Tennessee basketball ended UCLA’s season on Saturday night, knocking off the Bruins 67-58 at Rupp Arena to advance to the Sweet 16 for the third straight season.
Following the game, UCLA head coach Mick Cronin discussed Tennessee’s defensive giving them issues, where his team came up short and much more. Here’s everything Cronin said.
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On Tennessee’s second half offensive success
“Look, they’re a hell of a team. There was a time they were number 1 in the country, I think. They’re a hell of a team. Milicic’s a fourth or fifth-year guy, Lanier is a fourth or fifth-year guy, Zakai is a four-year starter, Mashack is a senior, Gainey is a senior, Dubar is a senior, Okpara is a hell of a junior. They’ve got a hell of a team.
Guys, they only scored 67. It’s not like we gave up 97, they scored 67. Not going to win many games, guys, you get 58.
Skyy not being able to play and Eric threw us off, it messed the game up. We had a chance to — if that wouldn’t have happened, we might have had a lead at half, it could have been a whole different game. I agree with Ben, the end of the first half — I used my timeout for an offense/defense substitution and we had a couple of really, really sloppy turnovers, soft plays that, you know — it is what it is.
But, again, they got an hell of a team. You’re want going to win you score 58 points.”
On the importance of the rebounding battle
“It’s always important.”
On how he felt about the matchup
“We got off to a terrible start. We were stopping them and I don’t have the first half stats but I think they had nine or ten offensive rebound at halftime. Our defense couldn’t have been much better early, but we didn’t do a good job on the glass in the first half for sure. Second half was even but the first half — we also — it was 9-0 second-chance points at halftime.
I told our guys this game was going to be won by other things: Who gets the ball when it comes off the rim, who is strong with the ball. They screened better than we screened.”
On what little things went wrong for UCLA
“Look, a lot of is them. I can come in here and — you really want the truth. They’re really good. They play tremendous defense. When you do set a good screen, usually they switch it and I would tell you — first of all, I don’t think they’re little things. You guys call them little things, I think they’re big things. I think they’re things that are not shooting the basketball, which is all that — when little Johnny comes home everybody wants to know how many points he scored. Nobody asked him if he blocked out every time or did he take care of the ball. So they’re big things.
What I would tell you is we didn’t do a good enough job screening and then when we did, they switched, they emergency switched. Numerous times they switched Zakai, Jordan Gainey or Chaz Lanier and Jahmai Mashack onto our big guy, and we did not throw him the ball. We kept dribbling the ball.
There was even one time we shot a pull-up jumper in the first half, we were winning and Aday Mara has a guard on him and we decide to iso against Okpara. So our offense got us beat tonight. Our offense got us beat. Lack of execution and the end of the first half stuff.
When you are going to play at this level you’re not going to shut teams out. You’re not shutting Tennessee out. We held them to 67. Did you want me to hold them to 57? That’s not happening, I mean, nobody held them to 57 this year, would be my guess. Offensively we were not good enough.”
On what point he turns his attention to next season
“Right now, guys, it’s 12:40 a.m. and our season just ended. That’s it. You’re going to ask me about next year. Right now my biggest concern is how bad the seats are on the Allegiant flight, on that terrible plane that we’re going on to fly home tomorrow.”
Report: “Hang in there.”
Cronin: “And is there any chance that Doug got me some hot food, because I don’t eat on game day — that I got something edible. Not next year, not right now, guys.”
On where this team fell short
“Look, we restored us back to where we need to be in the NCAA Tournament. We had the 4 seed in the Big Ten Tournament out of 18 teams. After having almost no NIL and having to go to Europe to try to find cheap players, in a debacle, and fighting through it last year and finishing fifth. If we didn’t have to do that — it put us a year behind, okay?
So I thought — this group of guys did as good as they could do, Ben. I thought Eric’s injury and Will had to have a little surgery in the middle of the season threw us off, but this group of guys, you know, Aday improved. You have a team where literally your four most important players are transfers. They came together and had a heck of a year. This team is — and Tennessee is great, man, they got an hell of a team.”
On his best UCLA teams having continuity
“You can say that about anybody, buddy, I’m not in the mood to talk about a different era. It’s a new era, my man.”
On how important continuity is for them moving forward
“What I would tell you, tough loss today for my older brother, Coach Pitino and I, but he’s smart. If you’ve giving me a choice, I’ll always take talent. Does that answer your question? Doesn’t mean it’s important. You want to give the other guy three or four-year guys, but I got better players? I will always take talent. So continuity is irrelevant if you don’t have talent. You got both, you got Zakai Zeigler, right? And you got Zakai Zeigler. You’re running around with basically another coach on the court. He’s an hell of a player, too. I will always take talent, though, Ben, but both are important. There’s a lot of stuff that’s important.”
