Wednesday, November 20, 1996
NIT:
More mature UCLA team under Lavin looks to avenge ’94 loss to
TulsaBy Hye Kwon
Daily Bruin Staff
Eight long months removed from a shocking loss to Princeton, the
UCLA men’s basketball team will embark on the 1996-97 season
tonight against another opponent that stirs up painful memories
from past seasons.
Tulsa, which defeated the Bruins 112-102 in the first round of
the NIT 1994 tournament, marches into Pauley Pavilion at 9 p.m.,
this time with hopes of pulling off an early season upset in the
first round of the preseason National Invitational Tournament.
Senior forward Charles O’Bannon, who scored 15 points and 12
rebounds against the Golden Hurricanes as a freshman three seasons
ago, remembers the loss as if it happened yesterday.
"It was a feeling of losing to a team you shouldn’t have lost
to," O’Bannon said. "It left a real bitter taste in my mouth."
Ranked fifth in the nation, the Bruins are overwhelmingly
favored to avenge the loss. However, UCLA is still an unproven team
in the Steve Lavin era, which officially begins tonight. According
to Tulsa head coach Steve Robinson, the fact that there’s a mystery
surrounding Lavin makes it tough for the Golden Hurricane to devise
a game plan.
"With Coach (Jim) Harrick, you had a general idea of what you
can expect from UCLA," Robinson said. "With Lavin, it’s unknown as
to what kind of style they’ll play with."
Tonight’s matchup promises to be a good one because, much like
UCLA, the greatest asset of Robinson’s team is its fast breaking
game. While most teams the Bruins will face this year will be gun
shy about engaging in a track meet with them, the Golden Hurricane
might be one of the few exceptions.
"We try to get it up and down the floor," Robinson said. "We do
worry about not giving up easy baskets to (the Bruins) because they
have tremendous team speed and that’s one of the great strengths.
Everyone who plays UCLA will try to keep them from scoring easy
layups."
One player Tulsa will reply upon as the go-to scorer is
All-American Shea Seals. Hailed as one of the best shooting guards
in the country last year, Seals averaged 17.1 points and 5.7
rebounds per game. Choosing to stick around for his senior year,
Seals is the single most important piece of the Golden Hurricane’s
puzzle.
"People don’t have any idea what he means to the Tulsa
basketball program," Robinson said. "He’s a leader and works very
hard for this team. He’s a tremendous player."
While UCLA’s style might be somewhat of an enigma to Robinson,
the Bruin coaching staff apparently has a good scouting report on
Tulsa. The Golden Hurricane scheme will mimic the one used by Roy
Williams at Kansas, because Robinson was a one time Jayhawk
assistant and has taken the Williams’ philosophy with him to
Tulsa.
"Their initial attack is about 70 percent of their offense,"
Lavin said. "They kind of have a speed game where they’ll push the
ball up the floor and do some stuff out of their high-low early
offense. So, taking away their early offense and concentrating on
Seals will be the two keys on the game.
"But as always, we’re more concerned about what we do rather
than what our opponents do, which is kind of a UCLA philosophy. If
we play our brand of basketball, we dictate where the game
goes."
If UCLA beats Tulsa tonight, they’ll face the winner of the
Oklahoma State-St. Mary’s game. That second round matchup will be
played at Pauley Pavilion on Friday at 9 p.m.