Arizona Beats UCLA By Shooting 53% to 40%

The better coached team won with Arizona beating UCLA 78-75.  UCLA showed there was not much of a talent gap and kept it close despite playing one on one most of the night.

The first half was a bit shocking.  UCLA won the boards with Kyle leading with 5 defensive boards and Tony Parker with 5 offensive rebounds.  Tony was a beast on offense with 8 points as well to lead the Bruins.  UCLA forced four more turnovers.  So how was UCLA down 42-38?  Arizona passed much better while UCLA relied on individual effort.  Arizona played good defense and held UCLA to 39% shooting while the UCLA defense gave up a number of wide open threes to Gabe York and open dunks.

The second half showed two things for the first 14 minutes.  1.  Why Arizona is number one, good interior passing and great defense.  2.  That UCLA has the talent to play with almost any team but they are going to lose most second halves against better teams because they can only win if the game is fast and they are creating turnovers.  If UCLA can't get steals and run, their offense is in trouble.  And their D, ugh.

But then Arizona started turning it over and Arizona got tight on offense in the last four minutes, as Bill Walton said Sean Miller put Arizona in a prevent offense.  Gordon helped by missing the front end of back-to-back one and ones.  UCLA went on a 13-0 run to tie the game at 68-68 with the ice cold Jordan Adams hitting a three to tie.

At the end Nick Johnson hit a couple shots and Adams remained cold missing an open three to tie it.  The UCLA players fought to the end.