When the Heat Gets Turned Up, UCLA Turns It On

It got tense and testy once again for the UCLA team of tightrope artists, and once again, the Bruins found a wandering way to victory.

In a broiler-like atmosphere Thursday night before 12,695 at Pauley Pavilion, No. 13-ranked UCLA had to sweat the details--and beat back a scrambling No. 24 Stanford team--before emerging with a 64-56 victory.

The key moments came in the final eight minutes, after Stanford had fought back from a double-digit first-half deficit to close within four, 48-44.

The Bruins, who also succeeded in the pressure situations in two tight victories over the Washington schools last week, scored the next six points on hustle and flying defense, stretching the lead to 54-44 with 3:36 left to play.

“We definitely rise to the occasion,” said Kris Johnson, who scored the first basket of the run with a quick-reach rebound and shot--he called it a “Cedric Ceballos shot”--underneath the basket after an omm’A Givens miss.

Charles O’Bannon followed the Johnson basket in spectacular fashion, blocking a shot by Peter Sauer, then grabbing the outlet pass before performing a reverse-spin, reverse layup.

Givens followed that by rebounding a Toby Bailey miss with a short basket.

Though the Cardinal kept fighting, that burst--and a lopsided first half--was the difference in the game.

“We just played so bad in the first half, we didn’t give ourselves an opportunity,” said Stanford Coach Mike Montgomery, whose team trailed, 31-17, at halftime after getting outrebounded, 26-11. “We really got dominated on the boards, obviously.”

The victory was UCLA’s eighth in a row, and third consecutive in the conference, setting up a showdown Saturday with California, which beat USC Thursday to also improve to 3-0. The Bruins raised their overall record to 10-3; Stanford fell to 8-3 and 2-1.

Stanford made three baskets in a row at the start of the second half to trigger a 22-10 run. In that surge, starting guards Dion Cross, Brevin Knight and David Harbour, who had a combined four points in the first 20 minutes, combined to score 17.

Also, in the early minutes of the second, forward J.R. Henderson, who sliced through the Cardinal’s interior defense easily in the first half, picked up his fourth foul.

UCLA helped the Cardinal cause by making only 14 of its 22 free throw attempts in the second half.

“That was a typical Stanford game for us,” UCLA Coach Jim Harrick said. “We made a lot of mistakes the second half, even the first half. But I thought our defense first half was maybe our best all year long.”

In that first half, the Bruins held Cross, who scored a career-high 30 points last weekend against Arizona, to four points--mostly on pressure defense by O’Bannon and quick-switching defense around the bulky Stanford screens.

Cross made four of 14 shots and finished with 11 points. Knight was three for 11 shooting and had nine points.

Overall, the Cardinal shot only 34.4%, a recurring theme this season for Bruin opponents.

No team has shot better than 45% from the field against UCLA since its Dec. 4 loss to Kansas, and in the three Pacific 10 games, opponents are shooting less than 40%.

UCLA got off to quick 16-4 and 24-9 leads, as the Cardinal wobbled to a seven-for-23 shooting half.

“I don’t know if we were a little bit thinking about that shot-blocking thing or what,” Montgomery said, “but we went in there looking like we were expecting them to jump out of the rafters or something, and we ended up double-clutching a lot.”

Bailey led the Bruins with 14 points, and freshman center Jelani McCoy had another solid game with 10 points, 12 rebounds and four blocked shots.

“We’re just playing scrappy,” said Johnson, who scored 11 points and had eight rebounds. “Nobody’s doing the prima donna thing: Toby takes a charge and hits the floor, I hit the floor a couple times, Cameron’s out there flying around.

“Nobody’s getting cocky and saying we’re in the driver’s seat or anything. It’s not like we’re the one dominant team and are going to kill everybody. But we feel all right.”

* USC LOSES: Freshman Shareef Abdur-Rahim scored 28 points as cold-shooting California beat USC, 63-60, at the Forum. C6