SEATTLE — Alaska Airlines Arena was evacuated late Friday night, with only a few fans remaining to take photos with players and coaches on the field.
Outside the UCLA locker room, a group of family and friends gathered around the forward Tyler BilodeauTheir expressions reflect concern about the ankle he suffered during the match.
After he completed his radio interview after the Bruins’ huge victory over Washington, Coach Mick Cronin He asked a colleague where he could find the only reporter traveling to cover the team. The coach turned the corner to find the reporter and team videographer waiting for him in the nearby hallway.
“Do you think they played the game late enough?” Cronin cracked up before taking the first question. “What time?”
It was eleven o’clock in the evening, and the night was far from over. There was a 25-minute bus ride to Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, followed by an approximately two-and-a-half-hour flight to Los Angeles.
“We’ll be home at 2 a.m., 3 a.m.,” said Cronin, whose Bruins (14-6 overall, 5-4 Big Ten) just won their third straight game to raise their conference record. .500. “We should have played this game at midnight. When you sell your soul to television, that’s just what it is, and this is college sports — we sold our soul to television, so we’ll go home at midnight, get some rest and prepare the best we can.” Play a team [USC] Who played on Wednesday, took Thursday off and was focused on us while we were here, so there’s a lot of inequality in this thing.
“I’m sure at some point later in the year things will go our way – I haven’t found that out yet, but I hope so.”
This was the result of a brutal expansion of the Bruins family. The team had just played four of its last seven games on the road, including a home game sandwiched between two trips that would have been played in Las Vegas instead of Los Angeles.
That way, at least USC’s opponent, Michigan, had to change hotels and do some traveling themselves instead of staying in Southern California for two days before facing the Bruins after their win over USC.
Cronin credited his coach, Tyler Lesher, and director of basketball performance, Dave Andrews, for keeping them fresh with a Big Ten schedule that requires longer drives and less consistency than the Bruins enjoyed in the Pac-12, when most of their games were on Thursdays and Saturdays.
Their new schedule includes games every day of the week except Wednesday as part of the Big Ten’s effort to provide attractive inventory to television partners.
“The Pac-12 is terrible for your national exposure when all your teams are playing at the same time, so if you want big TV contracts, and you want national exposure, you have to spread your games widely and that’s part of it,” Cronin said.
UC also takes much longer trips, though perhaps not as long as Cronin alluded to when asked about the inequality between Big Ten teams based on the West Coast and their conference counterparts.
“We’ve seen the Eiffel Tower — or the Statue of Liberty — twice in the last three weeks on our way down,” said Cronin, who could be forgiven for this mistake given all the miles we’ve covered. “We also saw the Capitol. Then we have to go back.” [to Indianapolis] For the Big Ten Championship!
UCLA guard Sebastian Mack, second from left, drives his car toward Rutgers guard JaMichael Davis, left, during a game on Jan. 13 in Piscataway, New Jersey.
(Julia Demaree Nickinson/Associated Press)
The only thing keeping this schedule from feeling truly professional is the lack of back-to-back games. Practices were truncated, Cronin said, and some days included only weightlifting and drills for players who did not play in games.
“It’s like the deal of the NBA right now — a lot of film, a lot of guidance, a lot of serendipity without bumping into each other and we have to keep them fresh for games because it’s not just playing every three days for us to travel,” Cronin said. “It’s just part of it when you’re buried on the coast.”
The Big Ten did its best to build equity into conference schedules by allowing UCLA to play road games against its three closest opponents — USC, Oregon and Washington — and combining two more trips so the Bruins wouldn’t have to travel far between games.
Next month, UCLA will travel 166 miles between games at Illinois and Indiana. On their final trip of the regular season, the Bruins will travel 141 miles between games at Purdue and Northwestern.
But there were also some missed opportunities. A one-time trip to Nebraska earlier this month probably could have been included as part of a three-game trip. UCLA’s trip to take on Maryland and Rutgers probably could have been scheduled immediately after the Bruins face North Carolina at Madison Square Garden in New York.
Equal rest was another point of contention. Maryland was getting two extra days of rest when it stifled UCLA on its home court. USC will also get two additional days of rest when the teams meet Monday night at the Galen Center.
Cronin was skeptical when a reporter recently asked if Big Ten teams coming east to face UCLA had similar wear issues as the Bruins.
“Are you worn out on them?” Cronin said.
The reporter said: Yes.
“Is this a joke?” Cronin said. Please tell me this is a joke.”
The reporter said: “Can it be compared?”
Said Cronin: “For comparison? Have you ever looked at the NBA stats on punters and everything these guys do in the West versus the East? Talk to [USC coach] Eric Musselman, ask him this question, who coaches in the NBA. Good luck, west is heading east. Ask me about UCLA’s record east of the Mississippi River in the past 20 years. When I got the job, I researched it for scheduling purposes. It’s under .500, okay? We have to go back [east] Four times. Oh, Big Ten teams have to come to Los Angeles, where it’s 70 degrees, once a year. They don’t even have to switch hotels. We are 12 miles away. Are you kidding me? Please, tell me you’re kidding me. I mean is this a plant? Is this a planted question? I mean you can’t be serious about that.
A week later, deep inside Alaska Airlines Arena, Cronin patiently answered a reporter’s questions about traveling and playing almost every day of the week, even if he had trouble keeping it clear.
“All I know is we play SC on Monday, right?” Cronin said.
