Bruins are victims of the transition game

Breaking news out of Westwood on Thursday had one basketball expert already penciling UCLA into next year's postseason tournament bracket.

NCAA? NIT?

Try the new College Basketball Invitational (won this year by Tulsa).

OK, it's not that bad.

As an exodus this isn't fleeing Egypt, although no one should make plans for a fourth consecutive Final Four. Anyway, who wanted to go to Detroit?

Call it over the wall, Part II.

A day after the Bruins football team ditched the scene in a time-honored tradition, two planks of the school's basketball squad broke ranks in what is fast becoming another rite of spring -- declaring intentions for the NBA draft.

While a Bruins world mourns the loss of Kevin Love and Russell Westbrook -- with Luc Richard Mbah a Moute and Darren Collison possibly soon to follow -- the devoted should be thankful Ben Howland held it together this long.

Those three straight Final Four runs took talent, timing and a little bit of plate-spinning. Thursday, however, the Bruins lost a formal dining set.

"You become a little bit a victim of your own success," said Santa Clara Coach Kerry Keating, a former UCLA assistant on Howland's staff.

It was bound to happen -- and the Bruins are bound to bounce back.

College basketball isn't what used to be or will ever be again.

Lew Alcindor doesn't show up on campus as a freshman, sit out a year and then win three NCAA titles.

John Wooden's pyramid of success at UCLA has been replaced by Howland's conveyor belt.

Coaches don't get to teach and coddle anymore, so the construct is simple: Sign the best players available and pray you win before they leave.

"It's very difficult to do," Keating said. "It takes a lot of planning."

What are the alternatives?

Until 2006, when the NBA instituted its age-cap rule that forced the bee-line players to college for one year, the best players (Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett) went straight from high school to the pros.

"Had the NBA not changed the rule, you would have never seen Greg Oden, or Kevin Durant, or Michael Beasley or Kevin Love or O.J. Mayo," former coach turned analyst Fran Fraschilla reminded.

In other words: Be thankful they were here at all, even if it means wondering how much Mayo meant to USC.