (Pe’Shon Howard) was looking around like, ‘I can’t get a layup up without it being knocked away.’ It’s really good when we’re all locked in and getting that kind of help from the weak side.”
That’s what Booker supplied on one of the more creative and crowd-pleasing first half blocks. Booker, pushing 6-2 in his sneakers, flew in and batted away a layup attempt by Trojans 7-footer D.J. Haley. It was only Booker’s second rejection of the season – and don’t bet on him forgetting it.
“I guess it was a pretty nice block and I’ll probably go watch that again,” Booker said. “It’s not that high; it’s just a good defensive play and we need stops like that whether it’s from me or Jaron (Hopkins) or Josh (Scott).”
CU also was nearly perfect from the free throw line, hitting 19 of 22 (86 percent) with Booker hitting all six of his attempts. He finished with 13 points on three-of-five shooting and had six of CU’s 15 assists.
“He has never had a game like this,” Boyle said. “He played within himself and was efficient. When he’s efficient we’re pretty darn good; I thought he was terrific.”
Booker was one of four Buffs in double figures, topped by Josh Scott’s 20. Xavier Johnson and Jaron Hopkins added 10 points each. J.T. Terrell and 7-2 center Omar Oraby led USC with 16 points apiece.
The Buffs led by as many 18 points in the first half and were up 17 (40-23) at intermission courtesy of a Booker buzzer beater. It came on a sweet step back shot by “Ski,” but it wasn’t indicative of the first-half storyline.
CU was demonic on defense with its shot-blocking spree and holding UCLA to two points for the game’s first 8:18. At the 11:48 mark, the Bruins were one of 12 from the field (8 percent) and the Buffs led 20-2, with the final five points of that bulge coming on two free throws by Booker after a technical foul on USC coach Andy Enfield and a 3-pointer by George King.
None of the Trojans escaped the Buffs’ first-half intensity – not even Enfield. The CU student section harassed him – good naturedly, of course – with a blown up mug shot of his wife, former model Amanda Marcum. But that probably wasn’t what incited the “T;” blame the Buffs for that. There was no discrepancy of personal fouls: USC was whistled for 16, CU for 15.
Dinwiddie out for the season
Jan 13th
By B.G. Brooks, CUBuffs.com Contributing Editor
BOULDER – If the Colorado Buffaloes are to make a run at the Pac-12 Conference regular-season championship and earn a school-record third consecutive NCAA Tournament berth, it will have to be done without point guard Spencer Dinwiddie.
The 6-6 junior’s 2013-14 season is over, ended by an ACL injury that will require surgery when swelling subsides in his left knee. The injury was suffered in the first half of Sunday afternoon’s Pac-12 Conference loss at Washington, and the prognosis that the Buffs and their fans dreaded was delivered Monday afternoon when Dinwiddie underwent a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) exam.
“It’s a big blow for him . . . he’s worked so hard to put himself in the position he has and help lead this team to where we are today,” CU coach Tad Boyle said. “To have that all taken away from you in one basketball play is . . . it’s tough.”
It was equally tough, Boyle said, for Dinwiddie’s teammates: “They’re hurting. No. 1, we’ve got a close, tight-knit team. We’ve got great chemistry on this team. Guys care about each other. From that standpoint, the team’s hurting. There’s no question in my mind they’re a resilient group of guys, high-character guys. One guy goes down the opportunity for two or three more opens. We’re going to control what we can control, which is our attitude and effort every day in practice. That’s all you can do in life.”
After Sunday’s game, sophomore post Josh Scott called Dinwiddie “a big part, not the whole part, but he’s a big part of what we do. It’s just an adjustment and we’re going to have to figure out how to do that without him.”
Dinwiddie can expect a complete recovery, said Boyle, but he refrained from offering a timeline because the rehabilitation of ACL injuries differs from athlete to athlete. After receiving the news, said Boyle, Dinwiddie was “great . . . he’s controlling the things he can control – which are his attitude and effort. Get the swelling out of the knee and the surgery will happen when the doctors feel it’s appropriate. Then the rehab starts.”
