COLLEGE BASKETBALL 1995-96 : Game Hasn’t Been Top Priority for Utah’s Jessie Recently : College basketball: His infant daughter almost died and he faces more time in court than on one.

His newborn daughter was dying.

She lay motionless, attached to machines and tubes 600 miles away, and Brandon Jessie yearned to be with her. But he couldn’t. Not until a judge said so.

Jessie, a star senior guard at the University of Utah, awaited sentencing here in July on shoplifting charges as his child struggled to survive in an Orange County hospital. How he had reached that point, Jessie still isn’t sure.

He never experienced anything as traumatic. Not growing up the youngest son of former Ram wide receiver Ron Jessie. Not as a teen-ager, becoming one of Orange County’s brightest prep stars at Huntington Beach Edison High.

These should be the best days of Jessie’s life. Heading into his final college season, he is considered among the top shooting guards by NBA scouts. But Jessie, 21, has many troubles.

The NCAA suspended him for the Utes’ first seven games because of his relationship with sports agent Robert Troy Caron, a friend from Jessie’s years at Ventura College. He and Caron are defendants in a lawsuit. He feels tainted by the shoplifting incident. And his daughter’s fight for life has left him emotionally drained and physically unprepared for his pivotal stretch run before the NBA draft.

“It’s been real hard,” Jessie said. “Everything that’s happened . . . it’s taken my mental drive away. It’s taken me a while to get to where I was [last season], but I’m about there. I’m not there yet, but I’m trying. Like I said, it’s just real hard.”

Kiana Beau Jessie was born June 21 at Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian in Newport Beach. She has had to fight for life almost every minute since.

The only child of Jessie and his girlfriend of five years, Harper Maycock, Kiana was born with Down’s syndrome. Shortly afterward, she contracted a form of meningitis.

Down’s syndrome affects learning and reasoning ability, auditory and visual memory, language skills and muscle tone. The degree to which it affects each person varies. How it causes damage is unknown.

“That was a shock,” said Maycock, 22. “But we dealt with it and we’ve had a lot of family support.”

Maycock and Kiana moved in with Maycock’s parents in San Juan Capistrano after leaving the hospital June 23, and Jessie prepared to return to Utah. But Kiana came down with jaundice and taken back to the hospital.

There, tests showed that Kiana was also suffered from a rare form of bacterial meningitis that can be fatal to babies younger than 8 weeks old.

Kiana was transferred to Children’s Hospital of Orange County in Orange. Specialists fought the disease with powerful drugs, but her condition worsened and the disease created abscesses throughout her brain.

“It was horrible,” Jessie said. “Watching this little, innocent baby suffering and not being able to do anything.”

Jessie and Maycock lived at the Ronald McDonald House in Orange while Kiana underwent treatment. Normally, Jessie would have returned to Utah to work out with his teammates. Instead, his days were spent at the baby’s side and his nights were filled with grief.

“You just don’t realize how tough something like this can be until you go through it,” Maycock said. “Even if someone told me a story like this, I could only sympathize so much. It’s a whole different world when you’re going through it.”

Jessie had another problem. He and a teammate had been arrested June 3 on suspicion of shoplifting from a Utah department store. Jessie had to return to Utah on July 19 for sentencing on charges of misdemeanor retail theft.

“It was my fault,” Jessie said. “It was a case of bad judgment and I’m sorry. I feel some people are looking at me differently, like, ‘Maybe we should re-evaluate this guy.’ I made a mistake, I’ve learned from it, and I just want to move on.”

Kiana’s condition deteriorated rapidly in the days before Jessie’s court appearance, and doctors were not optimistic. Yet Jessie had no choice. He had to leave.

He was fined $250 and put on probation for a year and a half. As part of his sentencing agreement, he must speak about being responsible to students at five high schools in the Salt Lake City area.

“At that point, I didn’t care what happened to me,” Jessie said. “I just wanted to get back to Kiana.”

That was a battle too.

Jessie had planned to return the next day and had difficulty changing flights. When he got one, it was delayed three hours. And after finally getting back, he was further delayed when his father, on the way to the airport, had two flat tires.

“I just couldn’t believe it,” Maycock said. “His daughter is dying and he can’t get a flight, and then his dad’s car gets two flats. But I knew Brandon would get back, and I knew she would hold on for her daddy.”

Jessie arrived at the hospital after 11 p.m. and Kiana was still alive. Even better, she was improving.

“She was as close as you get to death,” said Dr. Antonio Arrieta, the hospital’s associate director for pediatric infectious diseases. “She should have died, but kids her age sometimes surprise you. You or I would have died, but kids have an amazing ability to fight.”

She still has. Maycock and Kiana recently moved to Salt Lake City and live in a two-bedroom house with Jessie near campus. Kiana continues on medication, but is growing. Doctors told her parents the meningitis probably caused severe additional brain damage.

“That poor little girl was born with two strikes against her,” Arrieta said. “It’s unpredictable how functional she will be. Those two kids have been through the wringer together.”

Jessie has handled the situation better than those closest to him thought possible.

“I didn’t think he or Harper were ready [to have a child],” said Ron Jessie, an attorney’s investigator. “But he has accepted the responsibility and he’s dealing with it.”

It will get tougher.

Jessie was angered by the NCAA suspension, imposed because he allegedly received a pager, a trip to Cancun and other benefits from Caron when he played at Ventura College. The suit in which Jessie and Caron are defendants stems from an alleged assault May 28, 1994, in Ventura.

“I’ve done nothing wrong,” Jessie said. “Everyone knows that. I don’t know why all this is happening now.”

As a junior, Jessie averaged 16.1 points and 5.9 rebounds. He was selected the Western Athletic Conference transfer player of the year, first-team All-WAC and the Utes’ co-most valuable player.

“I admire Brandon for a number of things,” Utah Coach Rick Majerus said. “He really loves this baby. He has had to go through some tough times and he does have a lot on his plate.

“But he has to realize he’s not the Lone Ranger in having responsibilities and problems. Brandon can’t use this to rationalize not doing well in school or on the court.”

Jessie realizes this will be a difficult season. He plans to do his best and hopes for a long NBA career. But life will go on if that doesn’t happen.

“Kiana makes me look at life completely different now,” Jessie said. “I’m still going to work hard every day in practice and play hard in games. I’m still going to listen to what Coach Majerus has to say.

“But it’s hard to get [to the NBA], and I’m not worried. If I make it, I make it. If I don’t, I don’t.”