LOS ANGELES — Between celebrating Bill Walton’s memory and the potential for UCLA men’s basketball coach Mick Cronin to earn his 500th career win, anticipation was high.
Both lifetime moments were executed, as UCLA honored the late Walton with video tributes and a halftime ceremony; and Cronin earned his 500th victory. But it wasn’t easy.
The Bruins (20-8 overall, 11-6 Big Ten) overcame their shortcomings, grinding out a 69-61 win over the Buckeyes (15-13, 7-10).
The offensive malaise that hurt the Bruins in an upset loss to Minnesota on Tuesday, carried into their first Sunday game of the season, which tipped at 12:45 p.m., seemingly too early of a wake-up call.
UCLA forward Eric Dailey Jr., rose to the occasion. Dailey, who had averaged just 6.8 points over the last five games, scored a game-high 20 points, knocking down three 3-pointers and grabbing eight rebounds.
Dailey scored the first nine points of the second half, largely benefitting from UCLA’s ability to grab offensive rebounds. After a trio of missed layups, the ball found Dailey for a 3-pointer from the top of the key. He then grabbed an Aday Mara miss to score a putback layup, before curling off a screen from Mara for an elbow jumper.
Before Dailey’s eruption, the UCLA offense again looked disjointed. They run very few sets. Instead players are supposed to penetrate the lane, kick passes out to start a chain reaction, and then rely on their decision- and shot-making. When multiple players are off in tandem, they can go cold for long stretches.
UCLA didn’t score a point from the 17:01 mark to the 11:29 mark of the first half.
Throughout that stretch, though, they strung together stops and turned over Ohio State three times, but even on the transition opportunities that the defense sparked, UCLA couldn’t capitalize.
Kobe Johnson picked off a pass and threw it ahead to Tyler Bilodeau, who missed a double-clutch layup attempt. Johnson took the ball again on the next possession, but Dylan Andrews couldn’t capitalize on the other end. Mara, then, grabbed a rebound and hit a streaking Sebastian Mack, who got hit and lost the ball out of bounds.
Mack eventually lifted UCLA’s spirit. He hit a 25-foot, shot-clock bailout, to break the early slump. Then, in another late-shot clock situation, he drove and kicked to Dailey for a 3-pointer, Mack celebrating with his three fingers in the air as the shot traveled in. Mack, later, drove for a tough floater, emphasizing it with a bark at his defender.
The Bruins’ ball movement was often stagnant and its dribble-handoff exchanges were rarely clean, but their suffocating defense made up for it.
Mara was especially effective on that end, deterring Buckeyes’ guard Bruce Thornton by hedging pick-and-roll actions and coming up with a pair of blocks. While UCLA forced just nine turnovers, they held Ohio State to 31.7% from the field.
Early in the second half, when Ohio State switched into a 2-3 zone, UCLA’s offense came to life. Rather than try to create for themselves in one-on-one situations, the Bruins passed through and around the zone.
Andrews hit Skyy Clark for a left-wing three. Clark delivered a bullet through the zone to Mara for a dunk. Mara followed that up with an and-1 finger roll and Clark hit another 3-pointer from the right wing to extend the Bruins lead to 51-42.
UCLA locked in from the free-throw line, hitting 13 of 15 attempts in the second half (15 of 20 overall). Clark added another 3-pointer with 41 seconds left to help shut the door on the Buckeyes