UCLA Turns It On in Time for Victory : College basketball: Zidek and Charles O’Bannon each score 18 points, but Bruins unimpressive in defeating lowly Oregon State, 78-67.

UCLA slogged closer to the finish line Thursday night, pinning a 78-67 defeat on lowly Oregon State in a decidedly unimpressive performance that didn’t exactly boost Ed O’Bannon’s confidence level about the Bruins’ chances in the NCAA tournament.

Knocking off No. 10 Louisville, then following it up by struggling against a Beaver team heading for its worst record in 92 years sort of does that to you.

Is UCLA simply turning it on and off, depending on the opposition? O’Bannon considered the possibility.

“All I know is we’re going to have to turn it on and keep it on because if we play like this again, we’ll be on an early flight home,” he said.

At this point, it seems pretty clear that nobody knows UCLA’s flight pattern, and this is not exactly what you expect after 26 games.

For the Bruins, 21-5 and 13-4 in the Pacific 10 Conference, well, let’s just say they’ve had much better games against much better teams than the Beavers (6-20).

This certainly has not been Oregon State’s season. Not after seven consecutive defeats, a 2-15 conference record, its first 20-loss season and more than a few Beaverites calling for Coach Jim Anderson’s bald head on a platter.

But with Brent Barry playing the best game of his career and the Bruins playing sort of half-interested, UCLA had to come from behind in the second half to pull away.

It was still a four-point game, 67-63, when Shon Tarver scored after a rebound with 3:19 to play. Tyus Edney’s short jumper from a left-side angle made the score 71-63 a minute later and UCLA closed it out with seven free throws the rest of the way.

UCLA made it look difficult, although Barry had a hand in that. Rick Barry’s son scored a career-high 31 points, including 20 in the first half when Jim Harrick tried defending him with Ed O’Bannon.

Barry had 10 points in the second half going against Tarver.

It took eight minutes for UCLA to fall behind by nine points in the first half, which ended with 11 UCLA turnovers and the Bruins trailing, 34-33.

By that time, Harrick was wringing the life out of his rolled-up program and wondering where he was going to get some relief.

It didn’t come from his bench, which produced exactly two points in limited duty, that from Cameron Dollar in 23 minutes.

Rodney Zimmerman and Marquis Burns were the only other non-starters to get into the game and they were on the court for a total of nine minutes. Kevin Dempsey didn’t budge. Harrick kept Dempsey on the bench for the first time in his career.

The Bruins finally pulled themselves together and moved ahead to stay when Charles O’Bannon’s jumper with 11:15 to go gave them a 54-52 lead.

Charles finished with 18 points and a career-high four blocked shots. George Zidek matched O’Bannon’s point total and put up his own career high with 14 rebounds.

Tarver struggled with only eight points and Ed O’Bannon made only four of 14 shots, but Harrick said it is important to note the result on the scoreboard.

After all, he said, the Bruins didn’t lose.

“They played real good, we just played OK, not good enough to win a tournament game, but good enough to win tonight,” Harrick said.

“I wasn’t sure we were ready mentally and emotionally to play, but we’ll be ready next week, I’ll tell you that.”

Meanwhile, the Beavers were coming off a six-game losing streak in which they were outscored by an average of 25 points a game. So the pressure wasn’t on them, Barry said, because the Beavers’ destination was nowhere.

“We didn’t have anything to lose and that’s something the big underdog always has,” he said. “Those are the toughest games teams that are ranked have to play.”

Charles O’Bannon said it’s way past time for UCLA to play games like the one that just ended.

“I don’t know what it is,” he said. “Maybe guys are saving it, putting it in second gear, cruising. We’ve got to stop it or we’re going to get embarrassed before we get to the tournament.”

One more game remains for them to get it right. That would be Saturday afternoon in Eugene against Oregon. After that, it’s tournament time. Early flights home beckon.