Sometimes it takes just a little tweak here and a little tweak there to make things right.
But about 10 days ago, Rawle Alkins spilled the beans on something that happened after the debacle of a loss to UCLA: they had a team meeting.
But, it was so very apparent to me something had happened – wasn’t sure at the time during the win against USC – that I turned to GoAZCats.com editor Matt Moreno to say that was my guess. Something had clicked, sharing the ball and a fluidity started either to emerge or re-emerge.
Sean Miller addresses the media before facing Oregon State and Oregon this week.
So, Moreno asked Alkins if that they had gotten together to talk. And, well, they had.
Who spoke? “A little bit of everyone,” Alkins said. “Everyone just said what was on their mind. It wasn’t like one person-dominant. Just a little bit of everyone saying what’s on their mind and what we need to help.”
Then came the sound-and-solid win against USC and then the nice but uneven win against Arizona State on Thursday. Arizona is now ranked No. 14.
On Thursday night, Allonzo Trier played a little coy when asked about the meeting after I asked if it had helped, but then said, “Guys know what their roles are what they need to do. It’s just about coming in and doing it.”
And well, they’ve done well for two consecutive games after two consecutive losses. What will it all matter the rest of the way? Who knows? But it has helped, particularly at the right time as the end of the regular season approaches.
“Sometimes team meetings can be over blown or over stated,” Arizona coach Sean Miller said on Monday. “Teams constantly having them probably aren’t good either. Over the long journey of the season there will be a couple of times where it’s needed. We’ve had those times. I’m sure Dusan has been at the forefront of those conversations, but I believe we have a team that cares about each other. They know we have high expectations. And we’ve all worked really hard.”
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