COLLEGE BASKETBALL / NCAA MEN’S TOURNAMENT : COLLEGE BASKETBALL / GENE WOJCIECHOWSKI : This One’s Good as Gold for Bruins

The ghosts of First Rounds Past came and went Friday evening and guess who didn’t hear boo?

UCLA, which spent its last trip to the NCAA tournament cowering under an Oklahoma City bench, has returned from therapy and no longer flinches at its own shadow, high seeding or basketball legacy. Instead, the Bruins keep telling themselves they’re good enough, smart enough and gosh darn it, people like them.

Of course, it helps to have Florida International, not Tulsa, doing the Casper imitation. That’s because nobody ever will confuse FIU’s Golden Panthers with Tulsa’s Golden Hurricane, which eliminated UCLA a year ago. Then again, nobody will confuse this season’s Bruins with 1994’s frightened team.

For instance, that wasn’t a game Friday night, it was a 92-56 salute to the Washington Generals, longtime basketball straight men for the Harlem Globetrotters. Except this time UCLA was Meadowlark Lemon and Florida International was the poor General who gets his shorts pulled down.

“We did the best we could, but that wouldn’t have been good enough tomorrow, that wouldn’t have been good enough a week from now,” FIU Coach Bob Weltlich said. “But we can watch. And 20 years from now we can tell the story, ‘And they threw one in at the buzzer.’ ”

Florida International should have known it was in trouble when Weltlich’s wife could have sworn she saw Bruin assistants on a nearby ski slope. On game day. Minutes before tip-off, a Golden Panther cheerleader climbed atop the shoulders of her partner and held up a sign that read, “FIU Has No Fear.”

What it had was no chance.

Worse yet, FIU committed its first turnover of the evening when the partner dropped the cheerleader on her rear end. She was OK, but the same can’t be said of FIU.

By game’s end, about the only Bruins not to score in double figures were 12th-man Bob Myers and Aaron John O’Bannon, Ed’s 10-month-old son. As for Coach Jim Harrick, he spent the second half trying to look interested. It sort of worked.

“I’ve been in this game a long time and I’m very conscious about not embarrassing another team,” Harrick said. “That’s important.”

Years from now, Florida International’s players can tell their children they played against the great Ed O’Bannon, Tyus Edney and George Zidek (OK, maybe not Zidek, but you get the idea). They also can say they were on the same Boise State Pavilion floor the night the Bruins discarded the memories of March 18, 1994.

Tulsa 112, UCLA 102.

Earlier Friday, as the Bruins killed time in the team hotel before their evening game, sophomore forward Charles O’Bannon watched favorite after favorite go down. Seventh-seeded North Carolina Charlotte lost to 10th-seeded Stanford. Then No. 14 Weber State stunned No. 3 Michigan State. That’s when it hit him.

“I’m thinking, ‘Man, that was us last year getting upset. That was Tulsa,’ ” O’Bannon said.

This time UCLA didn’t take any chances. The Bruins built a 20-point halftime lead, but kept reminding themselves of that awful feeling of a season ago. As they sat in the locker room during the halftime break, Ed O’Bannon turned to Edney and said, “Remember what it was like last year?”

How could they forget? After all, today is the one-year anniversary of that humiliating loss.

“That was on our minds,” Charles O’Bannon said. “We used it as our motivating factor.”

Motivation is everywhere for the Bruins. Back East, where Harrick swears the people think we still drive covered wagons down the 405, the questions are always the same:

--Who has more heart, the Bruins or the Tin Man?

--Defense: meaningless T-shirt slogan, or is it actually played in Westwood?

--UCLA lost to who back in ‘94? Maybe the 36-point victory against Florida International, the tournament equivalent of Athletes in Action, will help, but probably not. No. 1 seeds are supposed to leave footprints on 16th-seeded teams. Anything less and Harrick haters start reaching for their Magic Markers, poster board and start scribbling, “Jim Must Go.”

But no chance of writer’s cramp this week. UCLA will beat Missouri on Sunday and advance to the Sweet 16 because the Bruin sins of 1994 are the strengths of 1995.

Heart? You can use a stethoscope on these Bruins and not feel as if you’re wasting your time.

Defense? Florida International shot 33.9% from the field.

And then there is the ghost of Tulsa, which flew away early.

“It’s gone,” Charles O’Bannon said. “Now we’re looking forward to the rest of the tournament.”

* ARKANSAS: Defending champions survive a big scare against Texas Southern. C4

* STANFORD: Cardinal players say 70-68 victory over UNC Charlotte is one for Pac-10. C5