RECAP: No. 10 Arizona crushes Colorado in conference home opener

For the last 72 hours, Tommy Lloyd didn’t think much about the Stanford game. He moved on. It appeared the Wildcats did the same, stamping a statement turnaround game.

The UA routed Colorado in a similar fashion to how Stanford beat it five days prior, nailing 11 three-pointers (seven in the first half) and fixed their perimeter defense issue, only allowing the Buffs to shoot 4-15 from 3-point range for a 97-50 conference home opening victory Thursday night at McKale Center.

"We were on the other side of that a few days ago and today we flipped it," Lloyd said.

This is the Wildcats’ largest margin of victory in a conference game since 1997. Arizona is now 14-0 in games following losses under Tommy Lloyd, with an average margin of domination.

Kylan Boswell catalyzed this turnaround performance for the Wildcats — and himself, pouring in 14 points on 5-of-10 from the field and 4-of-7 from behind the arc, four assists and four steals. Caleb Love complemented and Pelle Larsson complemented Boswell with Love logging 16 and Larsson 18.

Boswell has struggled scoring the ball as of late, shooting 8-of-31 over his previous three games. However, Larsson stressed after the game that these up and down streaks tend to happen with players over the course of a season and that Boswell is "doing a good job."

“You can’t expect a guy to shoot 60% the whole season," Larsson said.

This present mentality was illustrated by the Wildcats starting the game by going on a 16-6 run in the first four minutes of the game anchored by two 3-pointers by Kylan Boswell, who last game shot 1-7 from behind the arc, to force the Buffaloes to call timeout. The 3-point frenzy didn’t end there with Boswell hitting 2 more, along with KJ Lewis, Jaden Bradley and Pelle Larsson nailing one. The Wildcats weren’t just effective offensively from the perimeter, however, scoring seven more points in the paint and eight more rebounds to lift them to a convincing 27-point halftime lead.

The Wildcats' fast-paced efficient play didn't end in the first half, with the UA outshooting the Buffs 62-40% despite rotating in their bench players throughout in the second half. The bench contributed 25 points in the team's second half efforts.

Their defense also didn't let up, collecting 10 steals in the second period.

Arizona finished the game shooting 56.3% from the field.

"Happy for the guys," Lloyd said. "Happy the guys played well but I don't know what time we play on Saturday, but we gotta be ready."

The Wildcats (11-3, 2-1 Pac-12) will host Utah (11-2, 2-0) on Saturday evening. The game will be televised on Pac-12 Networks.

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