{"id":187693,"date":"2026-02-21T16:33:16","date_gmt":"2026-02-21T16:33:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/187693\/"},"modified":"2026-02-21T16:33:16","modified_gmt":"2026-02-21T16:33:16","slug":"ucla-basketball-coach-mick-cronin-apologizes-for-ejecting-player","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/187693\/","title":{"rendered":"UCLA basketball coach Mick Cronin apologizes for ejecting player"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

UCLA<\/a> coach Mick Cronin<\/a> apologized Friday for a pair of outbursts<\/a> from earlier in the week and assured that he\u2019s still \u201ca good fit\u201d for the Bruins.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know I\u2019m not bigger than the brand,\u201d Cronin said. \u201cThe brand matters, the school matters. The last thing I want to do is bring negative publicity to our school. And sometimes \u2014 because it\u2019s not about me, I don\u2019t care what people think about me \u2014 I need to do a better job knowing I am the coach here, and I need to make sure I don\u2019t do anything to embarrass our school.\u201d<\/p>\n

An onslaught of scrutiny has followed Cronin since Tuesday night, when the notoriously short-tempered coach blew up at his own player late in UCLA\u2019s blowout loss to Michigan State<\/a>. After center Steven Jamerson II committed a hard foul with UCLA trailing by 27, Cronin was caught on camera berating the 6-foot-10 center before sending him to the locker room mid-game.<\/p>\n

Cronin said Friday that he personally apologized to Jamerson earlier this week and addressed the team about the situation. He explained that he initially thought the foul was \u201ca dirty play\u201d by Jamerson, but changed his tune after watching the film.<\/p>\n

His UCLA teammates have since tried to rally behind Jamerson, who they said was \u201ca little in his head\u201d in the wake of his unprecedented ejection.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was kind of a big-time moment,\u201d guard Skyy Clark said. \u201cAny player is going to have some thoughts after that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bruins players held a players-only meeting soon after to discuss how to move forward.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think, to be honest, the entire world has ever seen that in a game,\u201d guard Trent Perry said of the ejection.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t long after that moment that Cronin went viral again, this time for chiding a reporter who asked about the Michigan State student section during his postgame interview.<\/p>\n

Cronin didn\u2019t offer any direct apology to the reporter, but said Friday that he was often too candid and needs to \u201cdial back some of [his] humor.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have to realize, and I have to do a better job of this, that in this climate, you\u2019ve got to be careful with what you say,\u201d Cronin said.<\/p>\n

Yet even as the coach was roundly criticized for his handling of the situation, UCLA\u2019s players were insistent that Cronin still had their backs.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re not around him every day,\u201d Clark said. \u201cThey don\u2019t see the full him. That\u2019s just how he coaches.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"UCLA coach Mick Cronin apologized Friday for a pair of outbursts from earlier in the week and assured…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":187694,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[88257,4690,2424,88259,64517,88256,48,52,51,47,50,49,32008,8750,9442,5408,4265,42176,1092,88258,430],"class_list":{"0":"post-187693","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-big-time-moment","9":"tag-coach","10":"tag-friday","11":"tag-good-fit","12":"tag-hard-foul","13":"tag-jamerson","14":"tag-la","15":"tag-la-headlines","16":"tag-la-news","17":"tag-los-angeles","18":"tag-los-angeles-headlines","19":"tag-los-angeles-news","20":"tag-michigan-state","21":"tag-mick-cronin","22":"tag-player","23":"tag-reporter","24":"tag-school","25":"tag-situation","26":"tag-ucla","27":"tag-unprecedented-ejection","28":"tag-week"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187693","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=187693"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187693\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/187694"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=187693"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=187693"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=187693"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}