ASU Basketball: Marathon Rotation Runs out of Gas vs. UCLA
By Zach Pekale
In a game where four of five starters played all 40 minutes, ASU Basketball ran out of steam late against UCLA in a 87-75 loss at Wells Fargo Arena.
The ASU basketball team (13-16, 6-10) continues to impress against ranked opponents, this time challenging No. 5 UCLA (25-3, 12-3) for nearly 35 minutes before suffering a 12-point defeat. What was more impressive was the Sun Devils using five players to keep pace with one of the nation’s top teams.
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Head coach Bobby Hurley went with his usual starting five of guards Tra Holder, Shannon Evans II, Torian Graham, Kodi Justice and forward Obinna Oleka. Aside from Justice sitting 81 seconds, the starters never left the floor.
“I rarely came out of the game when I played and maybe that was my thought for the five guys tonight,” said Hurley “At one point we were going to go the bench in the first half and none of the guys wanted to come out. They’re warriors.”
In addition to battling blue chip prospects Lonzo Ball and T.J. Leaf, the Sun Devils battled fatigue but refused to go away when the Bruins made their runs.
“If we come up with a few more rebounds here or a few more stops there you might see a different result but I felt like we battled the whole game,” said Justice. “I wouldn’t trade the five we have on the court for anybody.”
ASU held Ball and guard Isaac Hamilton in check but had no answer for Leaf. The freshman finished one rebound shy of a double-double and recorded 25 points of 11-of-16 shooting.
With only starters seeing minutes tonight, no player taller than 6’8 played for Arizona State which gave UCLA a massive edge on the glass. The Bruins had 31 second-chance points on 17 offensive rebounds and held a 49-30 edge on the glass.
Despite being largely undersized, Hurley praised the defensive efforts of his team as they were disruptive on the perimeter and held UCLA to 7-of-23 from behind the arc.
For the Sun Devils, Justice and Graham carried the team offensively on what was otherwise a poor shooting night. Graham poured in 28 points while Justice had 19 as the duo combined to make 12 of Arizona State’s 14 made threes.
With the loss, ASU drops to 6-10 in Pac-12 play and has as many wins as Stanford and Colorado, however; the Sun Devils own the head-to-head tiebreaker against both teams.
Next: ASU Basketball: Sun Devils’ hot shooting not enough against Washington State
Arizona State will now have two days to reconvene and recover before taking on USC on Sunday. Tip-off between the Sun Devils and Trojans will be at 4:30 p.m. on Feb. 26 from Wells Fargo Arena.