It wasn’t a pregame drill, but Thursday night’s
blowout victory over USC sure felt like it to the Bruins.
“Lay-up after lay-up after lay-up,” senior Dijon
Thompson said.
“I don’t think we got this many dunks in exhibition
games. And it can’t get any better than doing it against USC
in my last game against them.”
Yes, the celebration at Pauley Pavilion was well underway by the
time the final buzzer sounded on UCLA’s 90-69 rout of
crosstown rival USC, and the Bruins wasted no time joining the
party.
Freshmen Jordan Farmar and Arron Afflalo slapped hands with a
group of jubilant students as they left the court. Junior Michael
Fey flipped his trademark headband into the crowd. And Thompson
flung himself into the center of a horde of shirtless Bruin
football players, high-fiving, chest-bumping, and reveling in
UCLA’s most convincing victory in coach Ben Howland’s
two-year tenure.
“We have to enjoy this one,” Afflalo said.
“It’s never going to be this easy again.”
In a season full of tense finishes, this was the laugher that
UCLA (15-9, 9-7 Pac-10) had been waiting for. Taking advantage of
USC’s lackadaisical effort and non-existent second-half
defense, the Bruins turned the second half into a glorified lay-up
line.
UCLA shot 60.7 percent from the field, out-rebounded USC 42-26,
and never trailed in the final 30 minutes of play.
“Those are the kind of numbers I like,” Howland
said. “I was worried about this game coming in because USC
had won two of three games, but we played really well
tonight.”
The victory was even sweeter for the Bruins because they moved
within one-half game of Stanford in the race for third place in the
Pac-10 standings. With only three games remaining in the regular
season and a difficult game at Notre Dame looming on Sunday, UCLA
needed to defeat last-place USC (11-16, 4-12) to have a realistic
chance to earn an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament.
Yet, for once, the postseason was not foremost among the
Bruins’ thoughts as they left the court Thursday night.
“Everything was clicking,” senior Brian Morrison
said. “This was a fun night.”
Midway through the first half, it appeared UCLA might be in for
another battle with the Trojans.
Clinging to a 35-30 lead, the Bruins seized control of the game,
reeling off a 14-0 spurt that seemed to break USC’s spirit. A
16-point advantage at halftime continued to swell early in the
second half, as UCLA revved up its engine and extended its lead to
30.
Afflalo had 14 of his career-high 22 in the second half, and
four other Bruins also tallied double-digits. By the time Morrison
sunk a pair of free throws to give UCLA a 78-46 lead, the cardinal
and gold sections of Pauley Pavilion had thinned out and the Bruin
players said the Trojans appeared to have given up.
“In the back of their heads, they knew it was over,”
Fey said. “They were just waiting for the clock to run
out.”
Now the task for the Bruins is to take the momentum from this
victory and build on it against Notre Dame. That was something UCLA
was unable to do last week when it crushed California on Thursday,
but could not complete the sweep against Stanford.
“I felt this good about last Thursday night, and we
didn’t play nearly as well the next game,” Howland
said. “We need to build on this.”