One team came in playing its best basketball of the season.
The other hobbled in, already overmatched and now without its
two best players.
When you add it all up, there was really only one way this game
could have gone ““ and lo and behold, it went exactly that
way.
No. 13 UCLA (25-6, 14-4 Pac-10) took care of business Thursday
in the second round of the Pac-10 Tournament, using big runs at the
beginning of each half to cruise to a 79-47 victory over a severely
undermanned and outclassed Oregon State team.
UCLA will face Arizona, who beat Stanford 73-68, in
tonight’s semifinals.
“This team did a great job just focusing on this
particular game,” freshman point guard Darren Collison said.
“We took this really seriously. We could’ve looked
ahead and said that we’re going to win the Pac-10
Championship, but we stopped right here and said that OSU is the
next obstacle we have to take care of.”
If the Oregon State Beavers (13-18, 5-13) can be called an
obstacle, they were an obstacle of very little resistance.
UCLA began the game on a 12-2 run, then used a 19-4 run to start
the second half, extending the margin to 26 and putting the game
far out of reach for Oregon State.
“I thought we really came out at the beginning of both
halves and played really well,” coach Ben Howland said.
“We got off to great starts because of our
defense.”
Aside from their 11 first-half turnovers, the Bruins were by far
the better team in every facet of the game, a fact that had Howland
in a particularly good mood afterward.
Senior center Ryan Hollins led the Bruins with a season-high 17
points and eight rebounds, and UCLA forced 18 turnovers while
holding Oregon State to 32.1 percent shooting and its lowest point
total of the season. The Bruins also won the rebounding battle in
convincing fashion (39-25).
It seemed, in a word, easy.
“Not necessarily,” sophomore point guard Jordan
Farmar said. “We had to play hard.”
But they didn’t have to play for long, a fact that Howland
hopes will help the team’s chances if the Bruins advance to
Saturday’s finals.
Farmar only played 22 minutes Thursday, the second-fewest minute
total he’s played all season.
Sophomore guard Arron Afflalo, who averages 34.3 minutes a game,
played just 23.
That meant more time for others, as reserve guard Janou Rubin,
who averages 2.9 minutes per contest, had six points in 12 minutes
against the Beavers. Lorenzo Mata even made an unexpected
appearance, playing for the first time since breaking his leg on
Jan. 12.
Hollins appears to be establishing himself as a legitimate
inside presence, as he was the most productive he’s been all
season on Thursday.
“I’m trying to be an example,” Hollins said.
“I’m trying to be one of the leaders. It’s pretty
hard to get a guy to follow you or listen to you when you’re
playing soft or when you’re not playing hard, so that’s
my biggest thing. If I’m trying to inspire the young guys,
then I have to lead by example.”
Thursday’s victory also provided some sense of revenge, as
Oregon State knocked the Bruins out of the first round of the
conference tournament last season. UCLA went on to lose in the
first round of the NCAA Tournament as well.
But postseason basketball affords no time to rest. UCLA must
return to the Staples Center today to face a hungry Arizona team
that was swept by UCLA this season.
Though the Wildcats will be without leading scorer Hassan Adams,
who was arrested on suspicion of drunk driving over the weekend,
the Bruins are wary.
“It doesn’t change things at all,” Farmar
said. “I think we really learned our lessons with things like
that facing USC without Gabe Pruitt when we lost over there. We
can’t take it for granted, because the other guys on that
team can definitely play basketball.”