UCLA Basketball: Bruins Have a Rough Time in Win, Now 13-0

The UCLA Basketball team has completed the non-conference season with a 13-0 record, but it was not easy as Western Michigan put up a fight in the Bruins’ 82-66 win.

Sure it took the UCLA Basketball team 37 minutes to wake up and put the hurt on Western Michigan, but better late than never.

Though the Bruins led for most of the game, the Broncos were in step with the #2 team in the nation for most of the game.

UCLA is not a great defensive team and WMU exploited that. The Broncos attacked the basket with little resistance and even got several open looks from behind the arc.

Though the Broncos only made 38.5% of their threes, the Bruins were worse from downtown as they shot 27.3%.

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The Bruins led 45-33 at halftime and though they started the game slow, it was expected that they would come out of the locker room re-energized, a trait they have developed this season.

Unfortunately, the opposite happened as Western Michigan went on an 8-0 run to start the second half.

The Broncos held on for as long as they could, but UCLA started to slowly pull away with less than ten minutes left in the game.

What doomed the Broncos were turnovers and foul trouble. WMU gave up the ball 17 times, though UCLA did not do much better with 15 of their own.

But it was the fouls that gave UCLA the advantage as they went to the charity stripe 16 times, making ten. Western Michigan only had 3 free throw attempts, making just one.

Bryce Alford led all Bruins in scoring with 22, which was fueled by four three-pointers. Aaron Holiday (16), TJ Leaf (14) and Isaac Hamilton (11) were the other Bruins who scored in double-digits.

It was ugly, but the bottom line is that it is a win. The 13th straight win to be exact. This is the first time the Bruins have been perfect in their non-conference schedule since the 1994-95 season, the year they last won a national championship.