While enduring what he called one of the “most disciplined weeks” of workouts since he’s played for Arizona, KJ Lewis also came down on himself.
Before helping lead Arizona to a 102-66 win over Southern Utah on Saturday, the Wildcats sophomore wing said he apologized to teammates and coach Tommy Lloyd for behavior that led to costly technical fouls in UA’s recent losses to Duke and Oklahoma. He also pledged to better control himself going forward.
“I know I’m one of the leaders of this group, so I’m just trying to be better in that aspect,” Lewis said.
Wildcats guard KJ Lewis (5) jumps for a lay-up against Southern Utah at McKale Center, Dec. 7, 2024.
Then, although it wasn’t technically about discipline, Lewis also all but took himself out of the starting lineup Saturday.
Lloyd already pulled Lewis from the starting lineup on Nov. 29 against West Virginia in the Battle 4 Atlantis, a day after Lewis had picked up his second technical foul in three games, but that penalty appeared to be over. This time, Lloyd said, it was Lewis’ idea to stay on the bench while freshman Carter Bryant started instead.
“It really wasn’t planned on early in the week and KJ came to me the past couple days and asked if I would be open to him not starting,” Lloyd said. “He just felt like maybe it would give other guys some opportunities to get some confidence and kind of put him in a role similar to what Pelle (Larsson) played a few years ago for us.”
Larsson has said he approved a move from a starting role into the sixth-man spot midway through the 2022-23 season, in part because transfer forward Cedric Henderson was more comfortable as a starter. Larsson went on to start throughout last season and become a second-round draft pick last June who is now playing regularly for the Miami Heat.
It’s possible that the Lewis-Bryant move remains similarly permanent.
“We’re gonna continue to evaluate it, but it’s something that I’m not afraid to do,” Lloyd said.
At least for Saturday’s experiment, the move appeared to work for both players. It put Lewis back in the aggressive sixth-man role he thrived in last season as a freshman, with Lewis picking up 15 points, eight rebounds and five assists and two steals. He still played the second-most minutes on the team, 23.
Bryant, meanwhile, had only five points but a team-high nine rebounds, four assists and two steals with just one turnover in 17 minutes.
Besides, Arizona hardly needed Bryant’s scoring. The Wildcats received a massive 62 points from their bench, with a total of seven players in double figures. The outburst was so widespread that even though the starting backcourt was limited — Jaden Bradley didn’t score a single point and Caleb Love shot 3 for 12 — the Wildcats still hit the century mark.
Reserve wing Anthony Dell’Orso led the Wildcats in scoring with 19 points while making 3 of 4 3-pointers. As a team, UA (4-4) shot 50% overall and 37.5% from 3-point range while stifling the Thunderbirds on the other end of the floor: Arizona held Southern Utah to just 41% shooting and scored 28 points off 18 SUU turnovers.
Wildcats guard Anthony Dell’Orso (3) drives the ball to the net against Thunderbirds guard Duncan Reid (23) during the first half at McKale Center, Dec. 7, 2024.
Jamir Simpson led Southern Utah (8-3) with 21 points on 8-for-15 shooting, but the Thunderbirds, who normally thrive on getting to the free-throw line, couldn’t get that part of their game going. They shot just 10 free throws over the first 35 minutes and made seven of them, often unable to get into the paint because of all those turnovers.
All that is why, after 10 minutes, it was never much of a game Saturday.
The Wildcats led 55-23 at halftime, then by more than 30 points for most of the second half. UA went up 80-38 when Dell’Orso hit a pair of 3s within 23 seconds midway through the half. SUU pulled within 29 points with 5:34 to go, prompting Lloyd to keep in his scholarship players until two minutes remained and with UA up 101-63.
Lloyd went deep into his bench, using 10 players for 10 minutes or more, while playing sophomore Conrad Martinez at point guard for 15 minutes. Martinez played only briefly in the Wildcats’ Nov. 17 game against Davidson but not in the Wildcats’ other two Battle 4 Atlantis games.
Martinez wound up with five points and four assists while going without a turnover, able to help the Wildcats revive both their fast-break game and high assist-field goal ratio (with assists leading to 23 of UA’s 34 made field goals).
“You’ve got to get stops, you’ve got to get rebounds, to run the ball — and we’ve got to continue to evaluate our running game,” Lloyd said. “It’s a huge part of what we do. It just hasn’t quite come as easy for this group …
“It usually starts with a ball handler and your point guard pushing and accelerating the pace of the game and finding easy opportunities. I thought Conrad came in and did a good job. Conrad ended up in some in some numbered fast-break situations, where you have a 3-on-2 or a 4-on-3 advantage, and I thought he made really good decisions.”
Arizona wound up with 21 fast-break points, fueled by 13 steals and a 47-32 rebounding advantage, entertaining the McKale Center crowd of about 11,000 in a way it had not since a 102-44 laugher over Old Dominion back on Nov. 9.
“As long as we defensive rebound, we run and give a maximum effort, I feel like that’s one part of” getting out on the break, said forward/center Henri Veesaar, who had 12 points and three rebounds. “This week (in practice) we had a lot of effort plays. We talked about that as a team just giving it up for everybody. If you make a run and you don’t get the ball but your teammate dunks the ball, we both could be happy for it, just as happy as if you dunk the ball.”
The Wildcats appeared to have fun from the start. In the first half, Arizona held Southern Utah to just 26.7% shooting and scored 20 points off the Thunderbirds’ 13 turnovers.
Love turned the ball over on the Wildcats’ first possession to start a rough first half in which he shot just 1 for 6 from the field. His turnover led to a 3-pointer from Southern Utah’s Tavi Jackson, but the Thunderbirds trailed by double digits most of the half.
UA led just 20-16 with 11:24 left before Veesaar picked up fouls that sent him to the line four times over the next two minutes. He hit all four ensuing free throws and Martinez followed by hitting an open 3-pointer to give UA a 27-16 lead with 9:33 left.
Wildcats forward Henri Veesaar (13) charges by Thunderbirds center Malik Lamin (32) during the game at McKale Center, Dec. 7, 2024.
Southern Utah never crept within single digits the rest of the way and, ultimately, the game may have proved more about therapy than competition for the Wildcats, whose two losses at the Battle 4 Atlantis last week dropped their record below .500 for the first time in 15 years.
“Great programs, good coaches, great players are going to stumble once in a while and the response is the key — learning from it and coming back stronger is the objective,” Lloyd said. “We’ve obviously been challenged early in this season, which is a good thing, and we had a good week to evaluate a lot of things. … Even how we practice, how we talk to each other, just all our behavioral things.
“It was really getting back to the nitty gritty of our culture. So all in all it was a good week.”
