HOUSTON -- Last month at Big Ten Media Day, Matt Norlander and I were conducting interviews with various coaches and players, among them UCLA's Mick Cronin, who was in a noticeably good mood. He was smiling. He was laughing -- so much so that, at some point later in the day, Norlander noted to me that Cronin, largely attached to an alternative reputation he knows he has, seemed happy and almost giddy talking about his team.

I don't remember the exact wording.

I wasn't taking notes.

But what I remember is us laughing about the idea of how funny it would be if Cronin was in such a good mood because he was the first to know his 2026-27 Bruins were going to be better than anybody expected. I didn't think much about that interaction after that afternoon. But then I settled back into my hotel room late Monday -- here on campus at the University of Houston, where Kelvin Sampson's Cougars started the season 1-0 with a 94-55 victory over La Salle -- and watched Cronin's postgame interview following an upset of Arizona with TNT's Allie LaForce, and there he was smiling big again, to the point that Brian Anderson, the network's elite play-by-play guy, mentioned it afterward.

Final score: UCLA 84, Arizona 75.

Is this Cronin's favorite UCLA team ever? He didn't say that, exactly. But after what was the biggest victory anybody notched on what amounted to opening night of the 2026-27 college basketball season, the 55-year-old eighth-year coach of the Bruins sounded like a big fan of what he and his staff have assembled in Westwood.

"I've not had a bad day coaching this team," Cronin said.

At some point, odds are, he will. But it definitely wasn't Monday, when Trent Perry made all 11 free throws he attempted and finished with 21 points, five assists and three rebounds in an 84-75 victory over an Arizona team that is projected to win the Big 12, according to the league's official preseason poll.

"It's a great win for us," Cronin said before later adding, "we're more athletic than we've been. {Freshmen] Nikola [Kusturica] and Joe Philon give us a dimension that I haven't had. They're above-the-rim perimeter players."

They might be a part of something special.

UCLA is up to No. 14 in Tuesday morning's updated CBS Sports Top 25 And 1 college basketball rankings, where Florida remains No. 1 following Monday's 77-67 win over Miami. Next up for the Bruins is Friday's matchup with North Florida inside Pauley Pavilion. UCLA will open the Big Ten portion of its schedule on the first day of December at home against Oregon.

Florida remains and begins the 2026-27 season at No. 1 in the Top 25 And 1 after returning six of the top seven scorers from a team that won the SEC by multiple games and secured a No. 1 seed in the 2026 NCAA Tournament. The Gators open their season Monday against Miami in the only game on the schedule between two teams both ranked in the top 20 of the Top 25 And 1. The Hurricanes are 19th in the Top 25 And 1.

Top 25 And 1 rankings