In stunned silence, they waited.
Huddled around a big screen television, the Bruins lingered last
March, mouths agape and tears welling in their eyes, hoping against
hope that the NCAA tournament selection committee had made some
mistake.
“Difficult,” Michelle Greco called it
afterwards.
“An absolute nightmare,” Kathy Olivier said earlier
this week.
Fast forward a year and UCLA finds itself in an unenviable but
eerily familiar position as it prepares for Sunday’s regular
season finale against USC.
Win and preserve the chance to avenge that memory. Lose and
relive it all over again.
The Bruins (15-11) are a handful of wins short of where they
would like to be right now, meaning that their task is abundantly
clear.
They must beat ‘SC. Then beat them again in the first
round of the conference tournament. And that’s just to play
their way back onto the bubble.
“It comes down to the rivalry; can you believe
that?” Olivier said. “As much as that sounds like a
nightmare, this team is up to the challenge.”
And maybe they are. A month ago, heck no, but now that Nikki
Blue is thinking pass first and Lisa Willis has regained her
shooting stroke and Noelle Quinn is playing like she’s
possessed, the Bruins are the sort of team that could exorcise last
year’s demons.
But against USC? Twice? That might be too much to ask.
A year ago UCLA snared a pair of victories over a
slower-than-death Oregon squad, setting up a semifinal showdown
with top-seeded Stanford. This year, it could be a lot harder.
The spectre of the crosstown rivalry aside, USC is good. And
desperate.
The Trojans, who topped UCLA at the Sports Arena earlier this
season, must also sweep the Bruins in order to keep their fading
NCAA hopes alive.
A split and both teams can start spelling out the three most
hated letters in basketball.
N-I-T.
Washington Associate Athletic Director Marie Tuite, a member of
the NCAA Tournament Selection Committee, acknowledged that the
Bruins are a few big wins away from tournament consideration right
now.
A strong finish will help, Tuite said, as will an improved
non-conference schedule.
“Unfortunately, they didn’t win too many of
those,” she admitted.
Yes, a decisive December victory over Texas, Purdue or Michigan
State would loom large right now, but the Bruins still control
their own destiny.
And Tuite is just itching to make a case for the Bruins, if UCLA
can make one for itself.
“They’re a heck of a ball club,” she said,
“but they need to make a statement in the Pac-10
tournament.”
Historically, under Olivier, the Bruins have been the
Pac-10’s biggest tease. They tantalized fans in the late
’90s with a slew of talented players, but never quite put it
all together. They began the conference season 5-0 last year, but a
late-January slump cost the Bruins dearly.
A late-season six-game winning streak piqued the interest of
weary fans this season after a sluggish start had them
understandably wary.
Olivier pledged after last season’s disappointment not to
let the squad’s fate be decided again by the selection
committee’s whim.
Well, that didn’t work.
But at least they’ve managed to make it interesting.
“UCLA is in an identical situation to where they were last
year,” Tuite said. “If they come up with at least 17
wins, you bet I can make a case.”
A case? Sure. But if the Bruins don’t want to spend the
second Sunday in March huddled around a television set, they better
shoot for 18.
Eisenberg was a women’s basketball beat writer last
year. E-mail him at jeisenberg@media.ucla.edu.