A smile swept across Kobe Johnson’s face Tuesday morning before joining his UCLA men’s basketball teammates on the practice floor at the Mo Ostin Basketball Center.

While addressing reporters in the patio just outside, the question that revealed plenty on his face had to do with the intensity of his new head coach, Mick Cronin. Johnson, a transfer guard from crosstown rival USC, plays the type of smothering defense and with the type of effort that the demanding Cronin covets.

“When I was getting recruited, it was a whole different side of Cronin that I saw,” Johnson said, alluding to the charismatic side when the coach is not occupied with running a practice.

“That’s why I came here, you know, I want these practices to be intense.”