WATCH: Mick Cronin Breaks Down UCLA's Win Over Oregon State

The Bruins' coach touched on the low-possession nature of Thursday's game, as well as Amari Bailey's breakout performance.

UCLA men's basketball coach Mick Cronin spoke to reporters following the Bruins' 62-47 win over Oregon State at Gill Coliseum on Thursday night. Cronin talked about how the Beavers tried to make it a low-possession game, Amari Bailey scoring in a lot of different ways, Jaylen Clark ending his shooting slump and what lies ahead in Eugene on Saturday.

They didn't get 30 until 7:34 left, so that was a defensive special?

Yeah, you know, I thought we played pretty decent on that end. But they – you know, they're in a good strategy, take their time on offense a lot, played deliberate to try to shorten the game. So it was very – I would have to see our points per possession, which was still probably pretty good, but it was a low possession game cause of their patience, which we tried to – we end up with nine steals, we tried to play a lot of people tonight. Obviously, we play again (Saturday), kept guys under 30 minutes, in particular Tyger and Jaime. But yeah, I mean, look, we always try to focus on things we can control. We still got sloppy with the ball at the end of the game, but I'm gonna focus on the positives.

Two more positives – Amari and Jaylen, huge nights for them?

Yeah, that would be the biggest one. As you know, I said to you in the press conference Tuesday, I think, we gotta get to a point where we can win games when Tyger and Jaime don't score a lot. And it's a long road for us cause back when we scrimmaged San Diego State, I think they had 58 between them. And then obviously you've got David. But so we needed to get to this point where, you know, our two leading scorers are Amari and Jaylen, or whoever else, but tonight it was Amari and Jaylen. You can't just be, you know, Tyger and Jaime and pray for rain on the offensive end. So that was my biggest positive, for sure, tonight.

Amari scoring in a lot of different ways?

Well that's the thing. Well, he's doing less with more – or sorry, he's doing more with less. And the trick on that is less dribbles, being more efficient. You know, young players, they play showcases, they play high school games where you can dribble the ball a lot of times and get away with it. You know, at this level, you can't do that. You gotta shoot when you're open, you gotta be able to go punch a gap one-two and score, you know? And I still want him to get to the foul line more, I still have a lot of work to do with him, but he's still only 18, his birthday's coming up. And, you know, he's playing in the super senior era against a lot of 22 to 24 year olds, and the kid's out there, he's only 18, which shows you how talented he is. He's just got unbelievable talent. My job's to help him figure all that out and how to use it. But we got him in a lot of good positions tonight. The one thing about him, he can finish at the rim over big people, which is something that's a big plus.

Jaylen broke out of his shooting slump?

Yeah, um, you know, we've shown him a lot of film and worked with him every day after practice. (???) Jaylen Clark's so intelligent that when you show him things and talk to him about things, he understands. I mean, his aptitude is great, he's just gotta makes the changes. He's worked really hard getting his head up where he sees his target when he's driving, not just his perimeter shooting. I'm more worried about, you know, his finishing 8 feet and in. He was quick shooting the ball before he even saw his target and nobody's gonna shoot the ball well that way. But that's our job to coach him through it.

Keys to big game Saturday?

Well, I think a big key was that we were able to rest some guys today. You know, we kept shootaround short, we kept practices – you know, it's this time of year where we practice way less, more mental preparation and we're able to keep shooting around shorter today and keep guys' minutes down today. It's important, you know, because in Tyger and Jaime's case, we've ridden them like Secretariat (???) all year, so, you know. I woulda said Chad, but you wouldn't know who that was, ran second a lot behind Secretariat. So we've ridden those two guys pretty hard, you know, so to be able to – for them to, you know, not have to score tonight, not have to do too much, not have their minutes be too high is a nice, nice thing for them, cause we're gonna need them Saturday, for sure. It's a long year, it's a long year. Gotta get Tyger back going, last couple of games he hasn't shot the ball, so. But I already know, you know, technically, what I've gotta know. He's gotta get the ball off his shoulder. So I gotta work with him on that tomorrow, get a little exercise tomorrow.

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