It took a few minutes for patches of empty Pauley Pavilion seats to be filled in for Thursday night’s game against No. 1 Arizona.
The culprit? Horrible traffic clogging the streets of Westwood and entrances to campus parking structures.
UCLA held its own against a long Arizona defense for 20 minutes of play, drawing on what is undoubtedly Pauley Pavilion’s largest crowd of the young season. Still, the Bruins had trouble getting to the hoop against the Pac-12’s signature traffic jam of a defense, and trail 42-38 at the half.
UCLA struggled a bit late to earn a field goal percentage of 38.5 percent for the half, but struggled to get anywhere close to the paint. The Wildcats didn’t commit their first foul until well over seven minutes had expired, and the Bruins didn’t take a free throw until 5:31, shooting from the charity stripe a total of four times in the opening 20 minutes.
A layup from Arizona junior guard Nick Johnson gave the Wildcats a six-point lead, their largest lead of the half, while UCLA’s lone three-pointer, a miracle bank shot from freshman guard Bryce Alford, knotted things up at 29 with 4:50 remaining. The Wildcats closed the half on a 13-9 run.
Arizona’s biggest weapons of the half were Johnson, who had 10 points, as well as 7-foot center Kaleb Tarczewski, who nearly matched his per-game average with nine.
A big surprise for the Bruins has been their rebounding game, which stood at a plus-one advantage at the half. Redshirt senior forward Travis Wear and sophomore guard/forward Kyle Anderson each have six points, while sophomore forward/center Tony Parker is the Bruins’ leading scorer with eight.