Even though Saturday’s Arizona-Utah game tipped off at 3:30 p.m., the gang back in Novi Sad still had to stay up until nearly 3 a.m. to see all of Dusan Ristic’s heroics in the Wildcats’ 74-73 win.
Not a problem.
“One hundred percent,” the senior 7-footer said when asked if folks in his hometown were watching. “Family. Friends. Everybody. I think it was on Serbian national TV, too.”
They’ve been through the drill for almost four years now, with the average night game requiring them to instead wake up at 3 or 4 a.m. local time to watch Ristic and the Wildcats live via an internet stream or Serbian broadcast, since they are eight hours ahead of Tucson in the winter.
They won’t have to do it much longer, at least to see Ristic play for the Wildcats, and Ristic is aiming to end the show on a positive note.
That’s what motivates him now, maybe as much as anything.
“I don’t have a lot of games left in McKale,” Ristic said on Thursday, after also helping lead UA to an 80-71 win over Colorado, having thrown in a showy spin move and finger roll while making 7 of 8 shots in that game. “I have a few more and I’m trying to give my maximum every game. I’m trying to help this team win as many games as we can.”
Two days later, in his fifth-to-last game in McKale, Ristic hit yet another level: He hit 9 of 11 shots for a career-high 23 points and supplemented his usual hooks and layups with 3-for-3 3-point shooting.
His last bomb gave Arizona a four-point lead with 1:40 left and put him over the 1,000-point career mark as a Wildcat. He’s now the 28th player in UA history to collect at least 1,000 points and 500 rebounds.
“I don’t know what to say right now. It’s an amazing feeling,” Ristic said afterward. “When the fans went crazy, I don’t know, it’s really hard for me to say anything right now.”
For a moment, at least, that last 3-pointer was a point of controversy. UA coach Sean Miller appeared more than a little displeased on the sidelines even after it went in, having called for a lob pass to Deandre Ayton inside and then watching Ristic uncharacteristically hoist one up from the top of the key.
Ristic knew that wasn’t really what he was supposed to do, either. Sitting next to guard Parker Jackson-Cartwright in the postgame interview room, Ristic even said that “Parker was like, ‘Why did you even take that last 3?’” before PJC interrupted.
“I didn’t say that,” Jackson-Cartwright insisted.
Both smiled, and everyone laughed. Maybe it didn’t really matter.
Ristic made the shot. Arizona won. And a little pride surged over Jackson-Cartwright, the fellow senior who has experienced similar ups and downs over his UA career as Ristic has.
“He just gets better,” Jackson-Cartwright said of Ristic. “It’s no surprise because he puts in the work, doesn’t complain. He shows up every day and he’s the same. He works extremely hard and he deserves it.
“It’s been wild. We’ve both come a long way.”
After the game, even Miller saw a bigger picture in that final 3-point shot that Ristic took. Maybe it was off-script and ill-advised, but the fact that Ristic squared up and boldly took it, as he did with so many other key shots over the weekend, may have shown the kind of confidence he didn’t always have earlier in his UA career.
“No doubt,” Miller said. “And I hit on this after Colorado — confidence is big for all of our players, but it’s really, really nice to see Dusan has the confidence that he does because he hasn’t always had great confidence playing here.
“Some of it was probably me taking him in and out, trying to make him a better defensive player and maybe not understanding his gifts on offense enough. But I know this: He’s in a really good place and he takes a lot of pride in winning.”
