Winning on the road is never easy. Giving up a huge lead doesn’t make it any easier, yet somehow Arizona managed to do both.
The Wildcats coughed up a 19-point lead but never trailed over the final 26 minutes, holding off No. 16 Cincinnati 72-67 on Saturday afternoon. It was their first Quad 1 victory of the season after losing the first five opportunities, and also the 15th win over a ranked opponent under Tommy Lloyd.
Jaden Bradley’s driving basked with 43.9 seconds left proved to be the game winner for Arizona (8-5, 2-0), which has won four in a row. Bradley led the UA with 15 points on 5-of-9 shooting while Carter Bryant had a career-high 14 by making all five of his shots including 3 of 3 from 3 and Henri Veesaar had eight points, eight rebounds and four assists.
Caleb Love had 12 but was just 3 of 15 from the field after dropping 33 against TCU on Monday.
Arizona shot 43.4 percent, its worst accuracy in a win since the opening round of the 2024 NCAA Tournament, and was outrebounded 39-34 including 17-8 on offensive boards. But the Wildcats made up for it by holding Cincinnati (10-3, 0-2) to 39.1 percent shooting including 5 of 25 from 3. The Bearcats also missed 11 of 23 foul shots, going 0 for 2 on three occasions.
Up 39-26 at halftime, Arizona was able to extend the lead to 18 in the first five minutes despite a potentially damaging moment in the opening minute of the second half when Tobe Awaka was called for a flagrant foul on an inadvertent elbow to Cincinnati’s Aziz Bandaogo. But Bandaogo missed both free throws and Jizzle James threw it away on the ensuing possession.
A 3-point play by Love made it 52-33 with 13:39 left but then Arizona got sloppy for the first time all afternoon. Back-to-back turnovers led to runout dunks for the Bearcats to key an 8-0 run to get within 11 with 12:03 to go; the Wildcats would finish with 12 turnovers that led to 13 Cincinnati points.
Arizona got it back up to 15 after another Love 3 before Cincinnati went on a 9-0 run to cut it to 58-52 with 7:24 remaining. The Bearcats made back-to-back 3s, after starting the game 2 for 20, to trail 60-55 with 5:56 remaining.
Cincinnati made it a 1-possession game (64-61) on a James jumper with 3:11 left, and what followed was more than two minutes where there were no field goals and the teams combined to go 1 for 5 from the line. That included Jaden Bradley missing two free throws with Arizona up 3.
A putback by Daniel Skillings Jr. tied it at 64 with 59.3 seconds to go, and after winning a review on an out of bounds call at midcourt Bradley drove straight through the Bearcats defense for the go-ahead layup and a 66-64 lead with 43.9 seconds left.
Bradley’s two free throws with 24.7 seconds left made it a 2-score game, then KJ Lewis hit 1 of 2 with 12.3 seconds to go. Anthony Dell’Orso drained two foul shots with a second left after Cincinnati hit a 3 to get within three with 2.4 seconds left.
No team led by more than two over the first nine minutes before Arizona scored seven in a row to take a 16-10 lead, only to Cincinnati go on its own 7-0 run. But after falling behind 19-18, the Wildcats outscored the Bearcats 21-7 over the final 6:02 of the first half.
A corner 3 by Love, his first field goal, started an 8-0 run capped by Veesaar dunking after faking from the 3-point line. The Wildcats got the lead up to 10 with 3:14 left before halftime and then scored the final five points of the half from the line including a free throw by Love with 0.6 seconds left after he was fouled on a dunk attempt after Veesaar blocked a drive by James.
The Wildcats continue their first Big 12 road trip Tuesday at West Virginia. The Mountaineers (11-2, 2-0) have won seven in a row including an overtime victory over Arizona at the Battle4Atlantis and an upset at Big 12 preseason favorite Kansas.
