Memory of ASU's upset win at McKale Center last season could motivate Arizona Wildcats

While guards KJ Lewis and Kylan Boswell both had stopovers in Arizona during their youth, none of the Wildcats’ 11 active scholarship players are actually from the state. More than half of them aren’t from any American state at all.

So, combined with the fact that UA men’s basketball coach Tommy Lloyd and ASU coach Bobby Hurley are friends, how is it supposed to feel like a rivalry Saturday when the Wildcats will host the Sun Devils?

“I think that’s always something for us,” Lloyd said Thursday. “When half your team is international guys, sometimes they don’t understand the built-in rivalries that happen within college basketball and fan bases.

“Now if they’re playing against another country that they grew up playing against, they understand. So you just have to kind of get on that level and explain it to them a little bit.”

Lloyd says his focus is on how Saturday’s game will impact the Wildcats’ season; Arizona is in position to win the Pac-12 and possibly capture a No. 1 NCAA Tournament seed if it doesn’t stumble badly the rest of the way. Lloyd said it also helps having returning players around to explain to other players what the game can mean to fans.

Then there’s that video.

You know, the one where ASU’s Desmond Cambridge steps nearly in front of Lloyd to throw in a 60-foot bomb that falls through the net at the buzzer, giving ASU an improbable 89-88 win at McKale Center last season? The one in which UA fumbled away a late 10-point lead with four turnovers in the final four minutes on Senior Day?

Yeah, maybe that could do the trick.

“I’m sure they have a good feeling about it, and I’m sure we don’t have a great feeling about it,” Lloyd said of last year’s game at McKale. “But we don’t sit around and talk about it. I just know we probably could have handled things a little bit better, and that starts with me. But I learn and I grow too.”

What the Wildcats have talked about all season is the historical and cultural perspective of their program, some of them citing after they clobbered Wisconsin in early December how they knew beating the Badgers meant something because of their long-ago successes over the Wildcats in the NCAA Tournament.

So there’s little doubt the ASU thing will be a topic of conversation at some point this week.

“Whenever we play ASU, we know how those games are and what fans expect from us,” Ballo said. “If anything (last year) gives us an extra motivation to play well for our fans, for the city. You know at the end of the day it’s all love. ASU is a great program. So are we. So it’s just gonna be a fun game Saturday.”

Sun Devils wake up

While the Wildcats received an entire week to prepare and rest for Saturday’s game, the Sun Devils had to host Oregon State on Wednesday at Desert Financial Arena.

Maybe because of what was looming at McKale Center on Saturday, the way Hurley explained it, ASU only pulled away in the second half for a 79-61 win after sitting in a 33-33 tie at halftime.

The Sun Devils shot 57.7% (60.7% in the second half) and scored 18 points off 14 OSU turnovers. ASU committed 15 turnovers but the Beavers converted those into only eight points.

“This is the Arizona game week and guys are thinking maybe past this game, so I’m happy that we were able to deliver a good performance in the second half,” Hurley said after Wednesday’s game. “We’ve got to play better in both halves. When you’re playing teams like Arizona we have to cut our turnovers in half, 15 to single digits. We can’t allow a team like that to get live ball turnovers and get out in the open court with that crowd and their talent.”

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Ballo on roll

After collecting 16 points and 13 rebounds Saturday at Colorado, Ballo has now put together a string of four straight double-doubles. Ballo is averaging 16.5 rebounds and 13.5 points during that streak, which includes UA wins over California, Stanford, Utah and Colorado.

“He’s played with great energy and effort,” Lloyd said. “I think you always want to start there with any player, and especially your big guys. And I just think his confidence has returned to a high level. He’s played great. When O plays really good, and with great energy and great effort, he’s a separator for us.”

Ballo, who said Thursday it’s mostly been a difference of playing with more energy and confidence while “knowing that my teammates believe in me,” will test his momentum against ASU.

Last season, Ballo entered the ASU game at McKale coming off an 18-point, 16-rebound performance against Colorado only to play just 18 minutes in the Sun Devils’ upset because of four fouls.

“I remember it pretty well,” Ballo said, generating chuckles when asked what his takeaway from that game was.

“Stay out of foul trouble,” he said.

Love named to Naismith list

Arizona guard Caleb Love was one of 30 players named Thursday to the Naismith Award’s midseason team.

Love leads the Wildcats (19-5, 10-3) in scoring with an average of 18.9 points a game while also averaging 5.1 rebounds, 3.3 assists. He is shooting 43.1% from the field and 34.9% from 3-point range.

Love and Colorado’s KJ Simpson were the only Pac-12 players named to the Naismith team.

Rim shots

Former UA center Christian Koloko is scheduled to be formally inducted into the Ring of Honor during Saturday’s game, having qualified automatically when he was named the 2021-22 Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Year.

The Phoenix Final Four Local Organizing Committee will hold a “Fan Jam” pop-up mobile event outside McKale Center from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. on Saturday to promote the Final Four in Glendale. Fans can practices shooting and enter giveaways.

Photos: Arizona State upsets #7 Arizona Wildcats, Pac-12 basketball