Colorado
UCLA
Buffs Prep For Visit From Bruins As Tough Stretch Continues
January 10, 2017 | Men's Basketball, Neill Woelk
BOULDER — When the Colorado Buffaloes play host to No. 4 UCLA on Thursday, it will be the fourth in a five-game run that is among the more difficult stretches a CU hoops team has ever faced.
If you like your opportunities flavored with a heavy dose of challenge and dash of a sense of urgency, it's a stretch you'll love.
Thursday's game against the No. 4 Bruins (9 p.m. tipoff), CU's conference home opener, will be the Buffs' first game in the Coors Events Center since a Dec. 22 win over Eastern Washington. It comes on the heels of Saturday's 82-73 loss to then-No. 17 Arizona (now No. 16) and ahead of a 6:30 p.m. Sunday home matchup with No. 25 USC.
That's three straight games against ranked teams, with the first of those contests the tail end of a three-game Pac-12 road trip. It all adds up to a five-game start to the conference season that may be as tough as any CU team has faced, especially in recent years.
The breakdown:
— For starters, the three-game road trip to open the conference season is the first such road trip for the Buffs since they opened with three Rocky Mountain Conference road games to begin the 1931-32 season. The Buffs have played three straight league games on the road numerous times before (the most recent in 2014), but it's been 85 years since they began a conference season with such a stretch.
— This will be only the fourth time in CU history the Buffs have faced ranked teams in three straight games, and the first in Pac-12 play. The last such stretch came in 2009-2010, when CU played at No. 2 Texas, came home for a game with No. 22 Baylor and then played at No. 13 Kansas State (they lost both road games and won at home).
The toughest stretch, though, may have come in 1990, when Colorado still played in the old Big Eight. That season, the Buffs played at No. 1 Missouri and at No. 2 Kansas — and then returned home for a rematch with No. 1 Mizzou (three losses).
The first time came in 1973-74, when CU played non-conference games vs. No. 15 Arizona, No. 12 Long Beach State and No. 19 UNLV (two losses sandwiching a win).
— The composite record of the five teams in the current stretch is a very healthy 66-17, with the three ranked teams owning a combined 46-5 record. The average RPI of all five teams is 62, with Arizona (15), UCLA (21) and USC (32) the top three.
It is not a stretch for the weak of heart.
"No question we need a sense of urgency," Colorado head coach Tad Boyle said after Tuesday's practice. "It's time. All you can ask for in life is an opportunity. What an opportunity we have on Thursday night with UCLA coming to town. A heck of a challenge, too, but a great opportunity. That's how we have to look at it."
No doubt a challenge, particularly with an 0-3 conference start hanging over the Buffs' heads. The UCLA lineup includes 6-foot-6 stars Lonzo Ball and 6-foot-10 TJ Leaf — two freshmen considered likely "one-and-done" candidates — who are key parts of a team that is third in the nation in scoring (92.8 points per game). Any doubts as to the Bruins' offensive prowess were doused earlier this season when they knocked off then-No. 1 Kentucky, 97-92, on the Wildcats' home floor.
"This is the best offensive team I've coached against in 26 years of college basketball," Boyle said. "They've got firepower from every player on the floor and certainly coming off the bench."
There is, however, some good news for the Buffs. While they did drop their last two games of the recent road trip, they played much better. ASU needed two free throws with just a couple of seconds left to sneak away with a win and two days later, the Buffs cut a 20-point Arizona lead down to five in the final minutes before coming up short.
"We've got a competitive toughness on this team," Boyle said. "We've seen it. We certainly saw it against (then-No. 13) Xavier back in December. But we've also seen where we get our heads hanging low and we start acting like we just lost our puppy. We can't have that kind of attitude against UCLA. It's got to be, 'Hey this is an opportunity of a lifetime. Let's attack it and compete from start to finish and let the chips fall where they may.'"
The "good" news for the Buffs is that their stretch of games against ranked teams will come to an end after Sunday's matchup with USC.
The bad news, of course, is that they don't get to do it at home. Instead, they'll be back on the road for games at Washington (Jan. 18) and Washington State (Jan. 21).
SEARCHING FOR SEPARATION: While the Buffs' rotation in games has regularly included as many as 11 players, the majority of the minutes have gone to starters Derrick White, Josh Fortune, George King, Wesley Gordon and Xavier Johnson, with Tory Miller coming off the bench to provide relief in the post.
After that, though, Boyle has tried to find consistency from the "next five" of junior Dominique Collier, sophomore Thomas Akyazili and freshmen Deleon Brown, Bryce Peters and Lucas Siewert.
In CU's last two games, Akyazili seemed to be the odd man out, playing just four minutes against ASU and five against Arizona — the fewest number of minutes he's played in any two games as a Buff.
"We've got about five perimeter guys that aren't playing the way they're capable of playing," Boyle said. "Thomas is one of them. We've also got four other guys. Trying to pick and choose who's going to play and how much they're going to play between those five guys is really, really difficult."
As a result, Boyle said, the Buffs are filming practices and the coaching staff is reviewing the film — something he said they "never" do in January.
"I want to see them practice," Boyle said. "Whose team is winning, who's being effective, who's helping their team, who's doing the little things. I want to give them an opportunity to practice and compete and earn more minutes. But my job isn't easy when it comes to those five guys because nobody has separated themselves and nobody has earned the right to play. But I have to play somebody and I have to make a decision on who's not going to play or who's going to play limited minutes."
Contact: Neill.Woelk@Colorado.edu
