EVANSTON, Ill. — The UCLA men’s basketball team avoided the kind of loss that might have sent head coach Mick Cronin over the edge.
Tyler Bilodeau scored 19 points to lead UCLA to a 73-69 victory over Northwestern on Monday night after the Bruins nearly blew a 14-point lead in the final three minutes.
Back-to-back dunks by Bilodeau gave UCLA a 68-54 lead with 3:07 remaining. UCLA then had three turnovers and a failed one-and-one free-throw attempt in the next five possessions. The Wildcats chipped away at their deficit and got within 68-65 on Ty Berry’s 3-pointer with 33 seconds left. Bilodeau then was triple-teamed and called for traveling, leading to a driving backdoor layup by Berry that capped a 13-0 run and cut the Bruins’ lead to one point.
Skyy Clark made one free throw for the Bruins with 21.7 seconds left, then William Kyle III’s steal helped the Bruins ice the win as Northwestern was forced to foul and the Bruins finished it off with two free throws from Dailey with 8.4 seconds left and two more from Clark with seven seconds left.
Eric Dailey Jr. had 12 points and six rebounds, 7-foot-3 Aday Mara had 11 points, 10 rebounds (six offensive) and three blocked shots in 16 minutes off the bench and Clark added 10 points and seven assists for UCLA (21-9 overall, 12-7 Big Ten), which kept alive its hopes for a top-four seed in the Big Ten Tournament.
Berry had 22 points and seven rebounds and shot 4 for 9 from 3-point range to lead Northwestern (16-14, 7-12), which saw its three-game winning streak come to an end. Martinelli scored 20 points, K.J. Windham added 10 points and Jordan Clayton went for seven assists with six rebounds.
There were nine lead changes in the first half and UCLA led 29-26 with four minutes left. The Wildcats got five points from Berry from there on the way to a 35-34 halftime lead.
The Bruins have won 10 of their last 13 games and improved to 8-3 in games decided by five points or fewer.
UCLA outrebounded Northwestern 38-24 but was still outscored 32-30 in the paint.
UP NEXT
UCLA closes the regular season at home against USC on Saturday at 5 p.m.