UCLA men’s basketball bowls over Beavers in biggest win of season
Junior guard/forward Jaime Jaquez Jr. drives toward the basket. Jaquez totaled 14 points in the first 20 minutes of play Saturday as No. 12 UCLA men’s basketball took down Oregon State in Corvallis. (Sakshi Joglekar/Assistant Photo editor)
Men’s basketball
| No. 12 UCLA | 94 |
| Oregon State | 55 |
By Jon Christon
Feb. 26, 2022 3:42 p.m.
This post was updated Feb. 27 at 10:48 p.m.
CORVALLIS — After the Bruins shot 36.8% from the field and 16.7% from deep Thursday night in Eugene, junior guard/forward Jaime Jaquez Jr. said it wasn’t his team’s night.
“Nothing was falling for us,” Jaquez said after the loss to Oregon.
Two days later and about 40 miles north, the shots finally fell.
No. 12 UCLA men’s basketball (21-6, 13-5 Pac-12) returned to the win column with a 94-55 blowout victory over Oregon State (3-24, 1-16) in Gill Coliseum on Saturday afternoon. The win marks both the largest margin of victory for the season and the most points scored in a game for the Bruins in conference play.
“It’s a long season. … We just got to remind ourselves why we play basketball,” Jaquez said. “We’re here to have some fun, and when you play hard, you have fun.”
The Bruins were able to connect on 58.6% of their attempts from the field and 65% of shots from beyond the arc – their best mark from 3-point range all season by more than 12 percentage points. The near-50% increase in long-range shooting from the previous game was also a season high.
Coach Mick Cronin said the improved shooting numbers were a result of a concerted effort to win the interior.
UCLA outscored Oregon State 34-18 in the paint and out-rebounded the home team 36-18.
“Once we got the ball inside, there was a lot of help and a lot of focus on the interior,” said redshirt senior forward Cody Riley. “That was definitely the key for our offense.”
The rout started early, as UCLA held a 15-point advantage after 20 minutes of play.
Despite a hot-shooting performance to end the first half, the Bruins trailed 11-9 four minutes in after a hook shot from Beaver center Roman Silva. A 3-pointer from forward Maurice Calloo extended the home team’s early lead to five.
“The game was close early because they had three offensive rebounds where they scored off all three,” Cronin said. “Once we shut the water off with the second-shot opportunities, it changed.”
Senior guards David Singleton and Jules Bernard made up the deficit by drilling back-to-back 3-pointers on ensuing possessions, giving UCLA back the lead – one it would not relinquish for the rest of the afternoon.
The pair of triples sparked a 13-2 Bruin run that extended their advantage to six. Jaquez – who scored the first points of the contest on a layup – scored eight straight points for the blue and gold midway through the opening period, capping off the stretch with a right-corner 3-pointer that put UCLA up nine.
“We made sure we made Jaime a big part of our offense,” Cronin said. “I was trying to force-feed him as much as possible (and) get his confidence going. We’re just a better team when that’s the case.”
Jaquez tacked on four more points in the rest of the first half, leading the contest at the break with 14 points as the Bruins entered the halftime locker room up 15.
“Talking before (the game), we had to make sure we told everyone, ‘We want to play inside. We want to get it inside,’” Jaquez said. “That’s something we weren’t doing as much in the Oregon game.”
After scoring 10 points in the opening period on 2-of-4 shooting from downtown, redshirt junior guard Tyger Campbell picked up right where he left off in the second half. A layup and 3-pointer on back-to-back possessions before the first media timeout of the frame helped the Bruins increase the advantage to 17.
With UCLA holding a 14-point lead after a 3-pointer from Oregon State forward Ahmad Rand, the Bruins proceeded to blow the game wide open on the back of a 22-0 run.
“Sometimes when the ball gets rolling, it’s like a downhill snowball,” Cronin said.
UCLA finished the game with 51 second-half points – one point away from its highest-scoring second half of the season – and made seven of its nine attempts from deep in the final frame.
The Bruins’ entire starting lineup – which was without leading scorer junior guard Johnny Juzang because of an ankle injury – scored in double figures, led by Campbell’s 20 and Jaquez’s 17. Even with the five starters combining to score 76 of the Bruins’ 94 points, none played more than 28 minutes.
“I wanted to make a couple more layups,” Jaquez said. “But it is what it is.”
