LEXINGTON, Ky. — Eric Dailey Jr. clapped along to the school’s fight song playing over the sound system.
Aday Mara and Lazar Stefanovic stood alongside one another on the perimeter and tapped basketballs before firing three-pointers.
Trent Perry sank a half-court shot and commenced a victory dance.
There was a reason they all seemed a little jaunty. Everything they did Wednesday afternoon inside Rupp Arena was a first.
All four UCLA players had never participated in an NCAA tournament open practice, much less a game. Few on this roster have.
Seven of the team’s top 10 players will make their March Madness debut on Thursday night when the seventh-seeded Bruins (22-10) face 10th-seeded Utah State (26-7) in a Midwest Region first-round game.
“This is why I came to UCLA,” forward Tyler Bilodeau said. “You know, it’s that time, so we’re ready for it.”
This week — and hopefully next week, and the week after that — is the reward for wearing the school’s four letters. Coach Mick Cronin said Bilodeau, Dailey, Perry, William Kyle III, Kobe Johnson and Skyy Clark all took less name, image and likeness money to come to UCLA than they were offered elsewhere.
“Now, we were in the ballgame, it wasn’t in another ballpark,” Cronin said, “but we were trying to get guys to gravitate toward what we were trying to build to get back into the tournament.”
Stefanovic, a senior, arrived as a transfer from Utah before last season without asking for a penny, though he was given NIL money. The big payoff was going to come as part of a team that made a run in the NCAA tournament.
“That was the No. 1 thing when I entered the portal,” Stefanovic said. “I wanted to go somewhere where I could fight for a title and have a chance to win a title.”
After missing the NCAA tournament last year for the first time since 2010, when he was in his fourth season at Cincinnati, Cronin quickly rebuilt his roster. He brought in six transfers along with three high school recruits after a dinner with Johnson and a slew of Zoom meetings with the other transfers.
“I’d say about 40 days of no sleep for me last spring,” Cronin said, “putting this team together. We try to sell these guys, ‘Look, this is UCLA, the expectation is to win.’”
Only three Bruins likely to play Thursday have NCAA tournament experience. Andrews was a backup to Tyger Campbell on a team that went to the Sweet 16 in 2023. Kyle played in one tournament game last season for South Dakota State, losing to Iowa State. His 14-point, seven-rebound performance against the Cyclones helped convince Cronin that he could play for the Bruins.
“Johnson was on USC teams that lost in the first round, to Miami in 2022 and to Michigan State in 2023.
“I mean, I don’t really have that much experience winning in the NCAA tournament,” Johnson said, “but just the environment of being in that type of atmosphere is different. You know, every team is going to come out with their best game and the little details matter in those types of games. So we’ve got to be locked in every single play, every single game and we’ve got to play a full 40 minutes; that’s what it’s going to take.”
Those on the verge of their NCAA tournament debut have heard plenty about what it takes to win this time of year.
“You’ve definitely got to be physical, you’ve got to be the toughest team, you’ve got to play really smart, you can’t have dumb turnovers or anything like that, you’ve got to execute on offense,” Clark said. “Your defense has got to be top-notch — these are the best of the best [teams], so you’ve got to come in sharp.”
One of Cronin’s favorite sayings is that everything he does is in preparation for March. He’s curtailed practices to keep players fresh and reiterated that seemingly small moments matter.
“An out-of-bounds play, whether it’s offense or defense, could decide whether you go home or not or you move on,” Cronin said. “So the details that I try to be so demanding on with these guys during the season, there is a reason — it’s all for this moment, to try to advance and win this tournament. That’s just the way we operate.”
Having compiled a 9-3 record in the NCAA tournament at UCLA — with two of the losses coming on absurd three-pointers against Gonzaga and the third on a bizarre confluence of plays in the final two minutes against North Carolina — Cronin knows what it takes to succeed on college basketball’s biggest stage.
Winning his way requires lockdown defense and sticking to the game plan, something that didn’t happen when Wisconsin kept making one three-pointer after another on the way to a blowout victory over the Bruins in the Big Ten tournament. Against Utah State, it will probably mean keeping the Aggies from pushing the pace with a guard-heavy roster that leans heavily on Ian Martinez (16.8 points per game).
“You can’t let another team get started to their strengths,” Cronin said, “because you start a snowball rolling downhill, it picks up steam.”
Growing up in Serbia, Stefanovic said he didn’t watch a lot of college basketball until the NCAA tournament each spring.
“Then they stream every single game and you watch and it’s exciting,” Stefanovic said, “so that’s what I knew before coming to the U.S., that was a big thing. So I’m really excited for it.”
Stefanovic’s favorite March memory growing up was Villanova’s Kris Jenkins making a three-pointer to beat North Carolina as time expired. Stefanovic later played with Tar Heels guard Marcus Paige, talking with him about the lunacy of that shot.
Almost everyone on UCLA’s roster has pretended to be in this moment, whether in their backyard or an empty gym, the game’s final seconds winding down, the ball in their hands for the last shot in the NCAA tournament.
“All the time,” Clark said. “And if you miss a shot with three seconds left, you magically get five more seconds.”
After so much waiting, their time is finally here.
