On a night when they were not shooting well and were getting badly outrebounded, the UCLA men’s basketball team found a way to will themselves to a thrilling victory over the No. 9 ranked Michigan State Spartans, 63-61at Pauley Pavilion on the UCLA campus. With the score tied at 61-61, forward Eric Dailey, Jr. drove to his left and hit an off-balanced bank shot in the lane over two defenders with 7.5 seconds left for the win.
The Spartans had a chance to tie or win the game in the final seconds, but Michigan State guard Jaden Akins was short on a three-point jump shot at the buzzer. The victory extended the Bruins winning streak to six games and improved their season record to 17-6 overall and 8-4 in the Big Ten conference. UCLA head coach Mick Cronin was pleased that his team had 19 points off of turnovers, to 4 points off of turnovers for Michigan State.
That was the second straight loss for the Spartans, who dropped to 18-4 for the season and 9-2 in the Big Ten conference. Both losses were in Southern California. On Saturday the Spartans lost at USC, 70-64. Michigan State head coach Tom Izzo was not happy with the effort his team gave at USC. On Tuesday night against UCLA, it was just about playing smart.
“Well, I’m not sure we deserved to win the game the way we played in the middle of it, Izzo said. “I said after USC we didn’t play as hard as we normally do, we turned the ball over a little too much, and we missed a lot of free throws. Here I thought, against Mick’s team, because he’s a hell of a coach, he does a hell of a job, we competed, we made our free throws, we turned the damn ball over 16 times compared to their three and that was the difference in the game.”
The Bruins did win the turnover battle 16-3 and that turned out to be the difference in the game, but Michigan State beat up the Bruins on the boards, outrebounding UCLA 45-27, and 14-8 on the offensive boards. Rebounding is an area of concern for the Bruins and an area that the Bruins need to improve in.
“I knew what we were going to get tonight, with them coming off of their first Big Ten loss,” Cronin said. “They came out ready, I knew Coach Izzo would have them ready. But the story of the game is one stat, points off turnovers. We only had three turnovers. I told the guys, if we get to the NCAA tournament and we play every game with three turnovers, we’ll cut the nets down.”
The Bruins took an early 3-0 lead on a three-point shot by Dailey, the Spartans then went on a 15-5 run to take a 15-8 lead with 14:21 remaining. The Bruins, behind the hot shooting of point guard Skyy Clark, came back to take a 35-28 lead at halftime. Clark had 13 first half points and two terrific assists, the first a lob to center Aday Mara for a highlight dunk, and the second penetrating the lane and kicking out to guard Lazar Stefanovic for an open three-point jump shot.
Clark was the best player on the floor in the first half at both ends of the court. Unfortunately, in the second half, he scored just one point. After extending their lead to 48-37 with 15:12 remaining in the game, the Bruins went cold and struggled to score the rest of the game.
The Spartans rallied to take a 59-58 lead over the Bruins with three minutes remaining in the game. Guard Dylan Andrew rebounded a missed layup by Adkins, fired a pass to Clark, who whipped a cross-court pass to a wide open Stefanovic, who nailed a three-point shot, giving the Bruins a 61-59 lead with 2:50 remaining. Those were the only three fast break points the Bruins had on the night.
Spartan forward Jaxon Kohler tied the score at 61-61 on a layup off an offensive rebound with 2:05 remaining in the game. Neither team scored again until Dailey hit his game winner with 7.5 seconds remaining.
“We missed layups, we missed free throws, and we couldn’t make a shot to save our life in the second half,” Cronin said. “But we won anyway. That’s what I try to build into these guys, and I try to build it as a character thing for their lives. When life doesn’t go the way, you want it to go, they’re still going to be successful and still make it through the tough times. When shots go in and your life’s easy, it’s all gravy. When it gets tough is when you find out. Michigan State made it tough on us.”
The Bruins will be back in action at Pauley Pavilion in Westwood on Saturday, February 8 to take on the Penn State Nittany Lions. The game will begin at 1:00 pm and will be shown on the Big Ten Network (BTN). Penn State has a record of 13-10 on the season and has lost 8 of their last 9 games, all against Big Ten opponents.
With their current six game winning streak, the Bruins are currently the hottest team in the Big Ten Conference. They cannot afford to look past the Nittany Lions, who beat conference leader Purdue earlier in the season. After the Penn State game, the Bruins will return to the road with games at Illinois and Indiana.