The UCLA men’s basketball program is in its eighth and final week of summer team workouts. For the first time, though, the Bruins opened practice Tuesday morning for members of the local media.

It did not take long into the 80-minute practice to see just how different UCLA will look with New Mexico transfer point guard Donovan Dent running the offense. Cronin equated it to a football team bringing in a new talented quarterback.

After Dent scored in a variety of ways from start to finish, Cronin recalled evaluating him as a 2022 recruit out of Corona (Calif.) Centennial.

”He shoots the ball way better than I thought he did,” Cronin said. “That was the reason none of us recruited him coming out of high school. You know, nobody in the Pac-12 recruited him.

”If he’d had shot it, like, half as well as he shoots it now, he’d have been here out of high school. Or, if I was smarter than I am, he’d have been here out of high school. But you’ve got to admit when you’re wrong.”

Dent is one of five new transfers on the roster along with fellow guard Jamar Brown (Missouri-Kansas City), forward Anthony Peoples Jr. (North Carolina Central) and centers Steven Jamerson II (San Diego) and Xavier Booker (Michigan State).

Cronin touched on the collective upperclassmen experience of the transfers, as well as retaining guard/forward Brandon Williams after the sophomore redshirted last season, and much more.

Watch the full press conference below:

Mick Cronin after Tuesday’s summer workout (8/26)