UCLA
UNLV
UCLA Prepares to Face UNLV on Friday Night
November 13, 2019 | Men's Basketball
LOS ANGELES – The Bruins will face UNLV on Friday, Nov. 15, in what will be the sixth all-time meeting between the two schools. UCLA improved its all-time record against UNLV to 5-0 in Nov. 2015, when the Bruins secured a 77-75 win over UNLV in a first-round matchup of the 2015 Maui Jim Maui Invitational at the Lahaina Civic Center. UNLV will enter this Friday's contest with a 1-2 overall record, having dropped consecutive games in overtime to Kansas State (Nov. 9) and at California (Nov. 12). UCLA last faced UNLV in Pauley Pavilion on Dec. 12, 1998, recording a 72-67 victory over the Runnin' Rebels.
FRIDAY'S GAME INFORMATION
Venue: Pauley Pavilion presented by Wescom
Venue Capacity: 13,800
Tipoff Time: 8:06 p.m. (PT)
Television: Pac-12 Network
TV Talent: Roxy Bernstein (play-by-play), Bill Walton (analyst)
Radio (UCLA Sports Network): AM 570
Radio Talent: Josh Lewin (play-by-play), Tracy Murray (analyst)
XM Channel: Ch. 373
SIRIUSXM Internet Channel: Ch. 373
EARLY IN THE SEASON
UCLA has overcome a pair of halftime deficits en route to a 2-0 start this month. The Bruins rallied from a 34-32 halftime deficit last Sunday against UC Santa Barbara, outscoring the visiting Gauchos by a 45-27 margin in the second half to notch a 77-61 win. Jalen Hill registered his fourth career double-double, logging a career-high 22 points and 10 rebounds. UCLA erased a 56-50 deficit in the final six minutes of the season opener against Long Beach State (Nov. 6), securing a 69-65 victory over The Beach. In that season-opening contest, Tyger Campbell led UCLA with 15 points and five assists.
PRODUCTIVE OUTINGS
Redshirt sophomore Jalen Hill recorded 17 of his career-high 22 points (and six of his team-leading 10 rebounds) in the second half against UC Santa Barbara. Hill tallied three double-doubles as a freshman last season. His 10-rebound effort on Sunday marked the sixth time in his career that he has registered at least 10 rebounds in a game. Junior Chris Smith, a 6-foot-9 guard from Chicago, totaled 13 points and five assists in the win over UC Santa Barbara. Smith, who has shot 50 percent from 3-point range (3-for-6), has averaged 13.0 points and 6.5 rebounds in the Bruins' two victories.
THE EYE OF THE TYGER
Redshirt freshman guard Tyger Campbell has averaged 8.5 points, 5.5 assists and 3.5 rebounds in UCLA's two games. Campbell, a 5-foot-11 guard from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, has shot 42.9 percent from 3-point range (3-for-7), recording 11 assists and five turnovers. He played a team-high 37 minutes in the season opener against Long Beach State, finishing that game with 15 points, five assists and five rebounds. He made 3 of 5 shots from 3-point territory in the season-opening win. Campbell missed the entire 2018-19 season after having torn the ACL in his left knee last October.
ADDITIONAL NOTES ABOUT UCLA
- The Bruins' roster features 15 student-athletes, including 13 players who were on the team last season. Looking at last season's primary 11 rotation players, UCLA has returned eight of those student-athletes. UCLA's returning nucleus includes a pair of fifth-year seniors (Prince Ali, Alex Olesinski), junior Chris Smith and sophomores Jalen Hill, Cody Riley, Jules Bernard, Kenneth Nwuba and David Singleton. The Bruins have added incoming freshmen Jaime Jaquez Jr. (Camarillo, Calif.) and Jake Kyman (Aliso Viejo, Calif.), a pair of 6-foot-6 guards from Southern California.
