UC Irvine’s Murphy Beats City Hall

Tod Murphy, who helped UC Irvine defeat UCLA in Thursday night’s NIT opener at Pauley Pavilion, is the school’s all-time career scorer. Last month, he broke the record set by Dave Baker in 1971-75.

Baker is now the mayor of Irvine. When Murphy broke his record, Baker said he was happy for him but added, “If he’s thinking of running for mayor, he better move to another city.”

Edgar Jones of the Cleveland Cavaliers is on the injured list, but his jaws are working faster than ever.

The latest: “My intelligence is at times baffling. People underestimate it. At parties I was always looked on more as a bookworm than a jock. If people aren’t prepared for me, they may walk away knowing less than they did when they walked up.”

Add Jones: He explains what he calls the EJ theory of evolution: “I didn’t develop as a basketball player, I evolved. First, I was a defensive specialist. Then I incorporated the shot-blocking and then threw the dunking and jump shooting into the mix. I came up with a dominating, exterminating, germinating, postulating machine.”

Trivia Time: Who were the Los Angeles Dandelions? (Answer below.)

When Boston Celtic forward Kevin McHale returned to the lineup after missing several games with an Achilles’ injury, he played seven minutes. He missed every shot he took and committed seven turnovers.

“Afterward,” he said, “I told Red Auerbach to take 1/82nd of my salary and give it to charity.”

Said Utah Jazz Coach Frank Layden when asked asked if he would enter a team-sponsored marathon: “No, but they can put the course around me.”

New York Mets infielder Ron Gardenhire, worried that he won’t survive the final cut, told Marty Noble of Newsday: “I could end up driving a tractor in Kansas. I might get the Dear John and then the John Deere.”

When it got down to nervous time against Texas Tech, Georgetown Coach John Thompson said he took all his seniors out at one point and started pleading with them.

Thompson: “I put my around them and told them, ‘You’ve been here before, I think.’ ”

Hoya guard Michael Jordan had a different recollection.

He told Anthony Cotton of the Washington Post: “It was something like that but he was gripping my neck and the words were a little stronger.”

Who says Doug Moe doesn’t have a way with words?

Here’s how the Denver coach described Thursday night’s loss at Chicago: “Chicago was pitiful early and we were pitiful, too. It was just two pitiful teams being pitiful.”

Said Cincinnati disc jockey Buddy Baron after Reds outfielder Dave Parker was ordered to donate $120,000 to a drug prevention program or face suspension: “Parker has to shell out $120,000 to play baseball. It could have been worse. He could be divorcing one of Johnny Carson’s wives.”

Trivia Time: They were a women’s football team that played in the National Women’s Football League in the 1970s.

Quotebook

Mike Lupica of the New York Daily News, on the eccentric WBA lightweight champion, Livingstone Bramble: “Every guy he fights has the home-planet advantage.”