← Eye On College Basketball
Eye On College Basketball
UCLA's Mick Cronin explains how he needs Donovan Dent to play more like Braden Smith
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Hey there Gary Parish. Welcome back to the CBS Sports Eye on College Basketball podcast where we sometimes discuss camel fighting, dodo birds and leaky black. If you're watching on YouTube, you know what to do to the like button shouts to Brandon Davies. And if you haven't yet subscribed to the CBS Sports college basketball YouTube channel, please also do that while you're here. Let's get into it. Different deal today. As you'll soon realize, Matt Norlander is not here with me. And that's because I'm in Chicago for Big Ten Media day. And while here, I sat down with most of the coaches and some of the players for quick conversations about their programs and college basketball in general. And we figured, or at least we hoped, that you guys might like to listen to those conversations. So we're placing them in the I Own College Basketball feed. It's me, GP at Big Ten Media Day. The conversations I had with coaches and players. They are on tap. I hope you enjoy them Right after this word from our partners.
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The app download Today, Gary Parrish here with UCLA head coach Mick Cronin headed in the Year seven at ucla.
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About that.
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Time flies, huh?
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Yeah, it does.
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I know. I remember when you were just getting pulled in that direction.
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Seems like yesterday.
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B
Yeah.
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But my daughter just went to college. That's when you really.
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Yes.
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You know, that's when you know.
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Yes.
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You know, when you're a little girl, you're moving her into American University. Like, what is going on?
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Yes. So you've made the NCAA tournament in four of the past five years. Things are going well. What have you learned about the UCLA job that maybe you didn't realize when you took it, but you understand it better now?
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Well, I knew about the basketball program and the greatness of the basketball program, the greatness of the Coach Wooden and a lot of others, and then obviously the players that have played there. I didn't know about the university and how big the university is. I mean, what a behemoth of academic research impact on the world. Not just, especially Southern California. The reach of UCLA and the medical side of it. It's an amazing place. And I know you weren't looking for that answer, but, but, I mean, I, I did not know that. I, you know, I just knew the basketball side of it. Right.
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You bring back three of your top four scorers from last season's team. That's not something every coach in the country can say. Is that where recruiting starts now, with player retainment?
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100% retention is. Is everything. Yeah. You got to start off with, first of all, you got to have two different jobs going on because as a head coach, you got to be deciding as your season's unfolding.
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Yeah.
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What am I going to do when the season ends? Because as you, you, you know, all our seasons come to a screeching halt with a loss in the NCAA tournament. Except for one team.
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Right.
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Everybody ends. It's like, you know, everything's great and then the, the excitement of the tournament, but, you know, the day you lose that you go home and then you're going to start having meetings and making offers to guys to return and you have to be on it right away. So that's the reality we're in now. So for us, yeah, we're very fortunate that we got three great players back and a freshman that didn't play a lot. That's going to be a huge, huge factor for us and have a great career at ucla and Trent Perry that we were able to retain. So, you know, Sky, Eric and Tyler. But, you know, having Trent back as well is big for us.
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You bring these guys back and then you also get into the Transfer portal. And it's not that high school recruiting doesn't matter anymore but it has been de. Emphasized. Do. Do you. The state of recruiting right now frustrating or exhilarating? Something in between. Where are you at on it?
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I. I don't. I, I'm at an age where I think it's a waste of time to have an opinion that nobody's going to listen to because it's like once the ship has sailed.
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Right.
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Like it's not going back.
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Right.
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It's like it's not going back to port. Yes. I feel for high school players because there's a trickle down effect and you know, not, not the top hundred high school players. They're all going to get scholarships. It's the, the D2 schools don't even recruit high school players because they're just waiting on D1 guys that didn't play.
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That's right.
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So there's just, there's a lot of high school players affected by it. That's not good. So you know what is good is I can go get Donovan Dent.
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There you go.
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So you know, there's good and bad to it. But I don't waste too much time on whether, you know, whether you like it or don't like it. You better embrace it. Right. I mean you have to embrace.
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Right. I got in trouble with some fan bases during the Donovan Dent transfer because I sort of held it up as this is a beautiful story and others want to hold it up as the high major robbing the Mountain West Conference school. But I just framed it completely different because I don't want to speak for Donovan, I never would. But he grew up in Southern California. I imagine he, he wanted to go to ucla. That's exactly right. And for whatever reason either he's not good enough at that time or somebody didn't recognize it at that time. But he did what any of us would do which is you take the best offer you got that's sitting on the table. And he went there and he was spectacular with which then opens up an opportunity to maybe come back home and start ucla. I just will never let anybody twist that into a negative thing. That's an awesome.
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And I always say what would you do?
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Right. I mean the same thing he did. Yeah.
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So like I slow, slow down now. But it's hard for people and this is, you know, not to get, you know, on a soapbox. But I just wish everybody in our country could just put the other guy's shoes on.
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That's right.
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You know, let's say Everybody trying to put the other person's shoes on before you start throwing darts at everybody for having a. For what? You know, making a decision to transfer. Put the other guy's shoes on or the other woman's shoes on, and it'd just be a lot better place. But look, you're dealing with fans and that's what you deal with. So you gotta deal with social media. That's part of your career. You gotta let them fire at you.
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Yeah, I should probably log off a little more often than I. Than I do. I think everybody understands. Braden Smith is the preseason Big Ten player of the year and one of the best. Yeah. One of the best point guards in the country. But you've got the reigning Mountain West Conference player of the Year in. In Westwood. How big of a role do you expect from Donovan Damp? What do you expect from him?
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Well, offensively, he's a. He's got NBA talent.
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Yeah, because he shoots it.
