Postgame Quotes – UCLA vs. Denver (Dec. 10, 2022)
POSTGAME QUOTES
UCLA 87, Denver 64
December 10, 2022
Mick Cronin, The Michael Price Family UCLA Men’s Head Basketball Coach
overall statement
“We forced 24 turnovers. First half I thought our offense – it happens. You miss shots. It happened against Oregon. But I was really unhappy with our energy when the shots don’t go in. We’ve got to rebound the ball, and our leaders, particularly our guards, can’t look like they lost their dog when their shots don’t go in. You’ve got to go play harder. Which is what Dylan [Andrews] and Dave [Singleton] do, and that’s why they started the second half. And you saw what happened. So you can’t worry about if your shot goes in. Those two guys were 0-for-8 from three; I don’t care. I couldn’t care less. Four years in, around here, you worry about playing hard, having a great attitude, being physical, go rebound the ball. I think we had nine offensive in the second half. We missed 21 shots and got nine rebounds in the second half. Almost half were misses. Those are things you can control. We took a lot of good shots that didn’t go in in the first half. You can’t control that. You can control your attitude, your effort, your energy. You’ve got to be mature enough to know you’re not going to make shots all the time. Let’s go rebound the ball. Jaime [Jaquez Jr.] has got to get more than two rebounds.”
on if the emotional pregame ceremony honoring Jalen Hill affected Tyger Campbell’s performance
“I think the pregame ceremony was awesome. I don’t believe in any excuses for performance. But I think the pregame ceremony was unfortunate that we had it. It’s still hard for all of us to process. Really, really hard. But we’re all going to the celebration of life for him tomorrow as a team. That will probably be the first time it’ll be even more tangible and real just because of the way everything’s happened.”
on removing his tie at halftime
“No one player is more important than your culture. Whether it’s at your business or your team. Your culture, your standard is your standard. I wasn’t happy with us worrying about the wrong things. You worry about the right things, the right things happen. Twenty years I’ve been a head coach. Worry about the right things, the right things happen. Worry about the wrong things, you get fired. Because then people say comments like ‘Boy, he can’t coach. They got all this talent, but they don’t win.’ Yeah. Because they worry about offense, scoring, shooting instead of execution, toughness, defense, rebounding. So somewhere along the line I lost my tie.”
on Jaime Jaquez Jr.’s role on the team
“He’s become an elite scorer in college basketball; you see that. My goal today was to get a bunch of guys minutes, so some of my act is staged, premeditated. But when we need a bucket, it’s pretty simple where you go. Very few guys in college basketball can score without the offense. Just give them the ball and they just go get it. That’s thing you usually only see in pros. You see that on TNT, not on ESPN. But he can do it. He can score over his man, around his man. But we’re a small team the way we play, so he and Jaylen Clark for us have to rebound. But he was a role player, a hustle guy, and he’s evolved. When you stay in school and you have a great attitude and you put the work in, you can evolve as a player. You see his evolution. He can really score.”
on his message to Tyger Campbell
“That we’re worried about the wrong things. Look, Tyger is the best. I’ve got no chance building this program without him. He’s not as tall as we list him. I don’t know if he can grab the rim. He’s done nothing but win here, and he’s the ultimate competitor. But at times, I want him to be more vocal, and he’s got to be an extension of me. So that’s the same message to Amari [Bailey]. They need to be an extension of me. And he’s older, so I couldn’t care less about his shooting. I care about his ball pressure, his body language, his talking to his teammates – where Dave Singleton excels at all. So does Dylan, really. So you saw where we started the second half. But hard for me to not admit that you’re playing Denver, and you know your next two games are Maryland and Kentucky. Maybe what Ben [Bolch] said honoring Jalen. When you’ve started four years, all the games and maybe you’re not as ready for today. But I just want him to be an All-American. I want him to play great every game. But I’ve got to protect my culture, so you’ve got to be an extension of me with your toughness and your fire and your competitiveness or you don’t get to play, and you definitely don’t get to start.”
