SEATTLE — His teenaged players might not have totally understood it until they took the Hec Edmundson Pavilion court on Friday night, but Washington Huskies coach Lorenzo Romar frequently emphasizes the importance of consistent energy and execution once Pac-12 play begins.
The competition is better. The games, usually, mean a little more. Everyone seems to be trying just a little harder.
And maybe, Romar postulates, that applies to the officials, too.
That’s one explanation for why the Huskies and UCLA Bruins combined for 64 fouls and 90 free throws during UW’s 96-93, double-overtime victory on Friday night. Washington hosts USC (12-2, 1-0 in Pac-12) at noon Sunday.
“It’s conference, you’ve got to turn it up,” Romar said, “and I’m sure the officials talk about the same thing — ‘it’s conference play, we want to make sure we call this the way we had talked about before the season.’ And it obviously was called a little tighter.”
The way they had talked about, of course, means allowing far less contact in an attempt to encourage more freedom of movement. That was the NCAA’s stated emphasis before this season began, and the Huskies have struggled at times to adhere to the new rules.
In their season opener, a 77-71 win over Texas in Shanghai, the Huskies committed 34 fouls. They’ve committed 320 in 13 games this season, more than all but 12 other Division 1 teams — and there are 346 Division 1 teams.
They were whistled for 33 fouls in 50 minutes of game time on Friday night. The officials also called 31 fouls on UCLA, and it is difficult to recall more than a few specific possessions during regulation that did not involve a foul or free throw.
Neither Romar or Bruins coach Steve Alford thought the officiating was one-sided, and it wasn’t. But it was certainly, uh, involved.
“We can’t worry about the refs,” said UW guard Andrew Andrews, who tied a career high with 35 points on Friday. “The refs are part of the game, we all know that, just like every other thing is part of the game — traveling, turnovers. So we can’t let that affect our mindset. We’ve just got to go out and do what we’ve got to do on the court.”
The Huskies had three players foul out on Friday — forwards Marquese Chriss, Malik Dime and Noah Dickerson. After Dickerson’s fifth foul — a questionable blocking call early in the first overtime as UCLA guard Bryce Alford dribbled between midcourt and the 3-point line — Andrews said he asked an official what Dickerson should have done differently.
The official told him, simply, to keep playing.
“They called it. What can you do?” Andrews said. “They can’t go back and say, ‘oh, no, he didn’t foul him.’ So we’ve just got to keep playing.”
Said Romar: “That’s why we talked to our team after the Santa Barbara game about taking care of business early, because if you don’t, you’re at the mercy of the ball bouncing off your foot, tipping the ball in your own basket, an official’s call — you’re at the mercy of that. So you can’t snivel about those type of things.”
Tip-ins
Andrews now has four games of 30 or more points in his career, and three of them have come this season. Brandon Roy and Quincy Pondexter are the only other UW players to have three 30-plus scoring games in one season under Romar. … Sam Timmins, a 6-foot-10 center from New Zealand, began practicing with the Huskies last week and sat on the bench for Friday’s game. He will practice and travel with the team this season but will not play, and will be a redshirt freshman in 2016-17.
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