UCLA Basketball: Mick Cronin Running Out Of Excuses After Maryland Loss

Your new-look UCLA Bruins have fallen to a shocking sub-.500 record 11 games into their 2023-24 NCAA season. With eight new players, including seven freshmen (the eighth is junior transfer wing Lazar Stefanovic), it's perhaps not a total shock that there's been some adjustment period for UCLA, which as you'll recall rode a veteran-laden roster to a Sweet Sixteen berth last spring.

Following a 69-60 loss against the Maryland Terrapins on Friday, the Bruins are now 5-6 on the year. It's also their fourth straight defeat.

Seventh-season head coach Mick Cronin was grasping at straws in trying to explain why his club has been struggling, per UCLA Communications.

"I don’t see positive in losses... I was concerned about this, after we played four NCAA Tournament teams and lost four bloodbaths, really good games... At the beginning of games we’ve got guys not coming close on free throws and open shots. So it’s just hard to win, man. It snowballs. It’s just my opinion. They’re good kids, they’re young. Clearly we don’t have a go-to guy. Yes, we need to get more out of Adem [Bona], but we have a confidence problem. It’s very clear to me. And what happens is they get rattled, and then they don’t play the defensive assignments correctly. So it snowballs, right? When you’re young, I think they’re trying to live up to the letters on the jersey, and the ball is not going in, and they start to feel the snowball effect of it. Just, this is my opinion.”

Bona is more of a defensive anchor, and hasn't exploded as a scorer just yet. Perhaps if he's featured more in the offense, that will happen.