WATCH: Mick Cronin Talks Jaylen Clark's Emergence, UCLA's Road Trip to Oregon
UCLA men's basketball coach Mick Cronin talked to reporters before practice Wednesday morning, giving injury updates on Tyger Campbell and Peyton Watson, as well as sharing his thoughts on Jaylen Clark's emergence and the status of handshake lines in college basketball.
MICK CRONIN
Jaylen Clark's offensive emergence?
Well, he just needed practice reps and time. I just keep referring you back to my press conference early, probably our first press conference this year when I told you he was our most improved player by far. All you're seeing is what I saw in practice in the fall. And the second thing, he’s probably missed four breaks—three with concussions and a two-week COVID break, so it’s hard to get into a rhythm and he’s a young player. I think what people tend to forget is basketball players to develop, young athletes need time. They get better with time, they get better with reps and that’s just a factor with Jaylen. I think another thing that helps him with our team because we have shooting around him, his ability to get to the paint, he’s almost like a second point guard for us and that helps us because he can finish, so he’s bigger than Tyger with his penetration, but he also finds the open man if you bring a second defender to him, but none of it surprises me. Young players, they learn to play with more balance as they get more reps and they learn to slow down, which is how they get on balance as they get more reps. Everybody has to understand that Kevin Love and Lonzo Ball are in the one percentile. The rest of these guys are in the 99 percentile; you’ve got to give them some time.
NIL stuff in early stages and where does it go?
The early stages of NIL, it’s all great. I think everybody out there should hire all UCLA men’s basketball players to promote their products. Please contact them through their social media immediately. You know, there’s a lot of things going on in Westwood, you know it all happens so fast that there’s things that I know are going on from our end to help promote that and grow that and it’s so complicated as far as what I’m allowed to do, what UCLA’s allowed to do, and sometimes you can’t even get the answer on that. They’ll just say, ‘OK, you can do it,’ but there’s no regulation and what can your state do versus the other state, so it really gives you a headache trying to figure that side out, but I think there’s no doubt that in the next two to five years with the Alston case, the paying of players has been deemed legal and I think it’s a matter of when, not if, I should say, so change is coming to college athletics, it’s coming rapidly and you better embrace it. As you said, I’m pro player because I think our guys are treated like pros, they get the same scrutiny in the media—definitely on social media—and they’re not as old and grizzled as me to never look at that stuff. They do and it affects them, there’s no doubt about it, because they’re young people and they have feelings. So they’re just under a tremendous amount of pressure whether you’re Johnny Juzang or Dorian Thompson-Robinson, you have the same type of pressure as a professional, so I’m all for those guys reaping the same rewards to an extent as professionals.
Haven't done the handshake line because of COVID, but thoughts on it after the Michigan-Wisconsin fiasco?
Well, the only reason I was a proponent of stopping it in the Pac-12 was because of COVID, what we were going through with the virus and our shutdown. So with no COVID, the handshake line is about sportsmanship. I love coach Izzo, he said you’ve got to learn how to get your butt kicked and go shake the other guy’s hand. Again, to teach young people character, if you don’t want us to have a handshake line, it shouldn’t be because of what happened last weekend. That’s the last reason that should happen. I think the only time it’s a problem—I think there’s much bigger problems like court storming and fan behavior that’s reprehensible. I heard it last night, you know, where it was ‘F-you Jay’ at Jay Wright, it happened to Tyger and Johnny this year. Some of that stuff is beyond reprehensible, so I think there’s many more topics that need to be discussed as far as behavioral things, but there’s no need to cancel handshake lines. That would be a complete overreaction, but I do think there are other topics to be addressed. Fan behavior at times is really, really, it needs to be addressed—and that’s at all levels. And I’m talking about 12-year-old AAU basketball all the way to the NBA.
Playing three games in five days again prepare you for March now that it's on the road? Any upsides to that kind of schedule?
No. I would say the fact that we’ve got to play three this late in the year, I’ve been on the record that I think it’s for money only, so we’ve got to get through uninjured. That being said, we just take one game at a time. So we’re focused on Thursday in Eugene doing what we’ve got to do there and then we’ll focus on getting rested and mentally prepared for Saturday and repeat for Monday and hopefully get through it with gas in the tank. Gas in the tank is extremely important at the end of the year, so how we handle practice today, for example, we were off yesterday and our pregame preparation, everything you can do as a coach to get prepared mentally and you have to make sure your players are recovered physically. You want gas in the tank. The thing I can’t control that bothers me most about it is, you have to prepare mentally to win the game, so you worry that burnout part of it for your guys, constantly having to prepare for game after game after game and where that leaves them at the end of this, so when it’s over we need to make sure we get refreshed next Tuesday and Wednesday before the big game on senior day the last Saturday.
What did Oregon do so effectively last time you played?
Their 1-on-1 ability to score off the dribble really was the problem for us. In the overtime, they made like five consecutive jump shots off the dribble, none of them off the catch. It's not easy to defend those, but it's an area where we gotta tighten up our team defense, our 1-on-1 defense. That's multiple guards that can make that play off the bounce, whether it's Richardson, Harmon, Young, actually. Youn, obviously, had a big one against us and here lately, Quincy Guerrier had a big game against Arizona on Saturday. Oregon, in a loss, looked like a top-10 team at Arizona on Saturday. They played so hard, they had guys cramping at the end of the game. It was a tale of two teams. I know coach Altman's fighting hard to get this team in the tournament and he's a tremendous coach, one of the best in the country because he's such a competitor and has so much pride. Obviously, this is a monster homestand for Oregon. So I would say, Tracy, the No. 1 thing you need to understand is we are gonna have to win Thursday. I know this sounds really simple, but we've gotta want to win Thursday as much as they do. If the other team is willing to do more physically, emotionally, than you are, you're not gonna win. So we have to understand what we're up against on Thursday and the situation Oregon's in.
David Singleton coming back next year?
It looks that way, it looks that way. Obviously, here at UCLA, you gotta get admitted to grad school and David's somebody that I have extreme belief in. So he knows he's more than welcome to do that. And then here, you can't wait until summer, so there's things that gotta go on here. Our grad programs are extremely challenging. As hard as it is to get into UCLA, it may be harder to get into grad school.
Also made a reference to Jaime coming back?
I don't know what you're talking about. I mean, look, whatever our guys – Johnny, Jaime, guys that are juniors – you know me, Tracy, I'm gonna support whatever they do and their decision with all of our players in the spring. Obviously, I hope Jaime Jaquez plays for me until I retire, that would be my answer with that.
Injury updates on Tyger and Peyton?
We'll see how they do today in practice. So I would say they're both day-to-day with their situations, so they're similar to their head coach in that regard, Ben.
Tyger improved?
We were off yesterday. We'll go through things today, see how that goes. I wish I could tell you – you don't go from not being able to play on Monday to 100% on Wednesday morning, so we'll see. I know you know Tyger's a soldier, that's the first game he's missed here for me with injury. If he's not out there, it's cause he just can't.
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