TEMPE, Ariz. “”mdash; Seeing Jordan Farmar slumped in a folding
chair deep in the bowels of the Wells Fargo Arena, his right foot
submerged in a bucket of ice and a look of exhaustion on his face,
you wouldn’t have believed what had just taken place.
And seeing Jordan Farmar standing on the floor with one minute
left on the clock, hampered by a sprained right ankle and largely
ineffective for 39 minutes of Saturday’s game, you
wouldn’t have believed what was just about to take place.
But such is the crazy thing about greatness.
Channeling both strength and fortitude from somewhere when it
seemed like there was nowhere from which to channel either, Farmar
took the UCLA men’s basketball team on his back and scored
twice in the game’s final 34.6 seconds to lead the No. 17
Bruins (13-2, 3-1 Pac-10) to an incredible, though poorly played,
61-60 victory over Arizona State.
“All great players, when they have that opportunity, want
to make that big shot,” UCLA coach Ben Howland said.
“And he’s a great player.”
With 12 seconds left Saturday, the Bruins appeared to be great
candidates for upset victims. Arizona State forward Bryson Krueger
had just made an improbable 3-pointer to give the Sun Devils (6-7,
0-4) a one-point lead. The Arizona State faithful were on their
feet, and Arron Afflalo, UCLA’s leading scorer, was on the
bench after suffering a hip injury just minutes earlier.
But Farmar, who was 1 for 6 with just five points and three
turnovers prior to his fadeaway jumper with 34.6 seconds left,
wasn’t worried.
“We were all calm,” Farmar said. “They made a
big shot to put them up one, there was plenty of time left to make
something happen, and I was just looking to be aggressive
again.”
Farmar took the inbounds pass, dribbled the length of the floor,
swooped to his left and laid the ball up with 3.6 seconds remaining
to give the Bruins the victory.
“No one stopped me,” Farmar said. “I got a
couple of bumps, but that’s the weight room all summer paying
off. I went through that and made a finish at the rim.”
Coupled with their 85-79 victory over Arizona on Thursday,
Saturday’s tense win gave the Bruins their first sweep in
Arizona since 1997. At 3-1, they are tied for first in the Pac-10
with Arizona and California.
But they had a lot to overcome Saturday to get to this point.
Following their energetic, emotional victory in Tucson, the Bruins
came out flat against the Sun Devils, who lost in a game’s
final seconds for the second straight time. UCLA cast up a number
of air balls, committed some awful turnovers, and even missed an
uncontested dunk on their way to a 29-23 halftime deficit on 24
percent shooting.
“We barely got this game,” said sophomore Josh
Shipp, who finished with 10 points and seven rebounds. “We
put a lot of effort for the first game, and we just came out
sluggishly in this game.”
Outplayed in most facets of Saturday’s game, Howland
discussed the reasons his team was able to win.
The first was that the team made its foul shots.
Though the Bruins finished 18-for-50 (36 percent) from the field
and 1-for-15 (6.7 percent) from 3-point range, UCLA made 24 of 29
free throws.
The second was the Bruins’ 38-29 rebounding margin.
And the third can’t be quantified.
“Just finding a way to win,” Howland said.
Finding a way despite the team’s slew of injuries. Finding
a way despite an awful shooting day. Finding a way on the road when
your opponent has just hit a huge shot to go up by one with 12
seconds remaining.
“As a point guard, as a leader, that’s my job
““ to find a way,” Farmar said.
Though he describes his injured ankle as “really
sore” and “throbbing all the time,” Farmar will
continue to fight through the pain.
He’s clearly not at 100 percent, but Howland has said that
the team is still better with him on the floor. The trip to Arizona
certainly proved that assertion.
On Thursday, Farmar hit four critical free throws down the
stretch to help secure the victory. And on Saturday, well, Farmar
took it upon himself.
“I’ve got so much confidence in Jordan,”
Afflalo said. “He’s just a clutch player. There’s
not more you can say about that.
“I had all the confidence in the world he’d make
that shot.”