Cronin Shares What He Has Learned About UCLA This Season

They’ve gone through a lot this season, from dealing with injuries to Mick Cronin ejecting his own player from a blowout loss, then snapping at a reporter in the postgame presser. It hasn’t been an easy season for the team by any stretch, but they’ve somehow made it work, and enter the tournament as a potential sleeper team to make the Sweet Sixteen. 

After bouncing out of the Big Ten Tournament to Purdue in the semifinals, Cronin was asked if there is anything he had learned about his team this season. 

Cronin’s Thoughts 

• “I was happy with the way they’ve competed,” Cronin said. “We’ve got talent, we just haven’t always had our mind on defense, which is very rare for teams I coach. But, we’ve got great guys. Since [we played Nebraska], it’s been a noted change in our team, we’ve just got to keep it up.”

• “We’re at UCLA,” he added. “No matter who we take the floor against in the NCAA Tournament, we’re going to run out there and we're going to be the ones wearing the baby blue and the four letters, so we believe in ourselves.”

UCLA Injury Updates 

The Bruins will be dealing with some slight injury concerns throughout at least the early part of the big dance. Both Tyler Bilodeau and Donovan Dent suffered injuries during the Big Ten Tournament.

The Bruins’ two best players should be good to go for the NCAA Tournament, but it will be something to monitor going forward. Bilodeau has been the team’s most consistent player this season, and Dent has been on fire of late, dishing out 78 assists with just six turnovers over his last eight games. 

With their full attention on the tournament, the Bruins will look to prove many of their doubters wrong by embarking on a deep run. Nothing that happened during the regular season matters now, and UCLA will need to come together to put forth a strong showing in the tournament despite its inconsistencies.