On Tuesday, Stanford men’s basketball fell to #12 UCLA 79-70 at home. UCLA junior guard Johnny Juzang led the way for the Bruins with 23 points & 5 rebounds while redshirt junior guard Tyger Campbell (14 points & 7 assists), junior forward Jaime Jaquez (14 points & 4 rebounds), and senior guard Jules Bernard (10 points) also finished in double figures. Stanford junior forward Spencer Jones (22 points) led the way for the Cardinal while freshman forward Harrison Ingram (17 points & 8 rebounds) and sophomore guard Michael O’Connell (13 points & 4 assists) finished in double figures as well. UCLA improves to 17-4 overall and 9-3 in the Pac-12 while Stanford falls to 14-9 overall and 7-6 in the Pac-12.
“Well, you can see why UCLA was in the Final Four last year, why they’re a top-ranked team this year,” Stanford head coach Jerod Haase said after the game. “They play motivated and hungry and pretty darn effectively. It’s one of the best, without looking at the tape, but one of the best mid-range shooting performances I’ve ever seen. That’s what they do. It’s not an enigma. That’s exactly what they do and they’re very talented, they’re well-coached and really tough.
“Having said that, I was really proud of our guys. I thought we competed really hard. Our guys’ intent to follow the game plan was really good. In the second half defensively we tried to make a lot of adjustments and some worked better than others, but the reality is none worked very well. And as a head coach, it is hard because when I have a team that is doing everything they can to execute the game plan, they’re giving their heart and soul, they believe in what’s going on out there and we come up short, it leaves me feeling a little bit empty knowing that I just wanna be able to give them a plan that’s going to work.
“But, I’m very proud of the way the guys competed tonight. We lost to a very very good basketball team and at this point our guys are, they’re exhausted. They’re in midterms; game after game after game right now and yet they come out and they brought energy at a real consistent, in a consistent way and mentally they’re locking in when they need to lock in as well. So, I said it once, I’ll say it again, I’m a very proud coach right now.”
Stanford got off to a strong start in this game as they led 12-11 with 15:49 to go in the first half. Jones was up to 6 points with two 3-pointers made while O’Connell (4 points) and Ingram (2 points) were on the board as well. Juzang was up to 6 points for UCLA with a pair of triples of his own. Both teams were going back and forth.
With 11:15 to go in the half, the game would be tied at 18 apiece. After a 3-pointer from Campbell gave UCLA an 18-16 lead, Ingram responded with a hoop plus the foul. Ingram would not make the foul shot following the timeout.
The next few minutes would continue to be a back and forth affair. With 4:45 to go in the half, UCLA would lead 31-27. It was a very clean game up to this point as each team had committed just one turnover. Jones and Ingram each had 8 points for Stanford while Juzang was up to 9 points for UCLA.
“I thought the assistant coaches and staff came up with a really solid game plan about how we’re going to attack, what we’re going to do offensively, everything from press offense to what we’re going to try and do to execute in the half court,” Haase said of the key to playing a cleaner game. “But the players did a nice job of handling the pressure, being confident with the basketball, getting to the spots they needed to get to. We did waiver a little bit, some, every once in a while a little bit in the second half, but the reality is the guys. The guys did a nice job understanding the message and making plays for teammates and keeping those turnovers down.”
A critical moment was when Jones picked up his second foul with 3:43 to go in the half. Not wanting him to pick up his third foul before halftime, Haase decided to sit Jones for the rest of the half and UCLA took advantage, closing the half on a 14-4 run. As a result, UCLA led 41-31 at halftime.
Stanford opened the second half on a 6-0 run thanks to 4 points from Delaire and a jumper from O’Connell. Juzang would respond for UCLA with a 3-point play while Jaquez got a bucket inside. As a result, it was still a 10 point lead for UCLA with 15:28 to go as they now led 47-37.
With 14:41 to go, UCLA extended their lead 52-37. Senior guard David Singleton nailed a triple while Juzang got a fastbreak layup. Stanford called for time, hoping to stop the bleeding.
Stanford responded nicely as it would soon be a 58-51 UCLA lead with 10:49 to go. Stanford was not going away, having made six of their last seven field goal attempts. Ingram was up to 15 points after a bucket inside; Jones was up to 13 points after a triple and a bucket inside of his own.
UCLA would once again turn on the jets to lead 68-53 with 6:43 to go. Juzang was really taking over as he was up to 23 points and 5 rebounds. Stanford was having a tough time containing him. It would be more of the same as UCLA led 72-58 with 4:00 to go. Stanford was trying hard to come back, but every time it looked like they might be on the verge of whittling down the UCLA lead, UCLA found a way to respond.
“He can score in a variety of other ways,” Haase said of Juzang. “It’s less at the rim. He can shoot three-pointers, but it’s again, it’s the midrange that is elite. It was against a lot of different players on our team. Most of our players have great length and so to be able to do that against pressure and against length is really impressive and there’s a reason he has the accolades that he’s gotten. He deserves them. He’s a really really high level player.”
To Stanford’s credit, they found a way to cut UCLA’s lead to single digits as it was a 75-68 game with 1:16 to go. They continued to fight, but time was not on their side. With 46.3 to go, Stanford had the ball as it was still a 75-68 lead. Stanford needed to score to keep their hopes alive. To Stanford’s dismay, Ingram shuffled his feet inside, resulting in a turnover. That appeared to be the nail in the coffin and indeed it was. UCLA would walk out with a 79-70 victory.
“Unfortunately this year, there’s been many times we’ve had pretty large deficits and the majority of the time we’ve made a run to get in single digits or at times even win the basketball game,” Haase said. “I absolutely love coaching this team. They don’t have quit in them. It doesn’t mean we’re going to win every game, doesn’t mean we’re going to fight back when we’re down every single time, but there is a competitive spirit within the group that’s really really fun to coach.”
For Stanford, this loss is disappointing in the obvious sense that they lost. Every game matters down the stretch and every time you come up empty handed, it’s a disappointment. That being said, Stanford played UCLA a lot better than they did at Pauley Pavilion and showed a great fighting spirit all the way through. As a result, they kept the game much closer and had a significantly better result. In hindsight, the game was lost when UCLA closed the first half on a 14-4 run. Had Jones not picked up his second foul when he did, this game may have gone Stanford’s way or at least gone right down to the wire.
“I thought we had more of an edge this game,” Haase said. “I thought we were locked in and just kinda maintained our fight throughout maybe better than we did down there. But this game in particular, the thing that did cost us negatively is we just couldn’t get stops. We were getting some scores on the offensive end, but on the defensive end, we couldn’t get stops and when we did, we couldn’t pile them together.”
Up next for Stanford is a road game at Oregon on Thursday. That game will tip-off at 6:00 PM PT on ESPN2 and Cardinal Sports Network radio.
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