UCLA Restarts Game in Time to Win, 87-77

UCLA took time Saturday to forget about its stumble against USC, honor its greatest heroes and defeat DePaul, 87-77, before a sellout crowd of 12,668 at Pauley Pavilion.

For a few hours, all was well again in Westwood.

Former center Steve Patterson, representing the Bruins’ NCAA championship team of 1970, was given a standing ovation before the game.

At halftime, both predecessor and successor to Patterson as UCLA’s man in the middle, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Bill Walton, had their jersey Nos. 33 and 32 retired in a ceremony that generated still more ovations.

And midway through the second half, when Trevor Wilson’s left-handed dunk gave the Bruins a 20-point lead, there was another wild celebration.

“It was kind of a festive day,” Bruin forward Don MacLean said later, “and once we got up, we kind of said, ‘OK, we’ve got the game won. Let’s just go home.’ That was kind of the mood.”

Apparently not among the visiting Blue Demons, it wasn’t.

DePaul cut its deficit to 77-74 with 1:19 left, taking advantage when UCLA missed the front end in one-and-one free throw situations four times in the last three minutes.

But with 1:05 left, Blue Demon forward Kevin Holland fouled MacLean, an 83% free-throw shooter.

“That wasn’t a very smart foul,” DePaul Coach Joey Meyer said. “We were only down by three, so we didn’t need to foul at all. But if Wilson or (Darrick) Martin had it, we were supposed to foul. We got a little excited, obviously, and fouled the wrong guy.”

MacLean missed the second shot, but Wilson grabbed the rebound and scored on a layup to increase the Bruins’ lead to 80-74.

Martin made it 82-74 with 39 seconds left, scoring on a breakaway layup after taking a long pass from Gerald Madkins.

The threat had passed.

“We played awfully well for about 33 minutes,” UCLA Coach Jim Harrick said. “We just lost our intensity a little bit.”

MacLean blamed that on last Thursday’s 76-75 loss to USC.

The defeat cost UCLA a share of the Pacific 10 Conference lead, and it was still on the Bruins’ minds as they took the floor, MacLean said.

“I think it really showed in the last seven or eight minutes,” MacLean said. “We just kind of played well enough to win. We let them back into it and didn’t finish them off with the same authority that we (had) at the start of the second half.”

Or with any authority at all.

Still, UCLA improved to 15-4 overall and 11-0 at Pauley.

MacLean, Wilson and freshman center Tracy Murray scored 18 points each for the Bruins, who made 61.8% of their shots, including eight of their first nine in the second half, when they improved upon a 41-32 halftime lead.

Abdul-Jabbar and Walton weren’t the only Bruin centers brought out of mothballs. Also making a re-appearance, at least in a significant role, was senior Kevin Walker, who scored 14 points and took seven rebounds.

For Walker, a starter all last season and for the Bruins’ first 11 games this season before being benched last month, the rebound total was a season high. His double-figure scoring effort was only his second of the season, and he also had a season-high four assists in 21 minutes.

He drew a chant from the crowd and praise from his coach.

“That’s the kind of play we need from a guy coming off the bench,” Harrick said. “We met again this week, he and I, and I told him, ‘Kevin, going into February and March, somebody’s going to have to come off the bench and win a game for us.’ ”

Walker, who met with Harrick just before his demotion, approached the coach this time, he said, to see where he stood.

“I hadn’t been playing as much as I wanted,” Walker said. “He just assured me that if I played, I’d stay in. And it showed today.”

Center Stephen Howard led DePaul with 28 points and 13 rebounds. Forward David Booth scored 23 points and Holland contributed 12 points and 12 rebounds, helping the Blue Demons outrebound UCLA, 41-33.

The game turned midway through the first half, when Harrick switched to a zone defense to curb DePaul’s inside effectiveness.

From the 7:53 mark of the first half to the 7:44 mark of the second, UCLA outscored the Blue Demons, 48-23, only to fritter away all but three points of its 20-point advantage in the next 10 minutes.

In the end, though, it mattered not at all. All that mattered to the Bruins was that they had taken care of business.

Bruin Notes

DePaul, which had won nine of 11 games after a 3-7 start, fell to 12-10 and has lost seven games this season by 10 points or more. . . . Trevor Wilson, who made only two of eight free throws, has made only four of 17 since injuring his right wrist in the first half last Thursday night against USC. “There are some things I can’t do with my wrist like this, but there are a lot of things I can do,” said Wilson, who felt shooting pain and later numbness in his wrist after dunking in the second half against DePaul. . . . Also retired at halftime were jersey Nos. 12 and 15, worn by former women’s basketball players Denise Curry and Ann Meyers.

Overlooked in UCLA’s 76-75 loss to USC was the play of point guard Darrick Martin, who scored 14 points on six-of-nine shooting and had seven assists. Said USC Coach George Raveling of the Bruin guards: “To my way of thinking, the straw that stirs that milkshake is Martin and (Gerald) Madkins. They’re the real secret behind their success. You’re talking about two big-time, superstar scoring guards coming out of high school who have submerged their games for the good of the team. It’s their unselfishness and their leadership and their defense that has been as contributing a factor as the scoring and rebounding of (Trevor) Wilson and (Don) MacLean. If they chose to see themselves in a different role, I think it would be detrimental to the team.” . . . Against DePaul, Martin had 11 points and eight assists and made five of eight shots.