Mick Cronin says blame me after UCLAs loss to

COLUMBUS, Ohio — There have been the same old suspects as Mick Cronin met with two reporters to assess what had gone flawed, UCLA’s season-long defensive and rebounding issues plaguing them once more.

Then got here one thing completely different as the Bruins’ coach pointed the finger at a new offender.

Himself.

“Blame me — blame me,” Cronin said after his group’s 86-74 loss to Ohio State on Saturday afternoon at the Schottenstein Center. “I recruited ‘em, I signed them as free agents. We’re not going to win meaningful games if we can’t stop the other team.”

Once hailed as big winners in the offseason when they landed top switch level guard Donovan Dent, the Bruins are trending toward being one of the most important disappointments of the school basketball season.

They can’t defend for long stretches, and when they do they often give up an offensive rebound. Xavier Booker’s transition to middle will not be figuring out. Tyler Bilodeau can’t appear to discover enough offensive assist. Dent seems to be an average level guard at the Big Ten stage.

UCLA’s limitations have been on full, irritating show once more against the Buckeyes as it obtained hammered on the boards and gave up too many big runs in having its two-game successful streak end.

Afterward, as he unloaded on his group and himself inside a inexperienced room that had been used for corgis taking part in a halftime race — a number of plastic water bowls remaining on the ground and a sleeve of tennis balls on a counter — Cronin acknowledged that there’s no straightforward options for a group that began the season ranked No. 12 in the nation but most likely wouldn’t make the NCAA event if it began today.

“I’m highly disappointed in getting our ass kicked physically and our inability to play defense,” said Cronin, whose 2½-minute media session may need been his shortest in seven seasons with the Bruins. “I offer no excuses.”

Some may say it’s robust to win on the street in this convention — particularly with guard Skyy Clark sidelined once more by a hamstring injury — but the Bruins fell short in the power and toughness departments as properly while falling behind by as many as 19 factors.

“Everybody wants somebody else to get the dirty work,” Cronin said. “We’re a team that struggles to have dirty-work guys.”

So what could be achieved about that going ahead?

“Nothing,” Cronin said. “I can’t trade guys. You get your ass kicked physically, you don’t defend in the Big Ten, you’re going to lose.”

After giving up 12-0 and 8-0 runs early in the second half, UCLA (12-6 general, 4-3 Big Ten) was additional deflated when it gave up two offensive rebounds on the same possession and then dedicated a foul to ship a Buckeyes participant to the free-throw line.

Ohio State (12-5, 4-3) shot 53% and received the rebounding battle, 37-27, with 12 offensive rebounds main to 17 second-chance factors. Cronin identified that the Buckeyes missed only 25 photographs, that means they rebounded nearly half their misses. Guards John Mobley Jr. (28 factors, six three-pointers) and Bruce Thornton (21 factors, eight rebounds) have been major nuisances for a protection incapable of offering more than token resistance.

“We had nobody who could guard Thornton or Mobley,” Cronin said. “In my opinion, we didn’t have anyone interested in rising to that challenge.”

Bilodeau’s 30 factors weren’t practically enough on a day that Dent added 13 (after making only his third and fourth three-pointers of the season) and ahead Eric Dailey Jr. fouled out with practically 9 minutes left after accumulating 12 factors and 4 rebounds. Three days after he tallied a career-high 30 factors, UCLA guard Trent Perry might handle only seven while making two of 9 photographs.

“I didn’t really offensively show up for my team,” Perry said. “I feel like I could’ve done a lot better in different areas so, of course, on my behalf it’s for sure on me.”

UCLA performed a fourth consecutive sport without guard Clark, who continues to close in on a return from the injury he suffered in the second half of his group’s loss to Iowa earlier this month. Clark’s absence offered more minutes for Eric Freeny (two factors) and Jamar Brown (eight factors, three rebounds), who had a negligible affect.

Meanwhile, Cronin is perhaps closing in on a tough choice — what to do about Booker. The big man obtained another start Saturday before offering little or no in return. He obtained yanked after only two minutes, never to return after Cronin pointed to the spot of an obvious defensive breakdown as Booker walked past him on his approach to taking a seat on the bench.

“Trying to play the guys that I think give us the best chance to win,” Cronin said when requested about Booker’s enjoying time.

Steven Jamerson II began the second half in Booker’s place. It made no distinction for a group with too many deficiencies.

Where do the Bruins go from right here? Things might deteriorate additional against No. 5 Purdue on Tuesday at Pauley Pavilion unless this group finds a approach to do issues otherwise.

“We have to come together as a group,” Perry said. “We keep losing because we’re not rebounding, we keep getting out-rebounded. We’re not talking as much. It was a totally different energy from Penn State to now, in my opinion — especially just, like, talking. I felt, even myself, we were kind of quiet. But we gotta pick it up.”

A home sport against one of the nation’s top groups could be a great place to start.