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At last, Arizona-UCLA will showcase both programs at their peak
Arizona and UCLA are undeniably the Pac-12’s two flagship basketball programs, but here’s a strange fact about their fierce rivalry.
For the past two decades, they’ve seldom been at their best at the same time.
When Arizona was a fixture in the top 10 late in Lute Olson’s tenure, UCLA only sporadically played up to its talent level under Steve Lavin. When Ben Howland led the Bruins to three straight Final Fours by reinstilling defense and discipline, the Wildcats floundered in the midst of a tumultuous coaching transition. And by the time Sean Miller returned Arizona to national prominence, UCLA was already in the throes of an abrupt decline.
That history of near misses is what makes Saturday’s showdown in Tucson feel so special. Finally, we get to see Arizona and UCLA square off with both at their peak.
On one side of the McKale Center will be the fourth-ranked Wildcats (26-3, 15-1), who have overcome the 19-game suspension of leading returning scorer Allonzo Trier to ascend to first place in the Pac-12. On the other side of the McKale Center will be fifth-ranked UCLA (25-3, 12-3), which has surged up the standings thanks to transcendent freshman Lonzo Ball and the nation’s most potent offense.
At stake is not only the Pac-12 title but also a bigger prize that could come with it. The three-way battle between Arizona, UCLA and sixth-ranked Oregon could also decide which team claims the conference’s highest NCAA tournament seed and lone spot in the geographically friendly West Regional.
Since the selection committee’s bracketing principles dictate that every league’s top teams get sent to different NCAA tournament regions, only one of Arizona, Oregon and UCLA will be able to stay out West. The team that separates itself among those three will probably be rewarded with a favorable path to the Final Four that would go from either Sacramento or Salt Lake City to San Jose to Phoenix.
The first time Arizona and UCLA met this season coincided with Trier’s return from suspension. A jacked-up Wildcats team roared out of Pauley Pavilion with a 96-85 victory on Jan. 21, establishing themselves as a Final Four threat and exposing some holes in the previously surging Bruins.
As Arizona’s guards were attacking the rim off the dribble with startling ease, it became clear UCLA’s defense had to improve for the Bruins to make any sort of national title push. They couldn’t rely on stringing together six straight brilliant scoring nights in March. They had be able to generate enough stops to survive nights when outside shots wouldn’t fall and their offense went from historically elite to merely above average.
Nobody will mistake UCLA for a defensive juggernaut these days, but the Bruins have made strides since their first meeting with Arizona a month ago. They were especially cohesive and hard working defensively in their two biggest wins of the month, a thrilling victory over Oregon and a rout of crosstown rival USC.
Whereas the first Arizona-UCLA game laid bare the Bruins’ biggest flaw, it actually masked problems that lay ahead for the Wildcats. It took Arizona a couple weeks to integrate Trier into its rotation after he’d spent the first two thirds of the season as a member of the scout team in practice.
But Trier has since found his stride, heralded freshman Lauri Markkanen has emerged from a mini-slump and seniors Kadeem Allen and Dusan Ristic have returned from injury. As a result, Arizona is just one win away from clinching no worse than a share of the Pac-12 title and two wins away from winning it outright.
Arizona warmed up for Saturday’s showdown on Thursday night by pulling away from upset-minded USC for a 90-77 victory. Only an hour earlier, UCLA had survived a classic trap game at Arizona State and emerged with an 87-75 win.
And with that it was finally time to look ahead to what could be the most high-stakes game between Arizona and UCLA since the turn of the century. The only recent game even in the same stratosphere was the riveting 2014 Pac-12 title game won by the Bruins on a go-ahead Jordan Adams 3-pointer in the final minute.
Not since 1999 have Arizona and UCLA met with both teams in the top 10.
It’s about time it finally happened again.
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Jeff Eisenberg is the editor of The Dagger on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at daggerblog@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
