They’re an athletic bunch and will run up and down on Alford’s crew. “We showed [our players] no tape”. “They’re a good team from what I hear”. We were soft. We were scared. “We’ll play with what we have”. And then all of a sudden it’s 24-0 and there’s no game.
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The game is scheduled to tip off at 9 P.M. Eastern time and to watch the live broadcast go here. “When you get knocked out, you might want to get back in the ring, but you’re probably still a little tentative when you got smacked, and we got smacked past year”.
Thursday night was a prime example of what the Bruins can do when it all comes together for the team. All of this ultimately led to the Bruins pulling off a big upset for the second loss by a No. 1 team already this season.
The pregame talk about UCLA trying to avoid another embarrassment couldn’t have been more wrong. The gold-clad Bruin fans hardly rolled out the red carpet, providing a raucous home crowd advantage for the Bruins, who took the lead at 4-2 and never looked back.
We did not think that Kentucky was going to get through this season undefeated at all.
Nearly a year after Kentucky reduced UCLA to dust in front of a national TV audience, the Bruins got the most cathartic possible revenge. Thomas Welsh opened UCLA’s scoring with an emphatic two-handed dunk. Tony Parker was too strong around the rim. The Bruins handed Kentucky its first loss of the season on Wednesday.
Somehow, UCLA made taking down the Wildcats look easy. Lee grabbed 12 rebounds in a game where Kentucky was missing their point guard, and John Calipari stated without Lee, Kentucky loses that game. It was the way the older Bruins beat the Wildcats to every important loose balls, outworked them for rebounds, and made shots both routine and spectacular.
At the other end, UCLA denied Kentucky access to the hoop, seducing the Cats into thinking they could survive from the perimeter alone. Freshman guard Jamal Murray had 17 points and five rebounds, but guard Tyler Ulis was held to nine points on 2-of-12 shooting.
Afterward, Calipari said Labissiere would be fine long-term, but that he had “no options” but to toughen up soon. Granted, the Wildcats don’t shoot well from the outside, but they do get up and down the floor in transition better than most teams in the country. He did not return. It lost to the Monmouth Hawks to open 2015-16, after all.
Shaquille O’Neal, Baron Davis and Jerry West sat courtside at Pauley Pavilion Thursday night, but even their combined star power couldn’t outshine the UCLA players on the court. Kentucky had not lost a regular season game since March of 2014. Perhaps it will. Maybe Thursday was a brief, joyous aberration. Why Kentucky Will Win Aside from Calipari being an all-around-better coach than Steve Alford, how about the fact that the Wildcats have forced 95 turnovers so far – something UCLA has struggled with having committed 99 turnovers.
The Bruins haven’t had much luck against ranked teams the past several years.
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“87-77”, Bryce Alford said.
