Pepperdine Has Own Scenario for Success

Geoff Lear gave Doug Christie a kiss. They are close. They have roomed together in Malibu for three years. They play basketball together for Pepperdine. They do things side by side, same way Hank Gathers and Bo Kimble used to do, same game, same aim, same conference.

Putting Pepperdine in the same predicament as last season’s Loyola Marymount team--having its captain and leader taken from it several days before the national tournament--might be carrying comparisons a tad too far.

“You mean like, ‘Win one for the Gipper?’ ” Lear asked Tuesday, politely suppressing a laugh.

No, of course not. And what happened to Gathers was far more ghastly than what happened to Christie, the most valuable player of this season’s West Coast Conference play. No one means to be disrespectful by suggesting that one situation mirrors the other.

And yet, athletically, the similarities are certainly there. Pepperdine is one of college basketball’s streaking teams, hot as a jalapeno . It has won 16 consecutive games. Destination in the NCAA tournament will be known Sunday. The conference tournament was to be a final dress rehearsal.

Except now the team must do without its leading scorer, Christie, who underwent surgery Tuesday, a day sooner than originally expected, on knee cartilage torn in a game a few days before.

This is exactly where Gathers went down, in the WCC tournament, just before what would have been the biggest event of his life. Without him, Loyola Marymount rode an emotional wave to the NCAA’s elite eight before being eliminated by the eventual national champion, Nevada Las Vegas.

When Lear spotted Christie on crutches before Monday night’s WCC championship game at Santa Clara, he couldn’t resist. He gave him a smooch for luck, Magic-and-Isiah style, on the cheek. Then Lear entertained his roomie with a career-best 32 points in a 71-68 overtime success against St. Mary’s.

The effort got him elected most valuable player of the tournament, making Lear feel like a king.

Which is better than he felt the night Christie was lost.

“At first, it was such a shock,” Lear said. “If you take the leading scorer and captain out of your lineup, it has to have an effect. It made everybody here nervous, me included.”

As with Kimble, with friend and partner no longer there, the need to pick up the slack began to occur to Lear. He became conscious, then self-conscious, about trying to take over the scoring. Coach Tom Asbury called Lear aside more than once to mention the need to relax.

You can hardly fault anybody at Pepperdine, though, for having a little anxiety attack.

As Loyola did, Pepperdine is going into the tournament short-handed and underrated. Not only has Christie been lost for the season, but starting guard Rick Welch turned an ankle in the tournament and starting center Derek Noether was hurt in Monday’s game, missing all but four minutes.

Had a couple of players fouled out, the Traveling Asburys might have had to suit up a mascot or a tuba player. The coach’s bench had more suits and neckties on it than uniforms.

But Pepperdine is accustomed to making do.

“Hey, we played at Arizona, the toughest place to play in the country,” Lear said. “And if myself and some of the big men hadn’t fouled out, we might have won that game, or at least come within a point or two. That’s why I still believe we can play with just about anybody in the country. People can say whatever they want, but 16 straight wins--nobody can deny that.”

Even so, one newspaper that publishes a top-64 national poll still did not have Pepperdine ranked last week. Ranked No. 47 was Villanova, with a record of 14-13. Pepperdine is 22-8. Ranked 42nd was Temple (21-8), which defeated Pepperdine with a last-second shot.

Reputation counts for something, and Pepperdine hasn’t been to the NCAA for a while, and not since Coach Jim Harrick left for UCLA. But what really cost the Waves was their terrible start, as opposed to a UCLA team that started with a bang.

Three consecutive losses early in the season helped leave Pepperdine’s record temporarily at 6-8, and left the players angry at themselves.

“That really opened our eyes,” Lear said. “We made the mistake of assuming that we were a good team. We forgot to go out and play like one. Our intensity wasn’t what you would call sky-high. We were totally lackadaisical out there.

“I think after we got beat by San Diego, it finally got through to us that we had to do more than just show up and play.”

Today, some of the Waves show up and can’t play, because they’re hurt.

But don’t tell them they won’t win any games in the NCAA tournament. That’s what somebody told Loyola.