Oh, the prospects

The UCLA men’s basketball team met Monday to discuss its recently completed season and begin thinking about the offseason. Meanwhile, Bruin fans can begin to speculate about which members of the team will still be in Westwood when next season begins.

Senior center Lorenzo Mata-Real, who is on track to graduate over the summer, will not return; that much is certain. Outside of that, the Bruins’ current roster is very much subject to change.

It’s believed that a number of UCLA players may declare for June’s NBA Draft. The earliest any official announcement could be made is 1:30 p.m. today, when coach Ben Howland holds his end-of-the-season press conference.

The biggest question mark belongs with the Bruins’ biggest player: center Kevin Love. Even before the freshman played a single game in Pauley Pavilion, many believed that he would only be on campus for one season before leaving for the NBA. He finished the year averaging 17.5 points and 10.6 rebounds per game and was named Pac-10 Player of the Year and a first-team All-American by pretty much every publication that compiles such a team.

While Love has said all year that he loves college, most draft projections place him as a mid-to-late lottery pick. And given that the knocks on him ““ that he’s undersized to play center in the NBA and doesn’t have world-class athletic ability ““ aren’t likely to change, it’s questionable whether another year in school could significantly boost his stock.

After losing to Memphis in the Final Four, Love said it was too early to think about making a decision.

“As of right now, I’m still a UCLA Bruin,” he said. “I’ll step back … go home, talk to some people, talk to my family, see what my options are. But right now, I’m still a UCLA Bruin.

“I’ll tell you what, it makes me hungrier knowing that we made it to the Final Four and we lost.”

The next most likely Bruin to declare for the NBA Draft is junior guard Darren Collison. As with Love, the prevailing opinion about Collison heading into this season was that this year would be his last at UCLA. He averaged 14.5 points per game, shot 52.5 percent from 3-point range and was a third-team Associated Press All-American.

One problem is that Collison’s skill set qualifies him more to play shooting guard in the pros. At 6 feet 1 inch and 165 pounds, he’s severely undersized for that role. And Collison’s 1-for-9 shooting and poor defense against Memphis’ Derrick Rose certainly doesn’t make a strong case that Collison can do well against bigger, NBA-caliber guards.

Like Love, Collison wasn’t talking about next year after Saturday’s game.

“This loss is more painful, so I care less about (when I make) that decision,” he said.

At the beginning of the season, few people believed that Collison’s backcourt mate, Westbrook, could also jump to the NBA. But Westbrook improved by leaps and bounds in his sophomore year, and the game he played against Memphis provided a national showcase for Westbrook’s incredible athleticism. While he only averaged 12.7 points per game, that athletic ability gives him one of the commodities most highly prized in the draft: upside.

In fact, Westbrook’s situation is something of the reverse of Collison’s. At 6-3, Westbrook is ideally sized to play point guard in the NBA ““ but this year, he’s played shooting guard most of the time.

While most projections have Westbrook as a mid-first-round pick if he comes out now, a full year of running the point could allow Westbrook to crack the top 10.

On Saturday, Westbrook also declined to comment on what his plans were for next year.

While it seems like a long shot that any other Bruins would be drafted into the NBA, Bruin Report Online’s Tracy Pierson has reported that swingman Josh Shipp and forward Luc Richard Mbah a Moute are still considering declaring.

Shipp, a redshirt junior, hardly played like an NBA prospect this year, spending much of the season mired in a shooting slump. But this is Shipp’s fourth year at UCLA. He is close to graduating and could see his playing time drop next year when UCLA adds three freshman guards.

Mbah a Moute, a junior, has the build and defensive skills to play in the NBA, but he badly needs another season to work on his outside shooting. After the Memphis game, Mbah a Moute didn’t sound like someone who had just played his last college game.

“I want to win a championship,” Mbah a Moute said. “Hopefully I have a chance to do it again next year.”

The draft isn’t the only thing that could deplete UCLA’s roster. Pierson has also reported that junior forward Alfred Aboya is on track to graduate this year and could leave the team to pursue a master’s degree. While Aboya’s minutes dropped this year, he’d be one of the Bruins’ few big men next year if Love leaves.

Sophomore forward Nikola Dragovic could also leave to play professionally in his native Serbia, according to Pierson.

The offseason is only a few days old, so as of now, all this remains uncertain. The deadline to declare early entry for the NBA Draft is April 27, so the Bruins’ roster is largely fluid until then. Even after that, players who don’t hire an agent have until June 16 to change their minds and take their names back out of the draft, which takes place on June 26.

Until then, the speculation continues.

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