TUCSON—A week ago, Arizona State coach Bobby Hurley ended a postgame speech to his team after a win with, “If anybody wants to win here, they better go to (expletive) Tucson.”

Hurley on Tuesday said his comments were not directed at Arizona but were meant to motivate his team. And although Arizona coach Sean Miller said he took no exception to Hurley’s comments when asked about them earlier this week, it sure seemed like his team did.

No. 16 Arizona (16-2, 5-0 Pac-12) pounced on ASU early and never let up, cruising to a 91-75 win in front of 14, 644 at McKale Center where the Wildcats led throughout. The Sun Devils woke up a bit in the second half, but it proved to be futile after a poor first half offensively where they made none of their nine 3-point attempts.

“We didn’t do what we need to do on offense to play,” Hurley said. “We’re at a disadvantage most times with size and to go 0-for-9 from three (in the first half) is not going to give us a chance. We needed to shoot it better, we didn’t. I appreciate and respect how our team competed and played in the second half. It easily could have gotten away from us.”

ASU (9-9, 2-3) started slow once again as it took the Sun Devils about three minutes to score their first point and around five to grab their first rebound. By then, Arizona led 12-0 on the scoreboard and 9-0 in the rebounding battle, leaving ASU seemingly flustered as it tried to recover and adjust on the fly.

Following a much-needed timeout, ASU cut the deficit to eight, providing a glimmer of hope that it could climb back into the game.

However, that’s when Arizona 7-foot freshman forward Lauri Markkanen’s 30-point, the eight-rebound night started to get going. He drained three consecutive 3-pointers to push the Wildcats’ lead back to 17 points.

“Markkanen can hurt you in so many different ways with his shooting, and he went off the dribble, (and with) the tip-ins,” Hurley said. “He’s a very, very complete basketball player. His game is very advanced, he’s a very mature player.”

ASU junior point guard Tra Holder, who scored 20 points on 6 of 10 shooting with three rebounds and two assists, called Markkanen a “future NBA player.”

“There is not much you can do about his size,” Holder said.

The Sun Devils’ reliance on three-point shooting has been well-documented as they had shot 46.7 percent from 3-point range in wins and just 27.6 percent in losses entering Thursday’s game.

ASU shot just 37 percent in the first half compared to Arizona’s 61.3 percent, leading to a 20-point halftime deficit.

“We’re not a team that can survive against a team like this if we’re coming into the locker room with 25 points at half,” Hurley said. “We need to be high 30s, low 40s at a minimum to give ourselves a better chance.”

The Sun Devils started the second half strong as they hit four threes in the first five minutes, helping them cut the deficit to 13 points.

However, they never reduced that deficit further.

“They wanted it bad, they competed hard,” Hurley said of his team. “It wasn’t an effort thing, it was more of an execution thing…We were just fighting to keep it at a reasonable margin and it was just too much to overcome that halftime deficit.”

In addition to Markkanen’s impressive performance, fellow 7-footer Dusan Ristic added 16 points on 6-for-9 shooting and seven rebounds. Arizona guard Kadeem Allen poured in 18 points of his own and guard Kobi Simmons had 13.

ASU senior forward Obinna Oleka nearly missed another double-double as he tallied 22 points on a 9-of-15 clip and nine boards. Additionally, senior guard Torian Graham scored 18 points on 7-for-15 shooting.

And while the Sun Devils made 10 threes in the second half — which alone were enough to surpass Arizona’s total for the entire game — the first-half struggles from distance doomed them.

“We shoot the three well and we are a high-scoring offensive team, so it puts a lot of pressure on us,” Holder said of the team’s three-point struggles in the first half. “It gives them long rebounds and they move the ball well in transition, so when the three isn’t falling we have to find other ways to score the ball and be effective.”

ASU overcame an early 10-point deficit to defeat San Diego State on the road in December and Thursday provided the same type of opportunity. However, the Sun Devils could not completely recover after a poor offensive first half in a hostile environment against one of the Pac-12’s top teams.

“No matter where you’re playing, you hope you can just get your feet under you in the game,” Hurley said. ”…We never got it to a margin where we could put any significant game pressure on Arizona.”

ASU now travels to face the Los Angeles Schools next week as they visit UCLA on Jan. 19 and USC on Jan. 22., two tough opponents for a team that just fell under .500 in conference play.