UCLA Bruins at Washington State Cougars Preview and Game Thread

This evening, the UCLA Bruins travel to Pullman, Washington to face the Washington State Cougars in the only meeting between the teams this season. Tonight’s game should be only of UCLA’s easiest games of the season.

That’s because the Cougars are one of the worst teams in the Pac-12 Conference this season. How bad are the Cougars? They’re so bad that I don’t understand why any school would employ Ernie Kent as their coach. While Kent was out of coaching between 2010-11 and 2013-14, he still hasn’t has a winning season since 2008. That includes four seasons at Washington State prior to this season and his last two season at Oregon. I’m tempted to say that Kent makes Steve Alford look like John Wooden, but the problem with that is that Kent did actually take two of his Oregon teams to the Elite Eight, which Alford has never done.

So far this season, Kent’s Cougars are 8-12 overall and just 1-6 in the Pac-12. Looking at the teams the Cougars have beaten, it’s hard to pick one as their signature win, but if I absolutely had to, I guess I’d say it was their win over CSUN. Their only Pac-12 win came against UC Berkeley two weeks ago.

One of the reasons UCLA should cruise tonight has to do with the Cougars’ size. While Washington State will likely start a lineup consisting of three forwards and two guards, their biggest starters are senior forward Robert Franks and junior forward Jeff Pollard. Both guys are listed at 6’9” tall. That means that Moses Brown will have a four-inch advantage over whichever one lines up on him. With the Bruins’ size advantage stretching beyond just Brown, UCLA should control the boards on both ends of the floor tonight.

The Cougars’ third forward is freshman CJ Elleby, who’s averaging 16.1 points per game. That makes him Washington State’s second best scorer behind Franks who’s averaging 21.2 ppg. The Cougs have a pair of guards who really aren’t contributing as much as they should be in senior Viont’e Daniels and junior Ahmed Ali, who are averaging 7.4 and 7.8 points per game, respectively.

Listen to the Game Here on BN!

This season, we are proud to, again, have today’s audio feed for everyone who opts to use the TuneIn player embedded below. For optimum results, start the audio feed then pause your DVR and sync them up together. Tonight’s game is on Pac-12 Networks with Roxy Bernstein and P.J. Carlesimo on the call. If you would rather listen to Josh Lewin and Tracy Murray call tonight’s game, you can do that right here.

Join your fellow fans discussing today’s game below.

This is your UCLA Bruins at Washington State Cougars game thread.


Go Bruins!!!