UCLA and Arizona, long each other’s biggest basketball rivals in the Pac-12, meet again Saturday at the Footprint Center in Phoenix as newly estranged.
It will be a non-conference game. On a neutral field. In an NBA arena that wasn’t sold out by midweek.
“The whole thing is weird,” Bruins coach Mick Cronin said Wednesday of a game that always drew one of the largest home crowds of the season for each team but is now being staged elsewhere as a name, image and likeness fundraiser. The teams will meet again next season at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas and in Los Angeles in 2027 at a location to be determined.
Adding to the bizarreness is Arizona’s early season status. The Wildcats (4-4), now a member of the Big 12 Conference, fell out of the national rankings last week for the first time since November 2021 and briefly had a losing record for the first time since the start of the 2009-10 season.
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In short, they’re feeling the same kind of pain that UCLA did a year ago, amid massive roster turnover. Guard Caleb Love is the lone returning starter on a transfer-heavy Arizona roster who will look for his first quality win when he faces the No. 24 Bruins (8-1).
“They’ve had a lot of changes in their staff,” says Cronin, whose latest makeover was an early success. “But they’re still the same, nothing really different in terms of what they do offensively, the things they do and how they play.”
Cronin said Arizona’s struggles are largely a function of a brutal schedule that included Wisconsin, Duke, Oklahoma and West Virginia, not to mention a long trip to the Bahamas for the final two games.
Some statistics support Cronin’s claim that the Wildcats remain a top-25 team despite their record. According to basketball analyst Ken Pomeroy, Arizona’s offensive efficiency is No. 24 nationally and its defensive efficiency is No. 37. (For comparison, UCLA’s offensive ranking is No. 48 and its defensive ranking is No. 4.) Pomeroy projects the Wildcats to win the game, 75-74.
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UCLA is painfully familiar with Love. A transfer from North Carolina and his late barrage of three-pointers lifted the Tar Heels to a come-from-behind victory over the Bruins in the 2022 NCAA Tournament after a quiet first half. He remains an erratic shooter in his second season at Arizona, making 18 of 61 three-pointers (29.5%).
But there are other signs that the Wildcats are heading in the right direction. Forward Trey Townsend, a transfer from Oakland University, is averaging 14.5 points over his last four games after a slow start. Center Motiejus Krivas looks to be returning to form after suffering a foot injury in preseason. And guard Anthony Dell’Orso, a transfer from Campbell, has provided a reliable weapon off the bench by making 50% of his 3-pointers.
The crowd at the Footprint Center will likely lean heavily in favor of the Wildcats, but likely won’t resemble what the Bruins are used to at the McKale Center.
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“That just didn’t happen before, right?” Cronin said he was playing against a familiar opponent in unfamiliar territory. ‘You played house-and-house. But the old times, that’s why they’re called the old times.”
Etc.
Cronin on forward Eric Dailey Jr. who makes 47.4% of his three-pointers: “He’s as dedicated a player as I’ve ever coached, so [it’s] a product of… his work ethic.” … Cronin said a fundamentals breakdown by guard Sebastian Mack contributed to the failed boxout on a free throw late in the Oregon game that led to a Ducks offensive rebound and 3-pointer. “He didn’t squeeze,” Cronin said of Mack. “Little things, which are not small things, but big things.”
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This story originally appeared in the Los Angeles Times.
