Arizona Basketball: Wildcats bounce Cougars, earn win No. 20

Arizona Basketball (20-10) halts a three game slid with a much-needed win over the Washington State Cougars (15-15) at McKale Center Thursday night.

Arizona Basketball had their backs against the wall on Thursday night, they needed to beat Washington State to keep their hopes alive for a No. 4 ranking in the Pac-12 Conference and a bye next week in the Pac-12 Tournament in Las Vegas.

Now all that’s left is to beat Washington on Saturday and UCLA has to beat USC at Galen Center. While it sounds daunting, it is indeed doable!

Arizona Wildcats Basketball

Nico Mannion has honestly found his groove shooting from all over the court of late, and I don’t think we have ever seen a floater from the side of the basket from him, but he made it!

When Nico’s shot is going in, the team has a much better chance of winning. His passes have reached NBA-level whether it is a lob to Zeke Nnaji, or a rifle pass to whomever he finds under the basket, there is no denying Nico has found his groove, and we are all here for it.

Win or lose we have to admit the officiating was much better last night than it was in the UCLA game, drastically better. The fouls seemed to be called equally, 19 called against Arizona, 14 called against Wazzu.

Wazzu actually made all eight free-throw attempts in the first half, meanwhile Arizona went 2-3 from the charity stripe.

Both teams struggled to make their shots in the first half as Arizona actually made 36.4 percent of their shots vs. Wazzu who made 31.3 percent. The game was basically even at the half with free throws seeming making the difference. Arizona went into the locker room behind by two points, 31-29.

At halftime, Brent Marr hit a half-court shot to win something, not sure what, but he reacted by going over to hug the Athletic Director Dave Heeke, meanwhile the crowd went wild as they were ready for a great second half.

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Perhaps Heeke should give Brent a court-side seat at every game from here on out? Can we thank Brent? Seems like the Wildcat lucky charm now!! Either way, the Cats came out of the locker room solemn, no skipping according to Jason Scheer, “Arizona looks like Sean Miller murdered someone at halftime.”

Whatever the reason, the Cats couldn’t miss and went on a 2nd half 26-0 run and never looked back. The highlight of the game was when Stone Gettings went in for a huge slam dunk off a bounce pass from Nico.

Can we just say right here, Dylan Smith is playing out of his mind on defense. He never gives up and doesn’t seem to run out of steam. Nnaji is the go-to guy under the basket but showed us he has nice outside jumper as well. He and Mannion where the high scorers on the team in both halves:

• Nico: 23 points, seven assists and two rebounds
• Zeke: 24 points, seven rebounds and two assists

Jemarl Baker Jr. dished five assists and scored eight points, while Josh Green, who was a welcome site back on the court, scored 12 points and added four rebounds and four assists. The Wildcats as a whole logged 22 assists which has proven to be a telling stat along with turnovers to which the team kept to 13 total.

Head Coach Sean Miller, who didn’t get any technicals, was happy to have a confident team once again. He was impressed that Green had bounced back so fast, but not in the first half, he attributed the sluggish first half to Green.

Anytime the third string role players get in a game, it’s a good thing and that happened on Thursday night. Chase Jeter will return after Saturday’s game, Max Hazzard we will find out when we find out. Smith educated us all in a postgame press conference, “We are always just two or three plays away from winning,” pointing out that Oregon was unranked last season and they won the Pac-12 tournament. On to Washington who just beat ASU. We also have to hold our noses and root for UCLA to beat USC.