{"id":354647,"date":"2025-11-04T09:10:14","date_gmt":"2025-11-04T09:10:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/354647\/"},"modified":"2025-11-04T09:10:14","modified_gmt":"2025-11-04T09:10:14","slug":"mick-cronin-goes-on-rant-after-uclas-dull-season-opening-win","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/354647\/","title":{"rendered":"Mick Cronin goes on rant after UCLA’s dull season-opening win"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It was the sort of postgame rant that Mick Cronin<\/a> usually saves for a bad loss at a time when he\u2019s trying to swing a season back in the right direction.<\/p>\n

This one came after a victory in the season\u2019s first game.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s how few positive takeaways there were for UCLA<\/a> on Monday night on its home court.<\/p>\n

Having beaten two quality opponents in exhibition games, the 12th-ranked Bruins struggled mightily in a game that counted against a team from the Big Sky Conference.<\/p>\n

Most of the problems came on the defensive end.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s so many mistakes,\u201d Cronin said after his team held on for an 80-74 victory<\/a> over Eastern Washington at Pauley Pavilion, \u201cI\u2019d like to fire myself for our defense.\u201d<\/p>\n

UCLA kept getting beat around the basket, giving up 38 points in the paint. The Eagles met so little resistance that they shot 53.7%.<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, if you think you\u2019re going to give up 53.7% in your own gym in a buy game and have a good year,\u201d Cronin said, \u201cyou have no chance.\u201d<\/p>\n

Eastern Washington\u2019s upset hopes lingered until point guard Donovan Dent<\/a>, making his UCLA debut after transferring from New Mexico, pulled down a rebound and scored on a fast break to extend the lead back to double digits with 30 seconds left.<\/p>\n

Cronin said he sensed this sort of showing coming given the way his team reacted to its exhibition victories. The Bruins scored the first 17 points while beating San Diego State on the road and held a 43-point lead on the way to a blowout of UC Irvine.<\/p>\n

\"Eastern <\/p>\n

Eastern Washington guard Straton Rogers (12) shoots a layup as UCLA guard Jamar Brown (4) and forward Tyler Bilodeau (34) defend during the first half Monday at Pauley Pavilion.<\/p>\n

(Ethan Swope \/ Associated Press)<\/p>\n

This was very different.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you have the wrong attitude in life, it shows up,\u201d Cronin said. \u201cBut I blame myself because I knew this was coming tonight and I couldn\u2019t stop it, so I failed miserably.\u201d<\/p>\n

What did Cronin do to try to stop it?<\/p>\n

\u201cFilm, speeches, went off in shootaround today about intensity and [how] pros show up every day,\u201d Cronin said, \u201cyou know, Nick Saban 101 \u2014 the process is more important than the opponent \u2014 but I lost them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dent said the team had good energy in practice and the pregame shootaround before things changed, the Bruins expecting a repeat of their exhibition results.<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, we kind of came out with the mindset like we\u2019re gonna come in and just blow them out,\u201d Dent said. \u201cI think that\u2019s kind of what caused this game.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t a total loss.<\/p>\n

Dent unveiled an impressive array of moves, including a no-look pass leading to a Xavier Booker dunk and an ability to change speeds that left defenders baffled. Dent finished with 21 points and nine assists and forward Tyler Bilodeau scored 14 of his 19 points in the second half on a night the Bruins played without forward Eric Dailey Jr., who continues to round into form from a knee injury.<\/p>\n

But few will remember any of that given what happened on the other end of the court.<\/p>\n

What were the biggest issues defensively?<\/p>\n

\u201cA lack of adherence to the scouting report, terrible pick-and-roll defense, help when we shouldn\u2019t, rotate off the best shooter to a non-shooter, post defense embarrassingly terrible \u2014 and those are all coaching, defense is coaching,\u201d Cronin said. \u201cEverybody says, \u2018How are you going to get this guy to play defense?\u2019 Well, the reason I\u2019m in my 23rd year and I\u2019m the coach at UCLA, I\u2019ve been able to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

Cronin praised guard Jamar Brown for making eight deflections \u2014 steals, blocks, tipped passes or loose balls collected \u2013 on a night the Bruins only collected 28 as a team, well below the threshold of 40 that their coach wants in any game.<\/p>\n

Otherwise, there wasn\u2019t much to praise. Cronin said he had a plan if this continued.<\/p>\n

\u201cListen, we\u2019ll just bench guys. We\u2019re going to play defense or you don\u2019t play,\u201d Cronin said. \u201cIt might have to take somebody blowing an assignment one minute into the game and then they don\u2019t play the rest of the game.\u201d<\/p>\n

Making UCLA\u2019s effort all the more embarrassing was who it didn\u2019t have to defend.<\/p>\n

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The Eagles played without guard Andrew Cook, a preseason All-Big Sky selection from Huntington Beach who averaged 16.1 points last season but is expected to be sidelined for the entire season after recently breaking an ankle in practice.<\/p>\n

Even while navigating Pauley Pavilion on a scooter, Cook was able to get some shots up pregame, rolling his way out underneath the basket and making a pump-fake before converting a layup.<\/p>\n

Given the way things went, he might have been able to score on UCLA\u2019s defense.<\/p>\n

What happens next for a team with Final Four aspirations that looked more like one unworthy of making the NCAA tournament? While Cronin said he would have to see if Monday humbled his players, he could predict how the next few days would go.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can tell you what it will do, it\u2019ll make sure that our practices are interesting,\u201d Cronin said, alluding to demanding sessions. \u201cThat\u2019s what I can promise. \u2018Cause it\u2019s on me, at the end of the day. I\u2019m not being funny or anything, you know, trying to be cute about that. It\u2019s my job to make sure we defend. It\u2019s my job to make sure we follow the scouting report. And it\u2019s my job to get them to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It was the sort of postgame rant that Mick Cronin usually saves for a bad loss at a…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":354648,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5123],"tags":[32072,1582,276,262,173181,9150,91195,2961,5617,224,5337,173184,449,24566,173183,554,173182,114810,3007,2501],"class_list":{"0":"post-354647","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-bruins","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-california","11":"tag-defense","12":"tag-dent","13":"tag-eagles","14":"tag-eastern-washington","15":"tag-la","16":"tag-layup","17":"tag-los-angeles","18":"tag-losangeles","19":"tag-no-look-pass","20":"tag-point","21":"tag-rebound","22":"tag-season-opening-win","23":"tag-shot","24":"tag-skyy-clark","25":"tag-steal","26":"tag-team","27":"tag-ucla"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/354647","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=354647"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/354647\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/354648"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=354647"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=354647"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=354647"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}