- In addition to Jaquez Jr. and Kyman, the Bruins have welcomed back Tyger Campbell and Shareef O'Neal, a pair of talented young players who missed the 2018-19 season due to medical reasons. Campbell has returned from a knee injury sustained in practice on Oct. 7, 2018. As a senior at La Lumiere School in Indiana (2017-18), he averaged 15.5 points and 7.2 assists per game. O'Neal, a 6-foot-9 forward from Los Angeles, was sidelined for the entire 2018-19 season after recovering from heart surgery in December. O'Neal starred at Crossroads School during his final two years in high school.
- UCLA's roster includes 10 freshmen and sophomores but does feature seven student-athletes who have played in at least 30 college games. Prince Ali, a 6-foot-4 senior, has played in 90 career games, making 49 starts. Ali and senior Alex Olesinski enrolled at UCLA in the summer of 2015 and have entered the season as UCLA's most experienced players (Olesinski has played in 75 games). Chris Smith, a 6-foot-9 junior, has played in all 68 games for the Bruins since the start of the team's 2017-18 campaign. Smith has made 14 career starts in two-plus seasons for UCLA.
- Mick Cronin enters his first season as The Michael Price Family UCLA Men's Head Basketball Coach. Hired as the Bruins' head coach in April 2019, Cronin spent the previous 13 seasons as head coach at the University of Cincinnati, his alma mater. He guided Cincinnati to the NCAA Tournament the past nine seasons and helped the Bearcats capture the American Athletic Conference's regular-season title in 2014 and 2018. Cincinnati also won the AAC Tournament championship in 2018 and 2019. Cronin has entered his 17th season as a college basketball head coach.
HEADED BACK TO MAUI
The Bruins will be playing in the Maui Jim Maui Invitational later this month for the sixth time. Most recently, UCLA played in the eight-team tournament in Nov. 2015, defeating UNLV in a first-round matchup before dropping consecutive games to Kansas and Wake Forest. UCLA won the tournament in 2006, with three straight wins against Chaminade, Kentucky and Georgia Tech. This season, the Bruins will open against BYU on Monday, Nov. 25. UCLA's second game will take place against either Kansas or Chaminade on Nov. 26. The Bruins will conclude the tournament on Wednesday, Nov. 27.
NEWS AND NOTES
- Prince Ali, UCLA's top returning scorer from last season's team, enters this Friday's game having scored 685 career points. He entered the 2019-20 season as one of 10 players in the Pac-12 to have scored at least 648 career points at the same Pac-12 program. Oregon State's Tres Tinkle stands atop that list (entered the season with 1,661 career points).
- The Bruins are returning 47.6% of their scoring production from last season. UCLA lost its top three scorers from last season's roster (Kris Wilkes 17.4 ppg, Jaylen Hands 14.2 ppg, Moses Brown 9.7 ppg), as all three student-athletes chose to pursue a professional career. UCLA has returned 56.6% of its rebounding production from one year ago.
- Former UCLA center Moses Brown, who was a freshman with the team last season, has become the 95th former UCLA player to have played in the NBA. Brown, a 7-foot-1 center from New York City, made his NBA debut with the Portland Trail Blazers on Tuesday, Nov. 12. He tallied three rebounds in four minutes of action in a game versus Sacramento.
- Jalen Hill, a redshirt sophomore from Corona, Calif., scored 22 points and grabbed 10 rebounds in the Bruins' 77-61 win against UC Santa Barbara (Nov. 10). He became the first UCLA player with at least 20 points and 10 rebounds in a game since Jaylen Hands had 22 points and 11 rebounds in UCLA's second-to-final game of last season (vs. Stanford, March 13).
- Jules Bernard, a sophomore from Los Angeles, scored 20 points off the bench in UCLA's 77-61 victory against UC Santa Barbara (Nov. 10). He tied his career high (points) in that game, having also logged 20 points off the bench in the Bruins' 90-83 victory at home against Oregon last season (Feb. 23), in what was UCLA's second-to-last home contest.
- UCLA's 11 total steals in the season opener (Nov. 6) were just one shy of a season-best 12 steals in last year's victory over Long Beach State (UCLA won, 91-80, in the second game last season). Prince Ali, Alex Olesinski, Chris Smith and David Singleton each came up with a pair of steals in the season opener against Long Beach State on Wednesday.
