A lot of healing took place Thursday at McKale Center — sometimes by taking it easy, sometimes by staying aggressive and sometimes by slowly finding a rhythm.
In the Arizona Wildcats’ 68-54 win over Colorado, the Wildcats rested guard Gabe York (ankle sprain) while the Buffs didn’t even suit up injured standouts Josh Scott (back spasms) and Xavier Johnson (ankle sprain), two of their top three scorers.
Then there was the mild ankle tweak that Askia Booker suffered when he came down awkwardly on one of his seemingly 347 three-point bombs, which forced him to leave the court briefly — and storm quickly back in.
Booker finished with a career-high 30 points on 11-for-17 shooting, the kind of singular effort the Buffs needed without Scott and Johnson around, and an effort UA coach Sean Miller said he hasn’t seen against the Wildcats since BYU’s Jimmer Fredette dumped 49 on his first UA team at McKale back in 2009-10.
“We didn’t have an answer for him,” Miller said. “That was a tremendous performance.”
Booker was so hot that after the game Stanley Johnson, who led Arizona with 22 points, was asked if he was tempted to try to keep up with Booker shot-for-shot.
“You saw the shots he was taking tonight – I don’t think I can match that myself,” Johnson said. “I thought we contested a lot of them and when you’re in a rhythm like that it’s tough to stop anybody.”
Meanwhile, there was the collective sight of the Wildcats healing together, stumbling at times offensively but gradually finding their way after a stunning 58-56 loss at Oregon State on Sunday.
Their win left the Wildcats at 15-2 overall and 3-1 in the Pac-12 heading into a Top 10 showdown with Utah on Saturday while Colorado dropped to 9-7 and 2-2.
While Johnson led the way for Arizona with 22 points and eight rebounds, collecting five offensive boards, Brandon Ashley tied his season high in rebounding with 11. Overall, the Wildcats crushed Colorado on the boards, 41-26, while scoring 17 second-chance points off 13 offensive rebounds.
And their defense, the one that fell apart in the second half at Corvallis? Well, let’s just say that hasn’t healed fully, yet.
“I thought we were OK,” Miller said. “I mean, we had a player score 30 on us.”
Booker made himself known all over the court, with layups, short jumpers and three-pointers – he was 6 of 9 from three-point range — but his teammates couldn’t help out much.
The rest of the Buffaloes shot just 31.2 percent from the field and totaled only 24 points.
As a result, the Buffaloes trailed by 10 at halftime and never by fewer than five in the second. A breakaway layup by Colorado’s Jaron Hopkins, a Phoenix-area product who once attracted UA’s recruiting attention, cut Arizona’s lead to 47-42 with 11:27 remaining, but Arizona had three-pointers from Elliott Pitts and T.J. McConnell over the next two minutes and went ahead by 11.
Pitts wound up setting career highs in points (12) and three-pointers made (four, on six attempts), making up for the loss of York in the same spirit that prompted Booker to wind up with his career night.
“When (injuries) happen, you look toward that next player to have a bigger role, and that was Elliott,” Miller said. “To see him respond like he did, I’m happy for him. He’s one of our team’s hardest workers and I thought all four of his threes were timely.”
Arizona wound up making 7 of 18 from three-point range, with T.J. McConnell going 2 for 3 and Parker Jackson-Cartwright adding another on two tries.
Arizona shot only 41.8 percent overall, however, its offense alternated between efficient and stagnant. But after the Wildcats recovered from a 21-point first half at Oregon State, Johnson was optimistic.
“I didn’t think we were out of rhythm,” Johnson said. “I just think we need to be more confident when things go 2-3 zone or mix it up.”
For most of the first half, though, the Wildcats appeared to lack their usual rhythm. They shot 43 percent from the field in the first half but took the 10-point lead in large part because of a 21-11 rebounding edge.
Against Utah, the Pac-12’s best team in rebounding margin, the Wildcats will have to rebound. And do a lot of other things really well, too.
More healing may be needed. Quickly.
“I told our guys in the locker room that Utah is the best team in the Pac-12,” Miller said. “They’re the deepest, the most experienced. They believe in what they do the most. And they execute on both sides of the ball.
“We’re going to have to upset them here in McKale. … We’re gonna need a great crowd, we’re gonna need a tremendous performance and some of these things you see here on the stat sheet we’re going to have to have them in a favorable light to beat Utah.”
