Offensively challenged Wildcats hold off San Diego State
The No. 3 Arizona Wildcats are perfectly imperfect.
In fact, winning ugly never looked so good, as the Wildcats continued to master the look in moving to 6-0 Wednesday night with a 61-59 win over No. 15 San Diego State in the title game of the EA Sports Maui Invitational.
Arizona, once again, looked vulnerable but found a way to win in beating the Aztecs for the fourth consecutive time and third in just more than a year.
Defense, again, was the difference. Arizona trailed 48-47 with 9:15 left but went up 55-51 to slowly pull away. But, it didn't do so decisively.
"Sometimes, if you're a very good defensive team, and I think we are, as the game wears on it becomes harder and harder to score against you if you stick to what you do well," Arizona coach Sean Miller said.
Arizona has struggled most of this young season and Wildcats assistant coach Joe Pasternack said the previous games helped Arizona win its second Maui Invitational in school history.
"It put us in a war early in the season," he said in a postgame radio interview. "Kansas State on Tuesday and this game, we're now ready when Gonzaga comes to town next Saturday. We've been down before by five, six (points). We're ready to go."
There isn't a flow to the offense. It's taken time in almost every game, as Arizona has looked choppy and stunted for the first minutes of games. Wednesday night was no different -- Arizona shot 33 percent in the first half -- although the Wildcats found a way to get the win despite shooting 43 percent from the floor, having difficulty getting into transition.
It helped Arizona may have found its go-to guy in freshman Stanley Johnson, who scored 18 points and grabbed nine rebounds. He also had three steals, one block and an assist. He was named the tournament's most valuable player.
"I don't think I've fully adjusted yet. There is still a lot of stuff that we do as a team that I'm not physically good at yet," Johnson said. "I think I've gotten a lot better since I got here, and I know me and coach Miller in the meeting, he's just telling me to get better every day, even if it's a little bit. I've been feeling that part of it ever since that meeting. So I still have a long way to go as a player on the team. But little stuff our team knows about, but I've definitely gotten better.
Johnson had help from sophomore Rondae Hollis-Jefferson, who had 14 points, six rebounds and three blocks. Hollis-Jefferson was named to the all-tournament team.
"To win the championship here at the Maui Invitational, you need great players and you need players that rise up to a challenge," Miller said, "and these two guys right here, they earned their all-tournament accolades by their performance."
Arizona had its chances to blow open the game late but failed to pull away thanks to a couple turnovers and a seven-point swing by the Aztecs, including a four-point play and SDSU's last-ditch 3-pointer to close out its scoring.
"Our goal coming in was if we can win the rebounding war was going to be a key for us," Pasternack said. "In the NCAA game (last spring) they had 18 offensive rebounds against us. We really drove that home in the last 24 hours. And our guys did a great job from a rebounding standpoint."
Johnson helped with that. His eight rebounds were big and he pushed the ball offensively. He had five offensive rebounds in the first half "and he hadn't rebounded great for us, but he stepped up," Pasternack said.
Pasternack said Johnson "was a man. He showed why he was highly recruited."
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