The box score doesn’t tell the whole story, but Colorado produced some encouraging numbers in Thursday’s 82-70 win over Arizona State.
For example, four different Buffs made at least four field goals, and CU went 26-for-29 from the stripe. Colorado also outrebounded the Sun Devils by eight and shot 47% on its home floor.
The eye test, however, brought about some different conclusions. In the eyes of head coach Tad Boyle, the Buffs had a few too many defensive breakdowns and struggled at times to turn defensive stops into points.
Still, Colorado played well enough to stay perfect at home (13-0) while improving to 7-5 in Pac-12 play.
“Our guys did a good job tonight,” Boyle said. “We didn’t play our best offensively. We had a few breakdowns defensively, but we did what we had to do and put away a really competitive, hard-playing Arizona State team.”
While Colorado didn’t get much production from its bench — besides Julian Hammond III’s nine points — this was a good team win. J’Vonne Hadley recorded his first double-double of the season (19 points and 11 boards), KJ Simpson had 17 points, Tristan da Silva dropped 15 and Cody Williams scored 11 in his return from injury.
“One of the strengths on this team is everybody’s capable of getting it going on any given night,” Simpson said. “J’Vonne had it going early, Cody started getting it going, Eddie (Lampkin Jr.) has always been a post presence, Tristan got it going and Ju (Hammond) got it going.”
Colorado’s next task is to avenge last month’s 47-point loss to Arizona. The eighth-ranked Wildcats will be in Boulder on Saturday for an 8 p.m. MT tipoff (ESPN).
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