Harrick Remains Unhappy About Technical Foul Called at Stanford

Seemingly unwilling to drop the matter, UCLA Coach Jim Harrick said again Tuesday that official Mark Reischling erred last Thursday in calling a technical foul on the Bruins’ Trevor Wilson.

And the call, Harrick said at his weekly media luncheon, cost UCLA a chance to win the game and possibly move into the top 10 in the wire-service polls. It also could end up depriving the Bruins of the Pacific 10 Conference championship, Harrick said.

Reischling made the call with 2:56 left and UCLA trailing, 71-70, at Stanford. Before the Bruins regained possession, Stanford scored six consecutive points en route to an 87-79 victory.

“I think everybody involved feels a little cheated that they didn’t allow the kids to decide the game,” Harrick said of the officials.

Harrick protested vehemently.

“I should have gotten a technical, quite frankly,” Harrick said when asked about the game. “I watched the tape and I’m embarrassed about me. (Reischling) made a mistake, and now I look like a fool. And it takes away from the great play by Stanford and the great crowd.

“They think that’s controlling the game. It certainly isn’t. They didn’t control the coaches. They didn’t control anybody. That’s a tough thing our team is going to have to overcome all year long--one guy making one call.”

Reischling, on orders from his supervisors, declined comment.

UCLA dropped from 16th to 23rd this week in the Associated Press poll and fell out of the top 20 in the United Press International poll after being ranked 15th last week.

Harrick has not been publicly reprimanded by the Pac-10 for his comments about the officials, a conference spokesman said.

But Frank McIntyre, supervisor of basketball officials for the Pac-10, said of Harrick: “Because he wants to carry it on, we are not going to carry it on. We made the call. It had to be made at the time, and that should be the end of it.

“To keep harping on this continuously doesn’t make sense.”