Although sluggish at times to start the game and at times in the second half when we let up, UCLA took care of business and beat CSLA 84 to 59. After 45 points in the first half, we started hitting threes in the second half (6-9 in second half) but were out scored in the second half. (Both exhibition games games we have let up in second half but we had big leads.)
On a night when we were playing with 8 scholarship players and one of them, Josh Smith, with one hand, everyone contributed but three stood out:
Brendan Lane had a great first half on offense when he led us in points and assists. He scored on the break and with our first three. He also had some nice short jumpers.
The second half at times was the Tyler Lamb show. He pumped faked CSLA out of the building, hit a three and finished great.
The third key player was Tyler Honeycutt. With Smith having one hand and Nelson out, TH picked up the slack with 15 defensive rebounds and it seemed like more. His rebounding limited CSLA to one shot often and helped lead our break. Tyler also brought the ball up the court many of those times.
More players reviews after the jump.
Josh Smith is impossible to miss. For such a big guy he is not scared to get on the floor and dove after balls. He made some nice plays but a few bad fouls. This time he played a big physical guy but CSLA had no answer
Malcolm Lee's dreaded cramps came back. He looked good in the first half.
Jermie Anderson played two guard some this game. He hit two nice in rhythm threes.
Antony Stover is relatively fast and gets up and down the court well. It will be interesting to see how he does against someone with some weight. He may turn out to be a better help defender than M2M defender.
Last but not least was Lazeric Jones who again started at PG. He had his moments and seemed to be the PG when JA was also in the game.
But Jones and Anderson bring up an interesting point, pun intended. It seems we are going to be a team that runs first through TH or ML and that the PG is not going to lead in assists but his main job is to bring the ball up in the set offense. It will be interesting to watch develop.
Can't wait for the real games to begin. Go Bruins.