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Yeah.
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He's got great assist rate. Like, it's all there.
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Yeah. And you average 20, 20 a game, shoot 40% from three. He's got next level speed. He's got some things that maybe Braden Smith doesn't have as far as athleticism. You know, what I need to do for Donnie is can I get him to have Braden Smith's intensity for 40 minutes? The grit defensively, the underdog mentality that I think that Braden Smith embodies, and I think those are the things that will make Donnie a pro. He does. He's got to do a little bit better job with his ball securities, turnover rate. You know, I've talked to a lot of pro people, so I just tell them, look, this is what they want to see, but it's also what he needs to do to help us, you know, because we had a good year last year, but we're at ucla.
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Right.
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You know, I say, I told him, you know, people get going to get mad at me for this one, but you know, what's. What was a really good year at New Mexico is like an average, not that good a year at ucla. You know, like, getting beat in the second round is. No, you know, it's not what. It's not what time it is in Westwood.
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Right.
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You know, I just let him know, like, you know, we got to get good enough. Like, dude, yeah, I'm intense. And I'm on you because, like, going to the second round ain't where it's at.
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No, no. I've seen UCA coaches get fired for going to the second round. Exactly. You Mentioned Braden Smith. He is among the candidates to be the national player of the year, not just Big Ten player of the year. You've coached against him. What makes him special despite some obvious physical limitations?
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Well, I think I'm in the opinion that most people, most mistakes in player evaluation in all sports. Come on under underestimating great players that lacked size.
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Gotcha.
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And there's a history, a litany line of guys to prove that that's where mistakes are made. He's a great player. And what he's great on, he's. And again everything's not just shoot. He can really shoot it. He's unbelievable passer, he's got great speed with the ball. But when you start talking about like real things, Gary, like okay, can he read the other team's defense? Okay, that's what you need to be able to do as a great guard. You know, at the highest level you're running up and down and AAU and this guy's ranked and that guy, that's got nothing to do with picking a team apart. He's a surgeon right in the pick and roll. Literally a surgeon. I mean he looks like Braden Smith. Looks like you're watching him run the pick and rolls like, like watching a 38 year old guy that's played in Europe at the highest level of the ACB league for 15 years. Like that's who you feel like you're watching when you watch the guy play. So he's a surgeon with the ball. But I will give you this, that the X factor to me is his toughness, like his competitive fire and his toughness or why he's so great. You can't be overcome his physical stature without having special toughness.
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Your non league schedule is going to keep you out west by design. By design. And I know people have fun with that. But just to be clear, there's data that supports going east is bad stuff for ucla, for anybody. Right?
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I mean how to work for Penn State's football team. You know, how to work for USC football when they had to go to Indiana. Fly home, turn around, go back to Illinois, right. You know, I mean those things or no, they went to Purdue, but they went to the state of Indiana. But anyway, travels. Look, travel's real. It's, it's, you know, when you see it and talk about it in the media, it's not the same as living it.
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Right?
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Like me just coming to Chicago for Big Ten media day.
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Not easy, right.
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You know, so. And then you factor in, I think we all forget. People start Talking about travel, they forget that. Well, the pros do it. It's. Yeah, but the pros don't go to school.
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That's right.
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They don't go to school. Everybody wants to keep dismissing the fact that the guys go to school. I mean, you know, as ucla, they go to an elite school.
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Right.
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Where it's not all online classes. Right.
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They actually got to be in a building. Yeah.
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Now, you know, now it's not raining, it's not cold, and you walk to class in sand and shorts.
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Right.
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So, you know, you are in Westwood.
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Yes.
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But you got to go, right?
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Yeah. That walk around the Westwood campus is really nice. I remember when Ben was there, like, walking from maybe Poly Pavilion at the time to his office, and he. I just remember something. He was like, yes, I make this walk every day. I will never get tired of this walk.
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Yeah, it's like I tell people, how you doing? I turned left on Sunset to go to work.
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There you go.
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Not many people do that.
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Right.
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You know, and when you turn left on Sunset to go to work, it's usually 75 degrees. You know, you got to watch some sunspots. You know, I'm coming out of Encino down the hill.
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Yeah, it sounds like a real problem. Rough problem. Last thing before I get you out of here. I've got you in the top 10 of my preseason rankings, for whatever that's worth. Obviously, Purdue is going to be in there.
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Yeah.
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This is a league that hasn't won a national championship since 2000, but has multiple teams. Michigan, capable of doing it this season. On paper, do you think you have a team capable of doing it? Do you think this could be your best UCLA team?
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I knew how good we were back in the day when you had Jaime Hawkes, Tiger Campbell, Jalen Clark, you know, returning. You know, now I know that Donovan Dent was an All American, but he hasn't played for me. Who's going to demand he take care of the ball and play defense? So how it's all going to work, you know, like, you know, three years ago, you know, when Dembona blew his shoulder and Jalen Clark tore his Achilles. I could told you, you know. Yeah, we're one of three or four teams that should win it. I think we got a chance to get. There's just so many unknowns now. I mean, you know, I see people picking Florida. The guy's got to his entire loss, his entire backcourt.
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Yes.
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And his backup in the back court.
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Yes.
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So it's just, you know, I don't know I know this. You talking about the Big Ten. Purdue was close last year. I mean, they lose it to Buzzer to Houston, who loses it to Buzzer to Florida, you know. And was anybody else in the Elite Eight in the Big Ten? Michigan State.
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I think Michigan State might have got there as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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I'm not, I think, you know, so it'll happen again for the Big Ten. I'm just hoping it's ucla.
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Yeah. Mick, it's always good to see you.
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You too, buddy.
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Thanks for your time.
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