(Photo: Brady Klain/WCSN)
The Arizona State Sun Devils came into Thursday’s Pac-12 Tournament matchup against UCLA having won six of its last eight games, playing some of its best basketball coming down the stretch, which they continued to do in an 83-72 win over the Bruins in Las Vegas.
Romello White led the Sun Devils with 19 points, while Zylan Cheatham notched a double-double with 13 points and 13 rebounds.
“My teammates really looked for me today,” White said. “I felt like they really tried to get me the ball and they did a good job doing that. I feel like I just finished well.”
Part of White’s success came from foul trouble on the Bruins’ side. Three UCLA players, including the game’s leading scorer in Kris Wilkes, finished with four personals. ASU shot 17-of-26 from the charity stripe. White also put up seven rebounds and a block.
The Sun Devils started slow, missing their first five shots from three-point range, but found their groove in the last 3:28 of the first half to blow the game open.
UCLA had the deficit at just two points before ASU responded by going on a 14-0 run that was capped off by a Kimani Lawrence buzzer-beater from half court as time expired in the first half.
“Lu hit a couple three’s,” Hurley said of the run. “The ball was popping and moving…I don’t think we could have finished a half better.”
The victory wasn’t without trouble in the second half, however. The Sun Devils failed to score a single point during a five-minute stretch in the second half and went without a field goal for over eight minutes in that same span. They also had to withstand an offensive onslaught from Wilkes, who poured in 25 points.
“They have players who can really get hot in a game,” Hurley said. “Wilkes and (Jaylen) Hands are very explosive-type players. We were able to battle through that and get the job done.”
As Hurley stated, it seemed as though ASU had closed out the first half strong enough and carried enough momentum into the second half to avoid a costly letdown.
While advancing in the tournament is a bonus for the Sun Devils, a look at the larger picture reveals that Arizona State has almost certainly secured, at the very minimum, an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament.
“After this game, what uncertainty?” Hurley responded to a question asked about the status of an at-large tournament bid.
That bid would mark a second consecutive NCAA Tournament appearance and grant Cheatham his first opportunity to play in the Big Dance.
“Zylan has been on a mission,” Hurley said. “His mission started last year. He has worked as hard as anyone in the program on his game.”
“It would mean the world to me, obviously,” Cheatham said. “As a competitor that’s what you prepare for. That’s what you want to do. To take that next step as an athlete and add to my legacy, I think will mean the world to me and my program. That’s the approach I’m going with, just taking it day-by-day, trying not to look too far ahead or too far backward, just trying to maximize each day.”
The Sun Devils will face the winner of the Oregon-Utah matchup on Friday at 8:30 p.m.
