UCLA’s Condor Is High-Flying Reserve : College basketball: After a miserable junior season, Owens has filled out and is filling in as a shot-blocking replacement for foul-prone Murray.

UCLA’s run to the championship of the Great Alaska Shootout last month could be subtitled, “Three Days of the Condor.”

Keith (Condor) Owens, so nicknamed because of a 7-foot-1 arm span, flew out of the 49th state after putting together his most memorable three-game stretch since he arrived in Westwood 3 1/2 years ago as a walk-on from Birmingham High School in Van Nuys:

--Against UC Irvine, the 6-8 reserve forward made five of eight shots, scored 11 points, took down 13 rebounds, blocked four shots and made a steal in 25 eye-opening minutes.

--Against Alaska Anchorage, he had seven points, six rebounds, six blocked shots and a steal in another 25 minutes.

--Against Virginia, Owens was perfect from the floor (three for three) and the free throw line (two for two) and had eight points, four rebounds, five blocked shots and a steal in only 23 minutes.

All told, Owens made 62.5% of his shots and averaged 8.7 points, 7.7 rebounds and five blocked shots in about 24 minutes a game in Alaska.

And many in UCLA’s traveling party believed that Owens was short-changed, not only by the statisticians--”He had 10 blocks tonight,” KMPC’s Paul Olden told his audience after the UC Irvine game--but by the tournament’s organizers, who left him off the all-tournament team.

“I don’t think there’s any question he should have been on the all-tournament team,” UCLA Coach Jim Harrick said.

That Owens would even be considered for an all-tournament team wouldn’t have seemed possible last season. He was jerked from the lineup after three forgettable starts in January and played only 70 minutes in UCLA’s last 19 games, not leaving the bench in six.

As a junior last season, Owens averaged two points, two rebounds and under 10 minutes a game. He blocked 10 shots in 26 games.

But Owens, who had four blocks in 16 minutes Sunday night in the Bruins’ 149-98 victory over Loyola Marymount, came back stronger and more confident this season after a summer in the weight room.

“He’s a lot more comfortable with his body and with his game,” junior forward Don MacLean said.

Added bulk has improved his self-image, Owens said.

“I felt at times that I was a pushover,” he said. “People could get me to the spot they wanted me to be, and they used that to their advantage. (In Alaska) I wasn’t moving them out, but I was neutralizing them. I’ve been able to get to the (proper) areas more frequently than in the past.”

That might explain his dramatic increase in blocked shots.

“I don’t know if it’s an art,” Owens said. “I don’t really practice it. You know when you can get a block and when you can’t. That’s just something I can kind of sense when I’m out there. I can’t really put it into words.”

Owens’ new-found shot-blocking ability has come as a surprise to Harrick, but his overall improvement has not.

“You give a guy 30,000 minutes of practice in college, which he’ll have at the end of this year, maybe he’ll develop into a pretty fundamental basketball player,” Harrick said. “Then add some game experience and confidence to that, and a guy can rise up and do something.”

Owens has risen most among his talented teammates, many of whom were high school All-Americans and coveted prospects.

He averaged 17 points and 10 rebounds as a senior at Birmingham, helping the Braves reach the City 3-A championship game, but a playoff slump scared away the few recruiters who looked at him.

“It was weird,” said his high school coach, Jeff Halpern. “After the playoffs, he was like a hot potato. They dropped him. I don’t know why. I felt badly because I knew he had the potential.

“To this day, it still amazes me. I would have assumed they’d be breaking down the doors. I would have thought somebody would have wanted him.”

But if Halpern was upset that, among others, USC and Hawaii stopped calling, Owens couldn’t have cared less.

The only child born to Andrew and Ellen Owens, a lawyer and a first-grade teacher, Owens was more oriented toward academics than athletics, though he also played doubles for the Birmingham tennis team before an eye disease affected his depth perception and cut short his senior season.

Owens applied for admission to UCLA, California and Michigan, choosing UCLA after a meeting with former coach Walt Hazzard, who told Owens that he probably could make the team as a walk-on.

But it wasn’t a chance to play for the Bruins that most excited him.

To the contrary, “My decision was based on the fact that athletes (at UCLA) get tutors and other special treatment that helps them in the classroom,” Owens said. “That was basically my motivation for trying to play basketball--to help my grades.”

Owens played only 17 minutes as a freshman under Hazzard, but after strong defensive games against Cal and Stanford in his sophomore season, he was given a scholarship by Harrick.

He was used primarily as a defensive specialist in the next 1 1/2 seasons, but Harrick said that, given more playing time this season, Owens probably will develop into more of an offensive factor for the Bruins. He made four of five shots against Loyola, improving his percentage to .667.

“He’s balanced and under control, where last year he’d always be falling down,” Harrick said. “He’s really a good shooter.”

With freshman Ed O’Bannon out for the season because of a knee injury and sophomore Tracy Murray susceptible to foul trouble, Owens knows that he probably won’t spend long periods of time on the bench this season.

“I know last year I was always thinking that I couldn’t make mistakes because I didn’t have much margin for error,” he said. “I was thinking twice before taking a shot. I need to go out on the court and say, ‘I’m just as good as the guy I’m guarding or anybody else on the court.’ ”

To this point, he probably wouldn’t get much argument.