Cold-shooting Arizona Wildcats struggle again on the road, losing 73-70 at Washington State

PULLMAN, Wash. — The Arizona Wildcats woke up to negative-digit temperatures Saturday, then made the snowy 100-foot walk from their bus to the Beasley Coliseum loading doors bundled fully up, with hoodies poking out of their oversized jackets and hands well-protected in gloves or their pockets.

Not exactly how they roll into McKale Center.

“It’s different, obviously,” guard Caleb Love said.

Then they went inside to play a game of basketball and somehow still ended up with frostbitten fingers, if not literally then at least figuratively, losing 73-70 in their final game at Washington State for the foreseeable future.

While Love poured in 28 points despite missing a potential game-tying 3-pointer with six seconds left, only Oumar Ballo joined him in double figures while the Wildcats rolled their worst shooting of the season off those previously pocketed hands.

They shot just 34.7% from the field while missing 17 of 28 layups and all three dunks they tried in what was their fourth loss in their past eight games.

Love and guard Jaden Bradley both said the cold-weather trip was no excuse and UA coach Tommy Lloyd partially credited WSU’s ever-shifting defense, but the truth was that, whatever, however, they just couldn't put the easy ones in.

Bunnies, they call them. So many of which hopped off the rim and clanked around awkwardly, ultimately costing the Wildcats their fourth loss in their past eight games, that Lloyd said “everything is on the table” for re-evaluation and warned his guys what feeble shot-taking could mean two months from now.

“We missed a bunch of layups and I told our guys, `If you want to win games in the NCAA Tournament, they don't call fouls in the charge circle. We're built to finish those shots. We didn’t,’ “ Lloyd said. It’s “individual responsibility. You get it in there. You’ve got to finish.”

Love is OK with that message. The North Carolina transfer had no trouble being aggressive in his usual way, surpassing 20 points for the fifth time in the past six games, though he was less than happy with hitting 10 of 25 shots overall and making just 5 of 13 3-pointers.

“That’s not good enough,” Love said. “Especially being the leader I am I’ve got to be more efficient. That's one key that why I came here, to be more efficient. The shots were going my way toward the end of the game, but it wasn’t good enough.”

Love was doing his microwave thing just when the Wildcats needed it the most, scoring 11 points over an eight-minute stretch midway through the second half after the Cougars had built second-half leads as high as 11 points. His layup and 3-pointer on successive UA possessions gave the Wildcats a 57-55 lead with 5:03 to go.

When that lead didn't last long, Love later gave them a chance to take another. He stepped back behind the 3-point line to hit a 25-footer that cut WSU’s lead to 65-63 with 1:35 left.

But the Cougars scored on their final four possessions from there. Guard Myles Rice hit a 15-foot jumper with 22 seconds left and, after UA's Keshad Johnson banked in a 3-pointer with 16 seconds left to cut WSU's lead to just 71-70, Rice drew a quick foul and hit two free throws with 11 seconds left to put WSU back up by three.

That left Love alone with the ball as the final seconds ticked off, with a chance to tie the game with a 3-pointer or pass it. Love said afterward that UA had hoped to pass to Johnson inside and get it kicked back for a good look but that the WSU defense took away options.

So Love pulled back for another 3-point attempt with six seconds left and it clanked off the rim. WSU’s Isaac Jones pulled down the rebound, with fans spilling onto the courts soon after.

“I’m obviously very comfortable with the ball on his hands," Lloyd said of Love. "And it's tough -- you're coming down and (it’s) are they switching? Are they in zone? There's a lot of scenarios going on there. I wished we had gotten a better shot but we didn't. I'll have to go back and take a look at that.”

Not only was Love the guy Lloyd was OK with taking the shot but he was also the guy WSU coach Kyle Smith was not OK with taking the shot. 

“Love was just `poof’ -- he's like Jason in Friday the 13th,” Smith said. “We couldn't get him to go away and he almost single handedly did it.”

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But it wasn’t enough, as Love said, and as Lloyd also said. Lloyd said the Wildcats need other players who are willing to “shoulder the burden” of staying aggressive when the game is on the line the way Love is.

Instead, Lloyd had a team that, in a game with seven lead changes and six ties, never led by more than three and was ahead of WSU for only two minutes and 37 seconds.

The Cougars led by up to eight points in the first half, 34-30 at halftime and by up to 11 in the second half.

The game was never in the Wildcats’ control.

“What I see is an average basketball team that has these really high moments, and then they relax. That's what I see,” Lloyd said. “So we’ve got to figure that out as a coaching staff, whether that's shaking up the lineup. ... these are all things I’ve got to think about, changing what we do. But everything's on the table.”

The normally balanced team that Lloyd had on Saturday had significant production from Love and Ballo, and off the bench from Bradley, but issues almost everywhere else.

While Ballo had 11 points and 14 rebounds, power forward Keshad Johnson had seven points and eight rebounds in a game when the Wildcats couldn’t contain the power forward on the other side of the floor: Jones collected 24 points and 13 rebounds to lead the Cougars.

Of the Wildcats’ two other starters, Pelle Larsson managed nine points and four rebounds but matched his four assists with four turnovers while point guard Kylan Boswell missed all five shots he took, didn’t have an assist or rebound and turned the ball over once.

Lloyd wound up playing Bradley for 26 minutes, with the Alabama transfer chipping in eight points and three assists while hitting all four free throws he took. Boswell played 24 and a half.

“Jaden has been playing well and he got us in a flow of the game,” Lloyd said. “But Kylan just didn't have that look tonight and he's got to figure that out. Kylan is a heck of a player. I don't care how old he is. He's good enough to play well on the road, and he hasn't. So he needs to figure that out.”

So on a team where Lloyd has said he’s aiming to create a bigger margin for error, the Wildcats shedded some Saturday.

Their effort left them 12-4 overall and 3-2 in the Pac-12 entering a return home to face USC and UCLA. The Wildcats still have the possibility that they won’t fall far from their No. 10 ranking because of losses elsewhere around the Top 10.

But something isn’t hitting Lloyd right, and the weather had nothing to do with it.

“It's not good enough, obviously," he said. "I'm not gonna get here and dissect this or that. We want to play better. We're capable of playing better today. We didn't. Washington State gets a ton of credit. I’m the head coach. The buck stops with me. I'm responsible for making sure we are better in these situations.

“So we'll do what we always do. We're gonna hang together. You know why? Because it's all we got. We're going to hang together because that’s all we got and we love each other.”

Photos: No. 8 Arizona falls 73-70 at Washington State, men's college basketball