Bruins Battered, Then Shaken Up

The ramifications of what took place Saturday afternoon at The New Arena will come in part Wednesday night at Pauley Pavilion, when the UCLA starting lineup is announced and the first UCLA substitution is made and Coach Steve Lavin, if true to his word, sends out the end of his bench to take on USC.

But the real fallout, the real damage report from the Bruins’ embarrassing 85-67 loss to California before a conference-record crowd of 15,676, might not come until March 7.

UCLA lost a game, erased an encouraging-even-in-defeat showing Thursday at Stanford and, to be sure, caught the eye of an NCAA tournament selection committee that puts particular weight on the final 10 games of the regular season when making its pairings decisions. And losing by 18 points with seven games left to a team that has lost six of nine, to a team you beat by 11 points a month earlier, is exactly the kind of thing that can result in the Bruins getting a lower seeding.

That they played without Jerome Moiso, sidelined by the sore arches that have plagued him for weeks, will be of little consequence. The Bruins (17-7, 8-5 in Pacific 10 Conference) got nothing inside against Cal--Dan Gadzuric had as many turnovers as rebounds, seven--but the bigger problem was really inside.

Or wasn’t.

“They took our hearts,” an obviously frustrated Baron Davis said after his career-high 27 points went to waste. “They stepped on it. They pounded us. And we didn’t do anything but cry. We were like kids.”

Added Sean Farnham, after playing a career-high 11 minutes, nine in the second half: “You can’t play half-hearted against any Pac-10 team, and that’s what we did today. . . . You can’t blame it on youth. Something’s got to be found in yourself.”

So underwhelming was UCLA’s response when Cal (14-8, 5-7) built an 11-point halftime lead that Lavin didn’t wait until Wednesday night at home to shake up his rotation, using Gadzuric only eight minutes after intermission and Matt Barnes five while keeping Travis Reed and Ryan Bailey on the bench. If the rotation was in constant flux to begin with, it got the biggest overhaul yet.

It also comes with notification that Lavin’s recent this-isn’t-a-country-club theme, trotted out after he benched JaRon Rush and Gadzuric last weekend for their efforts in practice, will be run into the ground in the coming days. Because he took time from his postgame autopsy Saturday--as the Bruins were nearly sprinting out of the locker room to make the flight home, fittingly running behind in that quest--to announce his opening lineup for the USC game:

Davis, playing very well under any circumstances and superbly for someone still about 90% back from reconstructive knee surgery.

Earl Watson, not playing very well, but at least playing hard, which is enough to keep a job these days on this team.

Rush, who regained his starting spot Saturday after a two-game absence, made three of 17 shots, but showed intensity in grabbing nine rebounds.

Those are the regulars.

These aren’t:

Brandon Loyd, who has played more than eight minutes once in the last five weeks and is averaging 6.7 minutes for the season.

And Farnham, who got eight and 11 minutes on the Bay Area swing, pushing his season average to 4.7.

Not to be overlooked is Lavin’s new sixth man, temporary as these things tend to be on the Bruins.

Todd Ramasar.

He got in for the final 6.9 seconds Saturday, after Davis fouled out for the seventh time in the last 13 games, the eighth appearance of the season.

So Lavin readies to open against USC--the Los Angeles team from the Pac-10 that had the successful Northern California swing--with two walk-ons in his first six, Farnham and Ramasar, and, counting Loyd, the three players playing the least, by far.

Loyd and Farnham get the promotions, and the three others keep their spots, because they played the hardest against Cal, and Ramasar moves into the rotation because he has practiced hard and has been the one Bruin to show constant enthusiasm on the bench. UCLA as a whole gets the new look because . . .

“We played a terrible game,” Lavin said after the Bruins lost for the third time in five games. “Cal played more physical, sharper, and added a good mix on defense. The game shows our lack of maturity, our inability to come off a high-level game such as Stanford on Thursday and compete competitively in the next game.”

As if there was much of a game. The Bruins showed a brief sign of life early in the second half, cutting the 11-point deficit to six with 17:37 remaining, but trailed by double digits most of the rest of the way.

It got as bad as 85-63. As it was, this marked Cal’s largest home victory over the Bruins since the 62-44 victory on Feb. 14, 1948.