Mick Cronin proud of how UCLA 'hung in there' against Colorado

No. 5 UCLA (16-2) held on for a 68-54 over Colorado (11-8), avoiding an upset at home.

Head coach Mick Cronin was proud of the team hanging in there against the Buffaloes after trailing 31-28 at halftime. UCLA outscored Colorado 40-23 over the final 20 minutes.

Cronin opened up on the bounce back in the second half for the Bruins.

“Obviously, great win tonight,” Cronin said postgame. “When you miss seven free throws in the first half, two front ends of a 1-and-1, and we’re 0-7 from three. Everything we talk about as a coach, it’s easier said than done, but you can’t be offensive sensitive, and we were for a little while. That’s why we got down nine, we were pouting because the ball wasn’t going in. When we stopped worrying about that, we started getting stops and rebounding. 

“Eventually the ball is going to go in. I told them at halftime, I’d rather the ball goes in in the second half. They didn’t really go in until the last 10 minutes. 

Cronin mentioned that UCLA hit its stride at just right the time, waning minutes of the ball game.

“But if you’re going to have a big 10 minutes where the ball goes in, you want the last 10,” Cronin said. “We made four threes, and I know they were all in the last 10 minutes. Great win, anytime the game isn’t going your way, you have every reason to get beaten, and you find a way to win and win by 14, shut a team out the way we did. 

“Forced 23 turnovers, have to be proud of your guys. I was proud of the way we hung in there when things weren’t going our way. 18 offensive rebounds, pretty good, 46% of our misses, 55 deflections tonight, season-high.”

Since UCLA struggled on offense, Cronin was hopeful things would turn a corner by the second half.

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“What happens when things aren’t going your way on offense, sometimes your mind wanders and you start feeling sorry for yourself, or you try and do too much on defense,” Cronin said. “We were fouling too much. It’s like I told them in a timeout, I don’t need heroes, I need soldiers. Soldiers win wars, heroes get people in trouble. They get you in trouble in sports. You have to be a solider and do your job. Keep doing your job, eventually the worm turns, and if it doesn’t you have to still do your job, play the right way and you’ll win the next one. 

“You can’t get out of character and panicking. I thought we did that a little bit, we did that a lot actually, that’s why we were losing. We put them on the foul line, they had 20 made free throws, we don’t give up that many free throws.”