The second Steve Alford walked into his introductory press conference as UCLA head coach, I knew trouble was a-Bruin. The slick hair and sharp smile, the finely tailored suit.
I'd seen first-hand what happened when UCLA went Hollywood before. The tail-end of the Ben Howland era was spent chasing recruiting stars and flash-in-the-pan scorers. The grit-and-spittle of the defense-dominated mid-aughts, when UCLA went to three consecutive Final Fours despite never finding a true go-to-scorer, had been sullied by an unpotable mixture of ego, draft dreams and squandered opportunities.
This wasn't the first time this happened in Pauley Pavilion. Steve Lavin, Howland’s predecessor, for all his charm and charisma, never was able to instill the discipline needed for a town like Westwood, which borders Beverly Hills to the west and nirvana everywhere else.
There are temptations out there. Whew, boy, are there temptations.
What UCLA needed was some home cookin'. It's not that the Bruins needed a taskmaster, but they needed someone who put defense over offense, strategy over free-wheeling, stop-and-think over fun-and-gun. Someone who set a high standard, on and off the floor, and never wavered.
The second Mick Cronin walked into his introductory press conference as UCLA head coach, I knew the Bruins had found their man. He spoke with an antsy impatience, like he couldn’t wait to get to coaching. He sounded motivated without sounding arrogant, despite leading Cincinnati to nine straight NCAA Tournaments. Unlike some of the ego that had ballooned on those UCLA sidelines, he sounded like someone with something to prove. Not like he’d proven it already.
“We knew he was a good basketball coach,” UCLA Senior Associate Athletic Director Josh Rebholz told me soon after the hire. “But there are a lot of good coaches out there. What differentiated Mick was the chip on his shoulder. He wants to prove people wrong."
In just two seasons, Cronin has been the salesman UCLA needed. There aren’t oil streaks left in his wake when he walks away. He spits truth.
He’s sold recruits on his style and alums on his savvy. He has peddled UCLA players on his vision, as magnified in their physical 51-49 Elite Eight win over Michigan. The Wolverines didn’t simply miss shots. They were bodied up. Harassed. Michigan wanted to be on another court with smaller players in another town. They were bullied. Franz Wagner looked like he was about to cry.
Can the Bruins continue their Cinderella run? Despite five wins in the NCAA Tournament as the only First Four entry since Virginia Commonwealth in 2011 to advance to the Final Four, the Bruins have been favored just once (Round 2, Abilene Christian). They enter Saturday’s matchup with top-ranked Gonzaga as 14-point underdogs, just the third national semifinal game since 1996 with a double-digit point spread.
You think that matters to Cronin?
No, what matters to Cronin is getting the most out of his players and leaving a legacy at UCLA. That's the only thing that prompted him to leave his beloved Bearcats. But he’s well on his way.
“I thank Dan Guerrero for believing in me,” Cronin said in his last press conference, after UCLA defeated Michigan. “I tried to convince him that and the guys that were around him with this, that I understood it and I wanted it. You know, Coach (Rick) Pitino is like an older brother to me and he used to say, "I'd rather live one day as a lion than a thousand as a lamb."
"It's like I told my father, "If I don't take this job, I'll feel like a lamb."
