Watson, Davis Leave Message on Backboard

Earl Watson, off the glass, to Baron Davis, defying gravity and several rules of basketball.

It was part of highlight-film history from the moment it happened, an aerial act of alley-oop electricity that both punctuated and overshadowed UCLA’s 90-72 by-the-book demolition of Oregon State at Pauley Pavilion on Thursday.

“I threw it off the backboard hard,” Watson said later, “so only Baron could get it. Because I know he can jump high.”

Davis jumped high. Davis got it.

“I yelled that I was trailing, and when I saw the defender, my eyes kind of lit up,” Davis said. “I knew he was going to throw it off the backboard. And I just wanted to go after it.”

You will see it replayed a thousand times by next week. It will go into the archives, it will be trotted out for a decade or two every time these two freshman guards are mentioned in the same sentence.

And every time you see it, Davis will jump higher and Watson will toss the ball more perfectly, and Beaver defender Nick Greene will look more helpless, caught between the inspiration and the thunder.

“Haven’t we done that before?” Davis said in the locker room to Watson, standing three feet away. “Yeah, that’s right, at Preview Day [in an intrasquad game.]”

But you didn’t have a defender to potentially knock away the ball that time, Davis was told.

“We didn’t care,” said Davis, who had eight points and a career-high nine assists. “We’re just trying stuff. Just having fun.”

Said senior swingman Kris Johnson, who had a game-high 20 points on nine-of-10 shooting: “They make those plays by instinct, they’re the most improvisational pair of freshmen I’ve ever seen.”

All this happened as No. 10 UCLA (11-2, 2-1 in conference play) was putting the finishing touches on one of its most thorough performances of the season, led by Johnson, Jelani McCoy’s five blocked shots and one particular showboat spectacle.

The stage was set when Oregon State (9-5, 0-3) fumbled away the ball on its side of the court to Watson (one of his three steals), who took off down the left side, a step ahead of Greene.

At the free-throw line he picked up his dribble, brought the ball down low with both hands, then flipped it hard off the backboard, directly to a trailing Davis, who practically tore the rim down with his follow-through.

That gave UCLA a 65-36 lead with 12:45 to play, put wild smiles on the whole Bruin team, caused Johnson to nearly flatten Davis with a chest thump and sent the crowd of 9,614 into euphoria.

Included in the crowd, for the first time this season, were Watson’s parents--Earl and Estella--who flew in from Kansas City, Kan., for this week’s games.

With McCoy due to break into the starting lineup Saturday against Oregon, this may have been Watson’s final game as a starter this season. He made the most of it: Besides the lob for the dunk, he made two three-pointers, grabbed four rebounds and scored a career-high 12 points.

“Nothing surprises me with those freshmen,” senior J.R. Henderson said. “You never know what’s going to happen.”

The dunk, of course, was not the only positive part of the night.

Oregon State kept it tight while swingman Corey Benjamin was flashing to the hoop and the Beaver inside players beat UCLA to a handful of offensive rebounds for easy baskets.

In fact, Oregon State outrebounded UCLA, 22-14, in the first half, including 10 offensive rebounds.

With a little more than seven minutes left in the half, the Bruins were ahead by only three, 29-26. But from then until halftime, a 20-4 run gave UCLA a 49-30 lead.

Swingman Toby Bailey spiced things further in the final two minutes of the half when, for the first time in recent memory, his breakaway dunk try was rejected by Benjamin.

On the ensuing Beaver possession, Bailey stole the ball, raced down the floor and threw down a double-pump dunk as he was fouled by Beaver guard Deaundra Tanner.

“He made a good block on that,” Bailey said of Benjamin. “But I didn’t worry about it. I just tried to make it up on defense. It just so happened I was able to do it right away.”

* USC FINALLY WINS: Trojans struggle early, but they defeat Oregon, 63-59, at the Sports Arena to end losing streak at seven. C6