UCLA Plants Gopher Trap

When the nerves are exploding and the fight for the Final Four has reached one last wrenching moment of crisis, Charles O’Bannon says he will stare at the Minnesota Golden Gophers and silently ask:

Do you fear UCLA? Because, after a season of shocks and success, UCLA fears nothing.

The Midwest Regional final today at the Alamodome isn’t about luck or destiny, O’Bannon says; it isn’t about matchups or motivational techniques.

Two weeks into the tournament, a step away from the Final Four, this is about confidence and courage, history and hunger.

“We believe that teams don’t think they can beat us, even when they get a big lead,” O’Bannon said Friday afternoon, not even 24 hours after the second-seeded Bruins had squeezed out an overtime victory over Iowa State after trailing by 16 early in the second half.

“Teams look at us, and we’re UCLA, the team that’s won all those national titles, and they know that we’ve done it before.

“We’re like the bully in a schoolyard playground, going up against the littler kids--we’ve got the confidence, they don’t, and we’ve just got to keep pushing.”

So, does O’Bannon assume that No. 1-seeded Minnesota, a team that has won 30 games this season and captured the Big Ten title going away, will be intimidated?

“Who knows?” O’Bannon said. “We know we’ve been there, and they haven’t.”

Coach Steve Lavin, like Minnesota Coach Clem Haskins, a protege of Purdue Coach Gene Keady, lauded the Gophers.

“I know they are quick and physical and play strong defense,” Lavin said. “You don’t won 30 games in the ‘90s unless you are an unbelievable team.”

But O’Bannon was thinking about 12 consecutive UCLA victories and two winning desperation shots by Cameron Dollar in the last three weeks and three comebacks from 16-point deficits and more.

Here is the number to highlight O’Bannon’s words: UCLA has the same number of national titles, 11, as Minnesota has total NCAA tournament victories.

The Gophers last advanced to the Elite Eight in 1990. Then Georgia Tech’s Kenny Anderson made a buzzer beater to lift the Yellowjackets past Minnesota in the Southeast Regional final, 93-91.

“They’re not one of the big-name teams, like North Carolina, Kansas and Kentucky,” O’Bannon said. “But that’s not to say that Minnesota is not a better team than any of them.

“But, I wanted to play them. I want to play all the highest-seeded teams because I don’t want any excuses. I don’t want to beat a No. 7 seed and have everybody say, ‘Oh, you only got into the Final Four because you got lucky.’

“We want to make history. We want to win two national titles, and I don’t know how many players can say that.”

But Minnesota wasn’t concerned about tradition and intimidation Friday. The Gophers were busy figuring out how to deal with the shoulder injury to starting point guard Eric Harris, who may or may not play today.

If Harris cannot play, All-American senior guard Bobby Jackson will move over from off guard to direct the offense, which he did on the way to a career-high 36 points in Minnesota’s double-overtime victory over Clemson on Thursday.

And Jackson did not sound like a player about to back down when asked about the Bruins on Friday.

“UCLA has great athletic talent,” Jackson said. “We have talented players, but we don’t have the same athletic talent as UCLA. So we’ve got to get the best out of everybody on our team.

“We’ve got to make it a war--and I know that’s what it’s going to be. This is going to be an outstanding battle.”

The Gophers spoke about pounding it inside to their power players against the UCLA frontcourt athletes, and about making sure the Bruins didn’t get rumbling in transition as they finally did against Iowa State.

But, basically, the theme was one of normality for Minnesota, of placing this game in the same context as their previous 33.

“We haven’t really played a team that pushes it up the floor like UCLA,” Jackson said. “They love to get up and down the floor. We like to run, but not as much as they do. We’re going to have to stop them from running.”

The Gophers are a balanced team, molded by Haskins’ defensive philosophies but always aware that Jackson is the one player who can take over a game--the one essential part of the nine-man rotation.

“We play a team game, and we like to spread it out and everything,” said forward Sam Jacobson, who tied a career high with 29 points Thursday. “But there’s no question that when somebody has to make a big shot or a big play, Bobby’s our No. 1 guy.”

Said the 6-foot-3 Jackson, “Sam is such a great shooter, when he gets rolling, he hits them--Bam! Bam! Bam! When he’s hot, we’re going to Sam.

“His role is to score. My role is to rebound, score, play defense. My role is everything.”

As Jacobson and Jackson continued to emphasize, Minnesota is hoping to grind down the Bruins, box them out, and keep the sprinting to a minimum--and at the Gophers’ convenience.

O’Bannon, for one, said that although he understood why opponents want to keep UCLA from running to easy victory, the implication that the Bruins are uncomfortable in a half-court wrestling match is dead wrong.

“People perceive West Coast players as soft, that we’re all about finesse, all we want to do is fast break, we can’t play half-court offense,” O’Bannon said. “I hear it from other players during the summer. They say if you take it to us, you can take our hearts.

“But we’ve proven we can play physical. We don’t mind it physical at all. We look at them and know that they want to make it a rough game. If that’s the game they want to play, we’ll do it physical.”

Don’t underestimate Minnesota’s talent, said UCLA guard Toby Bailey, not when Jackson is the Big Ten player of the year and the Gophers go nine deep with speed and strength.

The Gophers did not lose from Jan. 18 through March 6, a string of 12 games, and have won 15 of their last 16--which is a fairly good parallel to UCLA’s 12-game winning streak and 21 victories in the last 25 games.

“We’re both hot teams, we both are going to put five guys on the court at all times who can really play,” Bailey said. “They might have more to prove, but that doesn’t mean we’re not hungry. We tasted it two years ago, and we know how great it is.”

Which is exactly why O’Bannon feels so strongly about UCLA’s chances.

This season’s Bruin team, after the coaching controversies, the early failures and the stunning lunge toward greatness, is not looking over its shoulder as it powers through the tournament, according to the senior forward.

“The pressure isn’t there anymore,” O’Bannon said. “Before, we were facing every tournament game like we had to win, or it’s a failure, any loss would ruin the season.

“This year, coming from out of the rankings and after what we’ve gone through, it’s a situation where we feel like we’ve already overachieved--not what we think we can do, but what other people expected from us.”