This post was updated Nov. 8 at 12:17 p.m.
On the final possession of the first half, Peyton Watson isolated at the top of the key.
“I knew exactly what was going to happen,” said junior guard/forward Jaime Jaquez Jr. “I’ve seen it a bunch of times in practice.”
Freshman guard/forward Watson dribbled slowly as the final seconds of the first half ticked away. He then crossed over his defender, drove toward the hoop and flushed a dunk in front of The Den.
The first-half buzzer sounded and Watson turned toward the student section, letting out a roar to the bleachers.
“Coach (Mick Cronin) gave me the ball, he trusted me with the ball at the end of the half,” Watson said. “I just knew I had to do something to give us momentum going into the next half.”
The new faces in Westwood, Watson and redshirt senior center Myles Johnson, contributed on both ends of the floor in No. 2 UCLA men’s basketball’s 100-61 exhibition win over Chico State. The pair of newcomers combined for 18 points in 37 minutes in their first game under the lights in Pauley Pavilion.
On a team that returned all of its active players from its Final Four run seven months ago, the new Bruins held their own defensively as well, with Johnson logging nine rebounds and two blocks on the night. Watson tallied eight boards along with nine pass deflections – a statistic that Cronin said he has always used to measure his defense’s performance.
The Bruins were quickly out to a double-digit lead over the Wildcats with 11:34 to go in the first half. Cronin’s lineup early in the game featured the usual staples from last year’s squad.
“Just walking out of the tunnel, running out to go into layup lines, just seeing the crowd, I was so happy,” Jaquez said. “I had a big smile on my face. That’s something that I dearly missed. The crowd is what you want in games – it’s what you play for.”
Jaquez hit all four of his first-half shots, leading the Bruins with 12 points in the first 20 minutes. Junior guard Johnny Juzang went 0-of-4 to start the game but contributed two baskets by the end of the first half.
At the first media timeout, Johnson and Watson got their first minutes as Bruins. Out of the gate, Johnson pulled in one offensive and one defensive board and scored his first points in blue and gold at the 11:34 mark.
By the end of the opening 20 minutes, Johnson was second on the team in scoring with 10 points and had secured seven rebounds.
“(Johnson’s) size is something we need,” Cronin said. “We needed two things: We needed a great athlete that happens to be a great player – which is Peyton – and we needed a guy with size that happens to be a veteran, very effective defensive player.”
UCLA forced 11 turnovers out of Chico State in the first half. With those mistakes, the Bruins began running the floor, expanding their lead with each runout.
The newcomers played their part on the fastbreak too. At the 1:56 mark, Johnson logged his first of two first-half blocks and outletted the ball down the court to Juzang, who slammed down a dunk to push the UCLA lead to 12.
After Watson’s dunk concluded the half, the Bruin lead sat at 18 – and it only grew from there.
“(Watson) has no limits offensively,” Cronin said. “He handles the ball like he’s 5’10”. He’s got very quick feet. Most 6’8” guys can’t change direction the way he can, which is why he’s going to have such a long career in basketball.”
After three minutes in the second half, 3-pointers by Jaquez, Juzang and senior guard Jules Bernard pushed the Bruin advantage to 23. By the 15-minute mark, Watson and Johnson were back on the floor.
An inside pass near the hoop by redshirt junior guard Tyger Campbell set Watson up for his first second-half points. A few possessions later, Johnson put himself in the second-half box score with a put-back dunk.
To push the lead to 26, Watson collected a Bruin miss with 11 minutes to go, finding Juzang in the corner for a 3-pointer. On the night, he logged four assists, second only to Jaquez. An intercepted pass by Watson a minute later could have started another UCLA fast break, but Watson lost the handle before he could find a teammate.
Watson was replaced by Jaquez, who had not seen the floor since the second half’s first five minutes. Jaquez was quickly back on the score sheet, though, increasing UCLA’s lead to 29 with buckets on his first two possessions after subbing in.
The junior led the Bruins’ scoring, with 21 points on the night on 100% scoring from the field and from the line.
UCLA’s lead was 34 points with five minutes to go, and after The Den had called for him minutes prior, senior guard Russell Stong made an appearance. He played five minutes before the final buzzer, finishing with four points. Redshirt junior forward/center Kenneth Nwuba also got in on the action with five points on 2-of-3 shooting and three blocks.
UCLA’s first official game will be held Tuesday against Cal State Bakersfield.