on Will McClendon
“It was great. I’m so happy to have him out there. He passed up a shot I didn’t like. I ran a little play for him. He got 10 minutes. That’s his first real minutes in a long, long time, since they won the state at Bishop Gorman his junior year. He hates that knee brace; he doesn’t need it. The doctors like him wearing it for a couple of weeks, a certain period of time before they let him shed it. He hates it because of speed and quickness as a guard. But it was great to have him out there. I’m a big fan of Will. He defends, he’s everything that I just talked about. He believes in playing hard. All the right things. The guy’s got great parents, one of the best high school coaches in the country in Grant Rice. Can’t be me in golf, but he’s a great coach. I believe in Will. Really happy. Can’t imagine how happy he is right now. Imagine you haven’t played in two years; it’s crazy.”
on Jaylen Clark being back to form after the flu
“He’s a good player. He only made one bad play. I got upset late in the first half and said no more fouls, no more trapping. He fouled immediately, and Amari Bailey kept trapping. That might have been why the tie came off at halftime. Not sure.”
Junior guard Jaylen Clark
on head coach Mick Cronin’s tie coming off and his halftime message
“I think he went to the bathroom and just took off the tie.”
on scoring 24 points, the same jersey number that the late UCLA Bruin Jalen Hill wore
“It was huge. I don’t really talk about my high school career, but I attended the same high school as him my freshman year so I’ve been around him probably longer than anybody here. It’s crazy how life goes, and I haven’t read or looked at anything today. Just seeing his face from me remembering being 13 (and) 14 years old, running around with him every day to when we’re in COVID (times) and me, him and Tyger are sitting in the same corner where our lockers are because we got moved outside and we talking so much that our old trainer Wes is over there like, ‘Y’all need to be quiet.’ It puts the whole thing of life into perspective. You’ve got to make the most out of your day. Tomorrow isn’t promised. In the first half, it kind of affected me. I was just like, ‘damn’, the whole time. I’m looking around and I haven’t seen his mom and dad since the last game he played. It’s just really, really sad to see someone be gone like that. … We paid attention. First play we ran, we ran ’24 Out’. We was well aware.”
on seeing Will McClendon out there and score his first career points
“That’s big. It feels like I play with everybody. I didn’t play with Will from when I was like 9-to-13, if you know what I mean. Me and Will, we played on West Coast All-Stars together. (Our) parents are real tight, families are real tight. It’s great to see overcome all of that. I have never had an injury like that, but he’s been around here a whole year and hadn’t gotten to (reap) the benefits. He’s out there with us every day in practice and stuff and it’s nice to finally get to see him some shine and his name on the board. We’re a family here, and I feel like everybody is pretty happy for him.”
Senior guard/forward Jaime Jaquez Jr.
on how he was affected by the pregame ceremony
“I know Jalen Hill very well. Me and him were neighbors for a long period of time. Him ad Tyger and I was their next-door neighbor. We had a lot of great conversations over our time together. We wanted to run ’24 Out’ for him and I wear 24. It was always my number, but once he left, I called him to make sure everything was good. I didn’t want to just take it without letting him know. He was very welcoming of that and wanted me to have it and was always so positive towards what we were doing as a team. He was always so supportive, and we miss him dearly.”
on seeing Will McClendon out there and score his first career points
“Shoutout to Will.”
Freshman guard Dylan Andrews
on the 17-0 run to start the second half
“When we went on that (17-0) run, our defense just changed. We started hawking the point guard and went at him like the head of a snake. We knew for a fact that without him that they couldn’t get into their sets and run in their offense. So we started beating him up and they turned the ball over and we began capitalizing off that.”
on how it felt to spark the win
“Oh, it felt great. The energy is – one thing about me is I try to bring high energy off the bench with 1,000 percent effort.”
Denver head coach Jeff Wulbrun
overall statement
“UCLA’s pressure overwhelmed us. We had twelve turnovers in each half, which led to thirty-one points. It was overwhelming, but this was a good game to play before league play. This game exposed your deficiencies, so it’s good to play a team like this. Mick has really shaped this team. They are physical and tough-minded. They play great defense. He has done a really good job at molding his personality to this team. He has gotten very talented players to play defense and to play together. Mick has done a wonderful job with this team. I feel they could be in contention for a National Championship.”
on where they go from here
“We have a home game next week, a DII game. Then we’re on the road against Omaha, our first league game. Also, we have a non-conference game on December 21 against Oregon State.”
on the tradition and the mystique of playing in Pauley Pavilion
“Sure, we had some nerves initially. I felt that in the first half we competed. We kept the game competitive, but in the second half, we got overwhelmed.”