- Looking at UCLA's 15-man roster, 10 of the team's student-athletes either grew up in the Southern California region or attended high school in the Los Angeles area. Cody Riley (listed as Kansas City, Kan.), moved to the Los Angeles area when he was in middle school and attended Sierra Canyon High School (Chatsworth, Calif.).
- Prince Ali scored 12 points last Sunday against UC Santa Barbara, marking the 34th game in which he has scored in double figures. In the season opener versus Long Beach State on Nov. 6, Ali scored all 10 of his points in the second half. Last season, Ali scored in double figures in 13 of 26 games played.
- UCLA has entered the 2019-20 season with four returning players who have registered at least 10 rebounds in one game – Jalen Hill (five times), Cody Riley (twice), Alex Olesinski (once) and Chris Smith (once). Hill had three double-doubles last season, including back-to-back double-doubles in games last March against Utah (March 9) and Stanford (March 13).
FEWEST POINTS SINCE
UCLA has surrendered 126 total points through the team's first two games (63.0 ppg). That marks the Bruins' fewest points allowed – through the season's first two games – since the start of the 2010-11 season, when UCLA allowed 119 points in victories against CSUN and Pepperdine. Through games played Tuesday, Nov. 12, UCLA led the Pac-12 in fewest rebounds allowed per game (27.5 rpg) and ranked third in the conference in the highest rebounding margin (11.5 rpg).
POINT GUARD POSITION
With Tyger Campbell returning from an ACL tear (left knee), he could become UCLA's fifth primary point guard in as many seasons. Over the past four seasons, not one player has assumed the primary point guard responsibility for a second straight season. In 2015-16, (junior) Bryce Alford was the team's starting point guard. In 2016-17, (freshman) Lonzo Ball recorded a UCLA single-season record 274 assists. In 2017-18, (junior) Aaron Holiday led the Pac-12 in scoring (20.3 ppg) as the team's primary point guard. Last season, (sophomore) Jaylen Hands served as the Bruins' starting point guard.
FINISHING STRONG
Jules Bernard closed his freshman campaign by scoring in double figures in eight of UCLA's final 11 games. He had scored at least 10 points in just two of the Bruins' first 22 contests. The 6-foot-6 guard finished his freshman year having averaged 7.6 points and 3.1 rebounds per game (33 games). In the team's final 11 games, Bernard averaged 11.5 points per game and shot 56.0 percent from the field (42-for-75). In addition, he shot 41.7 percent from 3-point territory in the team's final 11 games. Bernard scored a season-high 20 points in the Bruins' overtime victory against Oregon on Saturday, Feb. 23.
SEASON OPENERS
UCLA has gone 8-3 in season openers over the past 11 years and 16-5 in opening games over the past 21 seasons (two of those five losses took place in overtime or double overtime). The Bruins have opened the season with a game in Pauley Pavilion in 17 of their 21 seasons. Through his 17 seasons as a head coach, Mick Cronin has directed his teams to a 14-3 record in season-opening games (11-2 at Cincinnati, 2-1 at Murray State, 1-0 at UCLA).
AT THE FREE THROW LINE
The Bruins have shot 70.7 percent from the free throw line through two games this season, making 41 of 58 attempts. UCLA shot 71.0 percent at the free throw stripe in the season-opening win against Long Beach State (Nov. 6). Four days later, the Bruins made 70.4 percent from the free throw line in a victory against UC Santa Barbara (Nov. 10). Each of those single-game percentages is higher than the Bruins' free throw percentage last season of 63.3% (in 2018-19).
STREAKING
UCLA has made at least one 3-pointer played in its last 657 games. That 3-point streak began after the Bruins went 0-for-14 from 3-point territory in a 78-63 loss at No. 2-ranked Stanford on Feb. 3, 2000 (Maples Pavilion). UCLA has made at least three 3-pointers in 203 of 208 games since the start of the 2013-14 season. The Bruins made a school single-game-record 19 three-pointers (on 31 attempts) at Colorado on Jan. 12, 2017 (UCLA won that game, 104-89).
