UCLA Basketball: 2019-20 season preview for Bruins

All eyes are on new head coach Mick Cronin, who was brought over from Cincinnati this offseason. After a season where UCLA Basketball struggled, can the Bruins bounce back under a new head coach with a young roster?

If there’s a word to describe UCLA Basketball’s season in which it finished just one game above .500, including a 9-9 record in a weak Pac-12 conference, it’s a disappointment.

The Bruins entered the year having made the NCAA Tournament in each of its last two seasons and brought in five-star recruit Moses Brown to start alongside a dominant backcourt in Jaylen Hands and Kris Wilkes. Not to mention UCLA added three other top 100 prospects, per ESPN, and Tyger Campbell.

But quickly, the season fell into despair. Campbell and Shareef O’Neal both missed the season with injuries. The Bruins dropped four straight in December, including home losses to Belmont and Liberty. It was the last straw for head coach Steve Alford, who got the boot before conference play began. UCLA was 7-6.

Interim head coach Murry Bartow couldn’t right the ship, as UCLA would finish the rest of the season 10-10 and miss the NCAA Tournament. In the offseason, the Bruins would hire Mick Cronin from Cincinnati, who in 13 years, finished 296–146, and led the Bearcats to seven straight Tournament appearances.

Cronin has a talented UCLA team despite the departures of Hands, Wilkes and Brown. Campbell and O’Neal are healthy and top-100 recruit Jaime Jaquez Jr. joins the roster. There aren’t many veterans on the roster, but talent is not an issue.

Can UCLA bounce back from a season mired with struggle and injuries? Will Cronin be able to continue his success coaching at the Division I level in a new conference filled with a roster that he didn’t recruit?