The Washington Huskies Beat The Arizona Wildcats in a Nail-Biter 69-67

The Huskies and the Wildcats have quickly become rivals in the last couple of years. The past three games (including this one), the two teams have come down to the final possession. Last season, in Arizona, Derrick Williams had a huge block that helped seal the deal for the Wildcats.

The Pac-10 tournament came down to Arizona and Washington and who can forget the “COLD-BLOODED” shot by Isaiah Thomas in overtime to clinch the win for the Huskies.

This game proved to be no different, as the Huskies completed a sweep of the Arizona schools on the road, with a Tony Wroten block in the final second of the game.

This team looks a lot different than they did earlier in this season, especially on the road. Many will point to Austin Seferian-Jenkins as the difference, or renewed team chemistry, or even the rapid rise of Wroten. However, what really looks different is their intensity on the defensive end of the floor?

Arizona is a good shooting team, especially from three. They had just beaten Washington State by making 15 three-point shots. In this game, they only had 4 (out of 13). They held Arizona State to only 24 points in the first half of their last game and forced 15 turnovers against the Wildcats in this game.

There are still some mental breakdowns on defense. For example, at the end of each half in the past two games they have allowed a defender to get right to the hoop, as if their minds were already at half-time. But overall, the defense looks much improved. The defense looks like a typical Romar defense.

Game Notes: 

• Tony Wroten will most likely win “Player of the Week” honors again after his huge performances in the last two games. He had 17 points, 5 rebounds, and 4 assists.
• Abdul Gaddy was in foul trouble for a lot of the second half, and so his minutes were greatly diminished. He still tends to frustrate UW fans because of his lack of production in scoring and the way he slows down the game. However, his on-court leadership is helping not hurting this team.
• Aziz N’Diaye had a huge game being easily the tallest person to put in minutes, he had 12 points and 8 rebounds. He helped the Huskies get off to a fantastic start.
• Terrence Ross was the all-around man, he had 16 points, 7 rebounds, 3 steals, 3 blocks, and 2 assists.
• CJ Wilcox saw sizable minutes in this game and his 15 points were huge for the Huskies to win this game. They certainly needed a healthy Wilcox and he was there when called upon.
• Seferian-Jenkins only played for 6 minutes but had 3 rebounds. He had a couple of hard fouls and didn’t see much action after his second one. However, this is partly due to the fact that N’Diaye was having a ton of success down low.
• Desmond Simmons and Darnell Gant played good role players in this game but didn’t impact much in terms of stats. Their presence on the court matters in tight games.