Things started to come together over the weekend for UCLA.
Thursday, they picked up their first Pac-12 win of the season with a victory over Arizona. On Saturday, they overcame a slow start to dismantle Arizona State on their way to sweeping the Arizona schools.
As a result, the Bruins (9-7, 2-2 Pac-12) were given two days off by head coach Ben Howland, with their next game being five days away at USC on Sunday.
When they return to practice Wednesday, the focus will be on themselves.
"This is an important week of practice. This is the last time we're going to have four or five practice in a row before we play a game," said Howland. "We just got to really break things down and spend a lot of time at trying to execute what we're trying to do ... I really want to focus on us the next two days."
A huge part of that focus will be on offensive execution. It's something that got better last weekend. The Bruins shot a combined 49 percent in both games while handing out 30 assists versus just 17 turnovers.
A big boost in the execution was the play of the Bruins' bigs. Without Joshua Smith in the lineup last Thursday because of a concussion, the Wear twins had their best combined game as Bruins with a combined 34 points and nine rebounds.
Saturday, when Smith returned to the lineup, the big men played as good as they had all season, combining for 42 of the team's 75 points.
Smith spearheaded things with 18 points, playing what Howland says was his best game of the season.
It's been an up and down career for Smith in his first year and a half on campus. Conditioning and weight have always preceded or concluded discussion about his play on the court.
Howland hopes Saturday will be a prequel of things to come for Smith, but won't get carried away.
"It was one game," he said.
