ATLANTA “”mdash; The second time was twice as bitter.
As the UCLA players sat in the locker room following their 76-66 loss to Florida, suddenly none of the things they had accomplished this season mattered. From the dejected, defeated looks on the faces of Darren Collison, Luc Richard Mbah a Moute and Lorenzo Mata, to the tears streaming down the face of Arron Afflalo, the emotions of two painful losses to the Gators weighed down hard on the Bruins.
All of the effort, all of the success throughout the year instantly came to a crashing halt as the stunning realization that UCLA was once again going home without a title came to fruition.
“Last year we didn’t know what to expect,” sophomore point guard Darren Collison said. “We were playing against a good team, and we fell short. This year we felt we could take this thing all the way.”
All week leading up to the game, the players talked about how they wouldn’t have accomplished anything until they won the national title ““ how making the Final Four simply wasn’t good enough this season after the way the 2005-2006 season ended.
Coach Ben Howland was able to put into perspective a season that saw the Bruins win a Pac-10 Championship, remain in the top 10 all season long, and get back to the Final Four despite losing three starters from last season’s team.
“I’m really proud of our team,” Howland said. “We had a really successful year. There’s only one team that’s going to come out of the Final Four really feeling happy and that’s the team that wins (the national title). Although we did not win (Saturday), that doesn’t diminish for me, at least, the fact that we had a great season.”
But for the players, it was a little more difficult to reflect on the season’s positives after the loss.
One of the most frustrating things about the game for the team was the fact that their game plan actually seemed to be working early on. Whereas the Bruins were beaten around the basket by Florida’s quick passes out of double teams in last year’s final, UCLA’s double team and quick rotations forced 10 first-half Gator turnovers.
But with junior guard Arron Afflalo, sophomore forward Luc Richard Mbah a Moute and junior center Lorenzo Mata all in foul trouble, the Bruins couldn’t cash in on the offensive end. Sophomore forward Josh Shipp scored 14 of his team-leading 18 points in the first half, but he was the only scoring threat for the Bruins for most of the half.
“We had their offense well-schemed,” Afflalo said. “We were well-prepared (Saturday). It was about going out there and performing. We had a few lapses, did some different things which kind of turned the game for us. In the second half, they were able to get a lot more easy buckets.”
More foul trouble and a sudden inability to keep Florida’s big men off the boards plagued the Bruins in the second half. Junior post players Joakim Noah and Al Horford, along with senior forward/center Chris Richard, had their way with the Bruins on the offensive glass in the second half. Horford finished the game with 17 rebounds, and the Gators outrebounded the Bruins 43-26.
“For myself, it was a big disappointment,” Mata said of the Bruins’ rebounding difficulties. “That’s what I pride myself in, just working hard and trying to get every rebound. They just got all the loose balls.”
The Bruins tried to stage a late desperation comeback, cutting the Gator lead to 72-62 with just three minutes left to play, but it was too little, too late against a Florida team that was simply better than UCLA for the second year in a row. The Bruins’ inability to execute at key junctures in the game left them in the unenviable position of reflecting on how the year went and what could have been if things had gone just a little bit differently.
“You can take some consolation (in) what we did during the season,” Mbah a Moute said. “Not everyone gets a chance to go to back-to-back Final Fours, I guess. I mean, we had a good season; it just hurts the way it ended. It wasn’t as good as we wanted it.”
For Afflalo, there wasn’t as much consolation. Afflalo, possibly playing in his last game in a UCLA uniform, has accomplished plenty as an individual for the Bruins this season. But despite all of his individual awards and playing a principal role in leading his team to two consecutive Final Fours, there was no sense of fulfillment for the junior on Saturday, who is still unsure of his plans for next season.
“I don’t want to leave on a bad note,” said Afflalo, who scored almost all of his 17 points late in the second half. “I’m not giving any answers, but this school has done a lot for me, and I want to leave on a positive note if possible. From the minute I stepped here, it wasn’t about being an All-American; it wasn’t about being (Pac-10) Player of the Year; it wasn’t about none of that. It was about winning a championship. … I’m not satisfied one bit. I’m not into competing for a Final Four visit. I’m here to win it all and twice we came up short.”
The makeup of next season’s Bruin team is still very much in question. While it remains in question whether Afflalo or Collison will return, the Bruins will still have the bulk of their team back next season. Next season’s squad will also gain highly touted recruit Kevin Love, who is expected to make a significant impact on the Bruins’ inside game. If Afflalo and Collison come back, the Bruins would almost certainly start next season among the top five teams in the nation with the same high-reaching expectations they had this season.
But at the end of the game on Saturday it was very difficult to look back into the past or forward into the future. It was an experience the players had hoped they’d never have to go through again, but once it happened it was even more painful and consuming.
“Every loss hurts, but this one just hurts more,” Mata said. “We had a chance to beat them.
“It’s a disappointing loss, but I’m just going to be proud of everybody in this room here. We’re all family together. We win together and we lose together.”