Men’s basketball forfeits early lead to Stanford, lagging 9 points at the half
Sophomore guard Jaylen Hands scored a team-high 17 points in the first half against Stanford on Saturday night. Hands – who leads the Pac-12 in assists – also picked up three dimes, leading to eight more Bruin points. (Michael Zshornack/Daily Bruin senior staff)
By Sam Connon
Feb. 16, 2019 8:10 p.m.
Three and a half minutes in, the UCLA-Stanford matchup looked a lot like it did when the Bruins won by 22 on Jan. 3.
Fast-forward seven minutes, and the Cardinal used a 22-point swing to flip the script.
UCLA men’s basketball (13-12, 6-6 Pac-12) trails Stanford (13-11, 6-6) at halftime 49-40. Sophomore guard Jaylen Hands leads the Bruins with 17 points on 6-of-8 shooting to go along with three assists and two triples.
Hands scored or assisted on 23 of UCLA’s first 32 points.
The two teams traded threes in the middle of the first frame, with the Bruins and Cardinal combining for six 3s over a four-minute stretch.
Sophomore guard Kris Wilkes took an elbow to the face from 7-foot, 230 pound center Josh Sharma with 17:41 on the clock, sending him to the locker room. He would later return to the game and score five points on 1-of-5 shooting from the field.
UCLA – which ranks a Power-Five-worst 344th in the country in free throw percentage – was a perfect 9-of-9 before freshman center Moses Brown missed the team’s lone attempt with 1:27 remaining in the half.
Both teams continued their turnover-prone ways, combining for 13 in the first half.
