At the Pauley Pavilion, near UCLA's campus in downtown Los Angeles, the Bruins knocked off the Utah Utes, in their first win over a ranked opponent this season. The home side held the number eleven ranked team in the nation to under sixty points for only the third time this season -- Utah lost the other two times they were held to to below 60 points as well -- as they were defeated by a score of 69-59.
One of the keys of the night for the Bruins was to not turn the ball over, because that would lead to easy buckets for the Utes in transition. Throughout the entire 40 minutes, UCLA turned the ball over just six times while finishing the evening with 15 assits, which is a very good ratio for any school. It was Bryce Alford who led the way in that category by providing nearly half, seven, of the total amount of assists. This was evident of their game plan the entire night as they tried to attack the long arms of Utah. Norman Powell played excellently tonight finished as the leading scorer with 23 points, shooting over 50% on the night and making five out of six shots from the charity strike.
Utah had a decent shooting night as they made 23 out of their 47 shot attempts from the field, which is good for 49%, but it was their shot selection from behind that three point line that let them down. Brandon Taylor made four shots from beyond the arc, but he took nine attempts, and as a whole the Utes shot the ball 22 times. This means that nearly half of their total shots for the game came from deep and when you only make seven of them, it is not going to be a very good night any program.
The Utes will hope they can turn things around quickly as they play the USC Trojans on Sunday afternoon while the Bruins will play hosts to the Colorado Buffalos Saturday night.