Colorado University Athletics
Colorado
12-15, 5-10
Arizona
25-3, 13-2
No. 7 Wildcats Cruise Past Cold, Erratic Buffs, 82-54
February 26, 2015 | Men's Basketball, B.G. Brooks
BOULDER – Arizona might have been out of its element weather-wise, but the No. 7 Wildcats came in from the cold and quickly made themselves at home Thursday night inside the Coors Events Center. And the Colorado Buffaloes could do nothing about it, pushing their coach to the boiling point.
The Wildcats overpowered the cold and inefficient Buffs, 82-54, beating them for the sixth consecutive time. Of those six straight losses, none have been closer than 10 points, with Thursday night's defeat the worst during that stretch.
Arizona (25-3, 13-2 Pac-12) rolled to a 27-point win – 88-61 – last February in the CEC, and the Wildcats' 28-point win this February tied for the Buffs' worst home loss of the Tad Boyle era. Utah slapped CU 79-51 on Feb. 7 in Boulder.
"It's extremely frustrating," said Boyle, who watched his team (12-15, 5-10) lose its third consecutive game and the sixth of its last seven. "It's February 26th and we're not executing offensively. We're not doing the things we're supposed to do, we're not making plays and we haven't gotten any better.
"If you look at the teams that I've had here as a head coach, I feel that each team, outside of my first year, had progress and got better throughout the year. I don't feel like that with this team. I don't feel like we've gotten any better. We're still making the same mistakes that we did in November and we're not any better, offensively or defensively."
Much of Boyle's frustration seemed centered on his team's passivity. "There has to be some fight in the locker room and right now there isn't," said Boyle, who was whistled for a second-half technical foul. "It's like a submissive, beat-us-now-while-you-can kind of mentality. That's embarrassing. These guys are young men and they haven't been through what they're going through before. They're finding out a cruel life lesson: life isn't going to give you anything. Division One athletics teaches you that it's a very humbling and unforgiving arena. If you want to step into that arena you had better be willing to sacrifice and do whatever it takes to win and we aren't willing to do that."
At the other end of Thursday's spectrum was Arizona coach Sean Miller. "I told the team afterwards that this was one of those games, that I really have a great feeling about being their coach, about all of us being on the same team," he said. "Reason why I say it is, that I really felt about four days ago that our practices and the collective attitude of our team has never been better."
Arizona badly outrebounded CU, finishing with a hefty 38-25 board advantage. The Wildcats shot 53 percent from the field (27-of-51) while the Buffs managed just 38 percent (20-of-52). That was a percentage point higher than CU's best shooting mark over its five previous games.
The Wildcats went 5-of-10 from long range and made 23 of their 25 free throw attempts while the home team made 12 of its 21 tries from the line and was 2-for-9 from beyond the arc. And of Arizona's 14 assists, T.J. McConnell contributed six – matching CU's team total.
Leading by 12 points at halftime, the Wildcats effectively finished the Buffs in the second half's first 51/2 minutes, with 7-foot, 245-pound Kaleb Tarczewski muscling his way for eight straight points at the rim.
With 14:30 to play, Arizona surged to a 19-point lead and CU never recovered. Steadily pulling away, the Wildcats' 28-point final margin was their largest of the night.
Scoring eight of his 14 points in the second half, Tarczewski was six-of-eight from the field and was one of five Wildcats in double figures. Stanley Johnson led Arizona with 15 points, while Gabe York added 14 and Brandon Ashley and Rondae Hollis-Jefferson had 11 each.
Askia Booker was the only Buff in double figures, scoring 14 points but hitting only 5-of-16 from the field. Boyle called Booker "a prolific scorer and he was trying to be aggressive, but he has to find a way to make others around him better. He's trying, he is, but he's not getting much help. It's frustration on both parts."
Boyle said Booker "is who he is and we know what he is. He's a career 40 percent shooter and that won't change down the stretch. There has to be a belief that he has in his team and his teammates have in him and I'm not sure it's there, but the fact is that we didn't execute. Arizona had a lot to do with that, they're the No. 7 team in the country and don't beat themselves."
CU post Josh Scott, who finished with nine points and six rebounds, said "there's players on this team that aren't stepping up. But, I will say that me and Xavier (Johnson, with Scott in the postgame interview room) don't have control of that. We just try to do what we're told. But obviously we haven't been successful in it."
Johnson, who had three points and one rebound, contended the Buffs "need to be more focused. And I feel like we need to show that we care more. It's hard sometimes. I'm not saying we don't care but it's just hard to battle sometimes."
CU dropped to 0-4 this season against Top 25 opponents and 0-3 against Top 10 foes. In Boyle's first four seasons as their coach, the Buffs had defeated at least one nationally ranked team. They won't get another chance until possibly the Pac-12 Tournament in two weeks in Las Vegas.
Down by 15 points just under the six-minute mark of the first half, the Buffs trailed by a dozen at the break – 37-25 – matching their largest home halftime deficit of the season. Utah was up 35-23 earlier this month in its visit to the CEC.
Thursday night's first half – and ultimately the game – was close for the first three minutes. But with the score tied at 4-4, Arizona launched a 13-3 run that was capped by York's two free throws for a 17-7 Wildcats lead. York contributed five points during that surge, including the first of his three 3-pointers in the half.
Booker opened only 3-of-12 from the field, and his first-half misfiring was emblematic of his team's. CU went to the locker room shooting 33 percent (10-of-30) while Arizona was hitting 48 percent (13-of-27) and winning the first-half board battle 22-16. And it would only get worse.
With Tarczewski working the paint nearly unchallenged and scoring eight consecutive points, Arizona surged ahead by 19 (51-32) in the second half's first six minutes.
If something didn't change fast – namely on the defensive end, in effort, and in hitting a few shots – any hope the Buffs had of defeating a Top 10 team was about to be swept out into the snowy evening.
Nothing changed.
Said Boyle: "I don't think that there is one guy that I can look at and say that he played well tonight. Not one. Not one guy. Usually we have one or two guys and if it's good we have four or five. Looking at Arizona, they had five guys in double figures, we had one. We don't have guys making each other better, our team just hasn't improved. That's on me, that's the responsibility of the head coach and I haven't done a very good job."
The Buffs host Arizona State on Sunday (6:30 p.m., ESPNU) in their final regular season home game.