UCLA 87, Denver 64
December 10, 2022
Mick Cronin, The Michael Price Family UCLA Men’s Head Basketball Coach
overall statement
“We forced 24 turnovers. First half I thought our offense – it happens. You miss shots. It happened against Oregon. But I was really unhappy with our energy when the shots don’t go in. We’ve got to rebound the ball, and our leaders, particularly our guards, can’t look like they lost their dog when their shots don’t go in. You’ve got to go play harder. Which is what Dylan [Andrews] and Dave [Singleton] do, and that’s why they started the second half. And you saw what happened. So you can’t worry about if your shot goes in. Those two guys were 0-for-8 from three; I don’t care. I couldn’t care less. Four years in, around here, you worry about playing hard, having a great attitude, being physical, go rebound the ball. I think we had nine offensive in the second half. We missed 21 shots and got nine rebounds in the second half. Almost half were misses. Those are things you can control. We took a lot of good shots that didn’t go in in the first half. You can’t control that. You can control your attitude, your effort, your energy. You’ve got to be mature enough to know you’re not going to make shots all the time. Let’s go rebound the ball. Jaime [Jaquez Jr.] has got to get more than two rebounds.”
on if the emotional pregame ceremony honoring Jalen Hill affected Tyger Campbell’s performance
“I think the pregame ceremony was awesome. I don’t believe in any excuses for performance. But I think the pregame ceremony was unfortunate that we had it. It’s still hard for all of us to process. Really, really hard. But we’re all going to the celebration of life for him tomorrow as a team. That will probably be the first time it’ll be even more tangible and real just because of the way everything’s happened.”
on removing his tie at halftime
“No one player is more important than your culture. Whether it’s at your business or your team. Your culture, your standard is your standard. I wasn’t happy with us worrying about the wrong things. You worry about the right things, the right things happen. Twenty years I’ve been a head coach. Worry about the right things, the right things happen. Worry about the wrong things, you get fired. Because then people say comments like ‘Boy, he can’t coach. They got all this talent, but they don’t win.’ Yeah. Because they worry about offense, scoring, shooting instead of execution, toughness, defense, rebounding. So somewhere along the line I lost my tie.”
on Jaime Jaquez Jr.’s role on the team
“He’s become an elite scorer in college basketball; you see that. My goal today was to get a bunch of guys minutes, so some of my act is staged, premeditated. But when we need a bucket, it’s pretty simple where you go. Very few guys in college basketball can score without the offense. Just give them the ball and they just go get it. That’s thing you usually only see in pros. You see that on TNT, not on ESPN. But he can do it. He can score over his man, around his man. But we’re a small team the way we play, so he and Jaylen Clark for us have to rebound. But he was a role player, a hustle guy, and he’s evolved. When you stay in school and you have a great attitude and you put the work in, you can evolve as a player. You see his evolution. He can really score.”
on his message to Tyger Campbell
“That we’re worried about the wrong things. Look, Tyger is the best. I’ve got no chance building this program without him. He’s not as tall as we list him. I don’t know if he can grab the rim. He’s done nothing but win here, and he’s the ultimate competitor. But at times, I want him to be more vocal, and he’s got to be an extension of me. So that’s the same message to Amari [Bailey]. They need to be an extension of me. And he’s older, so I couldn’t care less about his shooting. I care about his ball pressure, his body language, his talking to his teammates – where Dave Singleton excels at all. So does Dylan, really. So you saw where we started the second half. But hard for me to not admit that you’re playing Denver, and you know your next two games are Maryland and Kentucky. Maybe what Ben [Bolch] said honoring Jalen. When you’ve started four years, all the games and maybe you’re not as ready for today. But I just want him to be an All-American. I want him to play great every game. But I’ve got to protect my culture, so you’ve got to be an extension of me with your toughness and your fire and your competitiveness or you don’t get to play, and you definitely don’t get to start.”
