The Bruins are receiving their stat sheet stuffer and application cornerstone back for just one previous ride.
Guard/forward Jaime Jaquez Jr. declared he is returning to UCLA men’s basketball for the 2022-2023 year in a movie on social media Monday afternoon, delaying his declaration for the NBA Draft until finally next spring. Jaquez led the Bruins in points, rebounds and steals the two this period and very last season, main the way for a staff that built the Remaining Four and Sweet 16 in again-to-back years.
In his announcement online video, Jaquez cited seeking to earn UCLA’s 12th championship as 1 of the selecting elements in him electing to return for his senior campaign.
Jaquez was just one of the 5 finalists for the Julius Erving Award this year, supplied to the nation’s prime compact forward, but two of the other folks have now declared for the NBA Draft and the winner, Duke’s Wendell Moore Jr., could be pro-certain as nicely.
UCLA dropped guard/ahead Peyton Watson to the 2022 NBA Draft Pool on Tuesday and guard/forward Jake Kyman to the transfer portal two months before, but with Jaquez’s return, the system will still have to lose a different scholarship participant in purchase to make room for the a few incoming freshmen.
At any time since coach Mick Cronin arrived in 2019, Jaquez has been part of UCLA’s main, standing in as the headliner in the coach’s to start with recruiting class with the application. Jaquez is averaging 13.9 factors and 5.7 rebounds for each recreation throughout his collegiate occupation, finding up All-Pac-12 To start with Group and Next Group honors in addition to two nods to the All-Pac-12 Defensive Team.
“Jaime has been a remarkable and tenacious participant in our plan for three a long time, and we are thrilled that he will appear back again for his senior season in Westwood,” Cronin said in a assertion produced by the staff. “Jaime has a likelihood to go down with so several other wonderful Bruins in UCLA historical past who have played four seasons in entrance of the Pauley Pavilion trustworthy.”
Jaquez initially broke onto the scene at the 2019 Maui Invitational, when Cronin inserted him into the commencing lineup in opposition to Michigan State and never appeared back again. Jaquez has started in 89 of the Bruins’ final 91 game titles considering the fact that the end of that nonconference match – he came off the bench in the home finale his freshman 12 months in order for Alex Olesinski to get the start out on Senior Working day, then missed one particular sport due to damage this earlier January.
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Doing work as a result of many ankle and head injuries as a junior, Jaquez mostly retained his do-it-all, iron guy position by powering by way of individuals bumps and bruises all calendar year prolonged.
Jaquez notched vocation highs throughout just about every single for each video game, per 40 moment, for every 100 possession and sophisticated statistical group despite those people injuries. The 6-foot-7 wing finished the regular period on a tear, guiding his workforce to a 8-1 extend forward of the Pac-12 championship sport, but his creation bit by bit dropped at the time the postseason started.
Soon after scoring 23 factors in the Pac-12 match quarterfinals versus Washington Condition, Jaquez’s up coming 5 performances finished with 19 details, 18 factors, 15 details, 15 details and last but not least 10 factors in a Sweet 16 loss to North Carolina. Jaquez experienced his 3rd ankle sprain of the 12 months 6 times prior to that do-or-die contest, and after lifting UCLA to a multi-rating lead halfway by way of the 2nd 50 percent, he skipped his last nine shot tries of the evening prior to watching that gain flip into a late deficit.
By returning to Westwood for an additional season, Jaquez has a opportunity to erase those misses and change them with some significant time tends to make occur March Madness 2023. Jaquez has now appeared in nine NCAA event game titles with the Bruins, averaging 14.4 points, 5.9 rebounds, 3.1 helps and 1.3 steals for each video game in those contests.
Jaquez returning for another 12 months implies he will overlap in Westwood with his young sister Gabriela, a McDonald’s All-American who is set to join UCLA women’s basketball in the slide. The more youthful Jaquez committed to the Bruins previous summertime, planting the seed for Jaime to come back again for a fourth yr.
The Jaquez siblings will now have a opportunity to get Westwood by storm collectively, a single making a force to go out on leading while the other normally takes her to start with ways at the subsequent stage.
The Bruins now await the choices of guard Johnny Juzang, guard Jules Bernard, forward Cody Riley and middle Myles Johnson, needing a single to go away in purchase to meet up with the NCAA’s scholarship specifications.
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