Boyle credited Dinwiddie for his maturity, noting the player was “handling it very well. He’s going to be better because of it. He’s going to have a full and complete recovery. That’s the good news. It’s not a situation where he’s going to come back and be 80 percent. He’s going to be 100 percent when he comes back, whenever that is. I don’t know how long, I don’t know what the time frame is in terms of the recovery. It’s not going to be an easy rehab, but he’ll be fine.”
So, too, might be the Buffs – if they understand their top scorer and floor leader can’t be replaced by a single player. Boyle used the analogy of CU having to replace last season’s No. 2 nationally ranked rebounder when Andre Roberson declared himself eligible for the NBA Draft. The 2013-14 Buffs, said Boyle, are a better rebounding team than last season because that role has been taken on by committee.
“Everybody thought we’d have trouble rebounding because Andre’s gone, and guess what?” noted Boyle. “We’re a better rebounding team today than we were last year with the second-best rebounder in the country on our team. So everybody stepped up and everybody has to do that with Spencer out. Not one person is going to replace him . . . with everybody stepping up their game up a little bit, we can lessen the blow.”
Dinwiddie, of Woodland Hills, Calif., was CU’S leader in scoring (14.7 ppg), assists (64, 3.8 apg) and steals (26, 1.5 spg). He also led the Buffs in 3-pointers (26) and free throw shooting percentage (85.7).
In his 21/2 seasons, Dinwiddie already had worked his way into the top five in two CU career categories – No. 3 in free throw percentage (420-of-506, 83 percent) and No. 4 in 3-point field goal percentage (115-of-298, 38.6 percent). He had been recognized nationally, making the Top 50 watch lists for the Cousy, Naismith and Wooden Awards.
Boyle said the Buffs, who meet UCLA on Thursday at the Coors Events Center (6 p.m., Pac-12 Network), will focus on that game and not how they must adapt to Dinwiddie’s loss over the next two months. “What I told the team is that we don’t have to beat every team without Spencer,” Boyle said. “We have to figure out a way to beat UCLA without Spencer. That’s all we’ve got to do. Nothing changes in our preparation and in what we’re going to try to do. We’re down a man and everybody else has to step up.”
Beginning with the Bruins, the only Pac-12 opponent the Buffs have not defeated (0-2), Boyle said Dinwiddie’s injury is of little consequence to the rest of the league: “Nobody . . . really cares. They’re not going to take pity on the Buffaloes. I can promise you that. UCLA is going to come in there Thursday trying to get a road win. We’ve got to make sure we compete our tails off, scratch and claw, do everything we have to do to try to beat them.”
Figuring to share Dinwiddie’s minutes are freshman Jaron Hopkins, who already has logged more court time than any of Boyle’s first-year players, and sophomores Xavier Talton and Eli Stalzer. Said Boyle: “All three capable of taking care of the ball and getting us in our offense . . . they’re good team guys who shoot it, dribble it and pass it.
“We don’t have the star system here. Spencer was our leading scorer and leading assist guy, he led us in steals. There’s no question he was important to our team. I’m not trying to minimize this loss, but I just want our players to realize they’re here for a reason: they’re capable as well. When one guy goes down, the door opens for one, or in this case, maybe two or three more.”
Dinwiddie went down when his left knee buckled with 2:51 left in the first half at Washington’s Alaska Airlines Arena. No other player was around him. At the time, CU was leading 25-22, and Dinwiddie had scored seven points, with one assist.
At halftime, the Buffs still led 29-26, but with Andrew Andrews and C.J. Wilcox opening the second half with 3-pointers, the Huskies outscored the Buffs 6-1 in the first 2 minutes and took a 32-30 lead. CU never caught up and suffered its first Pac-12 loss of the season, 71-54.
Wilcox, guarded mostly by Dinwiddie in the first half and held to 10 points, erupted for 21 in the second half – including 13 in the first 6 minutes – and finished with a career-high 31.
In Monday’s national polls, the Buffs (14-3, 3-1) slipped from No. 15/17 to No. 21 in the Associated Press weekly rankings and No. 22 in the USA Today/Coaches Poll. CU has been ranked for six consecutive weeks in the AP poll – the longest since eight straight weeks in 1997 – and for five consecutive weeks by the coaches.
-COLORADO-
Andrew Green | Assistant Director Sports Information