on Will McClendon
“It was great. I’m so happy to have him out there. He passed up a shot I didn’t like. I ran a little play for him. He got 10 minutes. That’s his first real minutes in a long, long time, since they won the state at Bishop Gorman his junior year. He hates that knee brace; he doesn’t need it. The doctors like him wearing it for a couple of weeks, a certain period of time before they let him shed it. He hates it because of speed and quickness as a guard. But it was great to have him out there. I’m a big fan of Will. He defends, he’s everything that I just talked about. He believes in playing hard. All the right things. The guy’s got great parents, one of the best high school coaches in the country in Grant Rice. Can’t be me in golf, but he’s a great coach. I believe in Will. Really happy. Can’t imagine how happy he is right now. Imagine you haven’t played in two years; it’s crazy.”
on Jaylen Clark being back to form after the flu
“He’s a good player. He only made one bad play. I got upset late in the first half and said no more fouls, no more trapping. He fouled immediately, and Amari Bailey kept trapping. That might have been why the tie came off at halftime. Not sure.”
Junior guard Jaylen Clark
on head coach Mick Cronin’s tie coming off and his halftime message
“I think he went to the bathroom and just took off the tie.”
on scoring 24 points, the same jersey number that the late UCLA Bruin Jalen Hill wore
“It was huge. I don’t really talk about my high school career, but I attended the same high school as him my freshman year so I’ve been around him probably longer than anybody here. It’s crazy how life goes, and I haven’t read or looked at anything today. Just seeing his face from me remembering being 13 (and) 14 years old, running around with him every day to when we’re in COVID (times) and me, him and Tyger are sitting in the same corner where our lockers are because we got moved outside and we talking so much that our old trainer Wes is over there like, ‘Y’all need to be quiet.’ It puts the whole thing of life into perspective. You’ve got to make the most out of your day. Tomorrow isn’t promised. In the first half, it kind of affected me. I was just like, ‘damn’, the whole time. I’m looking around and I haven’t seen his mom and dad since the last game he played. It’s just really, really sad to see someone be gone like that. … We paid attention. First play we ran, we ran ’24 Out’. We was well aware.”
on seeing Will McClendon out there and score his first career points
“That’s big. It feels like I play with everybody. I didn’t play with Will from when I was like 9-to-13, if you know what I mean. Me and Will, we played on West Coast All-Stars together. (Our) parents are real tight, families are real tight. It’s great to see overcome all of that. I have never had an injury like that, but he’s been around here a whole year and hadn’t gotten to (reap) the benefits. He’s out there with us every day in practice and stuff and it’s nice to finally get to see him some shine and his name on the board. We’re a family here, and I feel like everybody is pretty happy for him.”
Senior guard/forward Jaime Jaquez Jr.
on how he was affected by the pregame ceremony
“I know Jalen Hill very well. Me and him were neighbors for a long period of time. Him ad Tyger and I was their next-door neighbor. We had a lot of great conversations over our time together. We wanted to run ’24 Out’ for him and I wear 24. It was always my number, but once he left, I called him to make sure everything was good. I didn’t want to just take it without letting him know. He was very welcoming of that and wanted me to have it and was always so positive towards what we were doing as a team. He was always so supportive, and we miss him dearly.”
on seeing Will McClendon out there and score his first career points
“Shoutout to Will.”
Freshman guard Dylan Andrews
on the 17-0 run to start the second half
“When we went on that (17-0) run, our defense just changed. We started hawking the point guard and went at him like the head of a snake. We knew for a fact that without him that they couldn’t get into their sets and run in their offense. So we started beating him up and they turned the ball over and we began capitalizing off that.”
on how it felt to spark the win
“Oh, it felt great. The energy is – one thing about me is I try to bring high energy off the bench with 1,000 percent effort.”
Denver head coach Jeff Wulbrun
overall statement
“UCLA’s pressure overwhelmed us. We had twelve turnovers in each half, which led to thirty-one points. It was overwhelming, but this was a good game to play before league play. This game exposed your deficiencies, so it’s good to play a team like this. Mick has really shaped this team. They are physical and tough-minded. They play great defense. He has done a really good job at molding his personality to this team. He has gotten very talented players to play defense and to play together. Mick has done a wonderful job with this team. I feel they could be in contention for a National Championship.”
on where they go from here
“We have a home game next week, a DII game. Then we’re on the road against Omaha, our first league game. Also, we have a non-conference game on December 21 against Oregon State.”
on the tradition and the mystique of playing in Pauley Pavilion
“Sure, we had some nerves initially. I felt that in the first half we competed. We kept the game competitive, but in the second half, we got overwhelmed.”