Alexander: UCLA’s seniors leave a basketball legacy, but what now?

LAS VEGAS — It was the end of the road for the UCLA’s men’s basketball team, a couple of stops short of the Bruins’ desired destination, and no one really felt like talking.

Jaime Jaquez Jr. and Tyger Campbell joined coach Mick Cronin at the dais following victorious Gonzaga’s elongated media availability – Cronin grumbled about how “it took 33 minutes to get me in here, which is ridiculous” – and the answers were for the most part clipped and perfunctory.

Until, that is, I asked Cronin to assess the role seniors Jaquez, Campbell and David Singleton had played in raising UCLA’s program back to a level where Final Fours were a reasonable goal. What were the attributes that stood out?

“Loyalty, which is rare in today’s society, which is something that I have great respect for,” Cronin said. “And when I look at those guys … I don’t respect anybody I think that’s a fraud that doesn’t work hard. I just don’t. I don’t care if you like me. I have great respect for those three because when you watch them play you don’t think, ‘Well, he should be better than that.’

“When you watch Dave Singleton and you see he’s limited athletically, you see that he gets everything he can out of his body and his talent. Tyger Campbell, unbelievable career. You can’t get any more out of his body and his God-given things that he has that he can’t change. He totally maxes it out.

“And Jaime Jaquez, same thing. Came in to us as a human turnover the first two months. And I just played him because he was as crazy as me. We were losing. He was pissed. I said, ‘I can build a program with this guy because he’s got heart.’ Now look at him.

“But it proves, if you work hard, you have a great attitude, you can become a really, really good player. So that’s why I respect those guys so much.”

UCLA won 31 games this season, 80 in the last three seasons with Jaquez, Campbell and Singleton playing prominent roles, with a Final Four and two Sweet 16s to show for it. At a university where the only banners that hang are for national championships, it’s not enough; Cronin and the players will be the first to acknowledge that.

But consider where the Bruins were for the better part of the previous decade and a half. After two straight Final Fours in 2007 and ’08 under Ben Howland, UCLA missed the tournament in 2010 and 2012 and Howland was fired after the 2012-13 season. Steve Alford got UCLA to three Sweet 16s, lost in a First Four and was fired midway through the 2018-19 season. Cronin’s first UCLA team in 2019-20 was 19-12 and didn’t appear in the tournament because there wasn’t one, thanks to COVID-19.

None of those UCLA teams were considered capable of winning a national championship. This one was in some quarters, even with the injuries to Jaylen Clark and Adem Bona that scrambled the lineup in the final weeks.

That’s why losing to Gonzaga – in a devastating déjà vu, on Julian Strawther’s just-inside-the-logo 3-pointer in the final seconds that brought back the memories of Jalen Suggs’ heave from the logo to eliminate the Bruins in 2021 – hurt as much as it did.

The day before, Cronin had said, “If it doesn’t go our way, I’m not going to come in here and say we lost because these two guys weren’t playing or these three guys weren’t playing. We’re still going to get to play 5-on-5. You’ve got to be tough enough to figure it out if you want to win.”

For the record, he was true to his word.

So what happens now?

Cronin had kidded earlier in the tournament about chanting to Jaquez, “One more year.” He has the extra COVID year of eligibility available to him, but there has been no indication if he plans to use it or if he will instead opt for the NBA draft, where he has raised his stock considerably.

This being the modern era of college basketball, there’s no sense plotting next season’s roster yet. Amari Bailey almost certainly raised his own stock as well – that cool 3-pointer he sank to put the Bruins back in front briefly in the final minute exemplified his ability to rise to the moment – and it could push him toward the NBA.

Freshmen such as Bona, Will McClendon and Dylan Andrews received and responded to additional responsibility as the season continued and would figure to be in line for even larger roles next season … but Bona could draw interest from NBA teams as well.

And the transfer portal will have an impact, too, though you can be sure that Cronin – whose coaching style is, ahem, not for everybody – will be picky when it comes to what’s available.

Then again, if you think Cronin is just some old soul who yells at the clouds in response to the changes in his game over the last few years, consider his response Wednesday to a question about those changes.

“You’ve got to look at it as different,” he said. “The dying words of every successful business (are) somebody sitting there saying, ‘Well, this is how we’ve always done things.’

“And I would remind that to the new head of the NCAA,” he added, a message for new president and former Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker. “They better heed those words if they want the NCAA to exist and continue. They better heed those words.