Tommy Lloyd’s key for Arizona’s success is letting Wildcats play

As Arizona Basketball is off to another hot start, the key to the Wildcats’ success is head coach Tommy Lloyd letting the team play. 

We are already at the halfway point through the 2022-23 Arizona Basketball season and the Wildcats are off to another hot this season.

Earning five quad one wins and currently sitting at No. 5 in the latest AP Top 25 poll rankings, the Wildcats are having a heck of a year with head coach Tommy Lloyd in year two of his coaching tenure in Tucson.

As Arizona earned yet another big win this past weekend against Arizona State in Tempe, the key to the Wildcats’ success is Tommy Lloyd letting the team play.

Building a 17-point lead at halftime, it seemed all too likely that the Wildcats would run away in this one. The offense was efficient, the defense was getting stops which led to transition points.

However, as ASU made its first seven shots in the second half, and eventually cut Arizona’s lead to just two points with 13:06 to play, only once during the Sun Devils’ furious did coach Lloyd call a timeout. Even then, it wasn’t until the score was 49-46 with 14:10 to play.

Unlike most coaches who would have likely called a timeout to get their team on the same page and calm their players down, Lloyd let his players play on.

Ultimately, coach Lloyd is right, we are all just armchair coaches, and he knows better, after all, he is the one coaching with a 46–5 coaching record.

As we have learned in his coaching tenure, it appears he likes to let his team play and learn from their mistakes in real-time and adapt to get better in those situations, rather than micromanage the game. This has been a huge part of his success as head coach and should continue to help this team as the games more meaningful in March.

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