Are Anteaters Facing Their Yearly Swoon?

You cover this basketball team and you spend a lot of time analyzing slumps and charting disturbing trends. For the last four seasons, the Anteaters’ season highlight films--if there were such things--would have been titled, “The Big Valley, Return to the Big Valley, the Big Valley III . . . “ You get the idea.

During Coach Rod Baker’s rookie season, Irvine wallowed in a 0-11 bog between Dec. 30 and Feb. 2. The next season, the Anteaters lost eight in a row between Dec. 30 and Jan. 30. In 1994, they lost seven consecutive Big West games in a three-week, early season free fall. And last season they opened conference play 0-6.

This season was going to be different, according to all the early indications, anyway. The Anteaters were pressing and causing problems on defense, dominating the backboards and they had enough firepower to win games when one of their top scorers had an off night.

They beat a couple of decent teams (St. John’s and Pacific), played well before losing to a couple of good teams (USC and Washington State) and opened the Big West with two victories. The valleys were just slight depressions in an otherwise smooth landscape: a sluggish loss at Oregon State, a blown 16-point lead and a defeat at the University of San Diego.

After losses last week at Santa Barbara and Fullerton, however, the specter of another slump is hanging over Irvine (5-6, 2-2 in the Big West).

Could this be the start of something big? And ugly? During the last three games, disturbing trends have been popping up like weeds.

The trapping full-court defense was a key in Irvine’s early successes. The Anteaters were 3-3 in nonconference play, but the only time they were out of a game with more than a minute to play was at Oregon State, when they shot 37% from the field.

Nonconference opponents averaged 19 turnovers, but it wasn’t as if Irvine was getting a steal every time it put on the press. Opponents were forced into playing at the Anteaters’ preferred up-tempo pace and were rushing some passes and shots. And most important, they weren’t beating the press for many easy layups.

Over the last three games, that has changed.

San Jose State scored 18 times on layups and many came on breakaways against the press. Irvine, however, shot 58% from the floor and won easily. UC Santa Barbara beat the press for easy layups eight times last Wednesday. The Anteaters shot 39% this time and lost.

Saturday night at Fullerton, the Titans had seven layups or dunks after escaping the press. This time, Irvine shot 56% from the floor and still lost.

“We caused 21 turnovers [at Santa Barbara] and 18 [at Fullerton], which I think would say that the press is pretty effective,” Baker said. “But we’re not the only program that looks at film, so now our job is to see what adjustments teams are making and then counter what people are doing against us.

“Part of the problem is that both of those teams are small and quick and they both have what is essentially a three-guard starting lineup.”

OK, but that makes the Anteaters’ recent inability to rebound even more of a quandary. Before the Fullerton and Santa Barbara games, Irvine had been outrebounded only twice in 11 games. St. John’s couldn’t do it. USC couldn’t do it. The teams that did--Oregon State and Washington State--combined to total only four more rebounds than Irvine.

In the last two games, however--against those teams that start three guards--the Anteaters have lost the battle of the boards, 76-52.

Saturday night, the combination of a deteriorating defense and sluggish rebounding proved fatal even on a night when Irvine’s offensive standouts--forward Kevin Simmons and point guard Raimonds Miglinieks--combined to make 17 of 23 shots.

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Oh for three: If you ever wondered why Bob Knight throws chairs and Baker throws sports coats, there was a classic case Saturday night at Titan Gym.

Simmons was gathering in a loose ball near the sidelines when Fullerton’s Chuck Overton flew into him, kicking the ball from his grasp out of bounds.

Certainly a foul? No call.

All right, give the signal for kicking the ball. Uh, no.

OK, the Titans knocked it out, so it’s Irvine’s ball out of bounds, right? Wrong again.

Fullerton’s ball.

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Anteater Notes

Former men’s soccer coach Derek Lawther has filed a lawsuit against the school for defamation of character and breach of good faith. Lawther, who coached at Irvine for 11 years, was fired in December, 1996. He claims Athletic Director Dan Guerrero made defaming remarks about him in a newspaper and conspired with director of soccer Marine Cano to write an unfavorable evaluation of his performance. Lawther, who coaches the Corona del Mar High boys’ team, was 78-130-7 at Irvine. . . . The men’s volleyball team is 4-0 for the first time in history after Sunday’s upset of 10th-ranked Pepperdine. The Anteaters host La Verne Wednesday night in Crawford Hall and open Mountain Pacific Sports Federation play with home matches Jan. 25 and Jan. 27 against Brigham Young. Freshman Donnie Rafter, from Tustin High, started in place of injured Mike Rupp and had 15 kills and three aces in the victory over the Waves. . . . Freshman guard Clay McKnight, who set an Orange County high-school record with 131 three-pointers last season at Mater Dei, has played in all 11 games this season. He made his first two-point basket--a layup--against the Titans Saturday. McKnight has made 11 of 32 three-point attempts this season. . . . Junior Marc-Andre Tardif had a straight-set victory over Boise State’s Albin Polonyi, the No. 23-ranked singles player in the nation, Saturday in the Great Northwest Shootout at Seattle. The men’s tennis team opens its home schedule by hosting 44th-ranked SMU at 1:30 p.m. Saturday in the UCI Tennis Stadium. . . . Junior Bryan Dove won nine medals during the recent Pan American Maccabiah Games in Buenos Aires. He won gold medals in the 200 breaststroke, the 400 individual medley and two relays. He won a silver medal with the water polo team and bronze medals in the 50 breaststroke, the 100 breaststroke, the 200 freestyle and the 200 individual medley. Tennis player Leah Fisher won a bronze medal in singles and a silver in doubles.