Bruins Almost Caught Napping

The greatest fears of UCLA Coach Steve Lavin, noted with such volume earlier in the week that his harsh words practically slammed off the walls of Pauley Pavilion, came to life Thursday night.

“I could see this coming,” Lavin said.

The 11th-ranked Bruins beat Washington State, 69-66, before 5,502 at Friel Court, but only after blowing a 17-point lead with a miserable second half against the only Pacific 10 Conference team with a sub-.500 overall record.

That it came after they had played so well in the second half of the game at Louisville made their fifth victory in the last six games all the more unworthy of praise.

The only good news for UCLA was the return, a game earlier than expected, of center Dan Gadzuric.

Gadzuric sat out the Louisville contest because of a sprained ankle that put his right foot in a walking boot and was regarded as doubtful for Thursday, especially since Washington State plays a small lineup.

But Gadzuric told Lavin on Wednesday, and again before the game, that he was ready to go.

The result was a team-high 16 points on six-of-nine shooting along with six rebounds in 21 minutes that he said came with only a brief moment or two of pain.

The rest of the Bruins did not get off so easy.

“You play like you practice, and we did not practice well Tuesday,” Lavin said, referring to the workout in Los Angeles that so lacked intensity he stopped it several times to scream at players and make them do extra running.

“They [the Cougars] out-competed us. . . . I don’t think we matched their energy.”

UCLA didn’t match them in any area in the second half, after taking a 35-24 advantage in the first 20 minutes.

Washington State (8-11 overall, 2-6 in conference) outscored the Bruins, 42-34, and outshot UCLA, 63.2%-34.3%, in that time.

Once down by 26-9, the Cougars held a 58-57 lead with 2 1/2 minutes left and trailed only 65-63 with 39 seconds remaining.

They were still down only 66-63 and had possession coming out of a timeout with 22 seconds to go.

But Chris Crosby, on a night when he would also miss five of six shots, had the ball slip out of his hands as he prepared to put it back in play.

Bruin JaRon Rush accepted the gift and kicked it ahead to Ray Young, who went in for a dunk and the security of a 68-63 cushion with 17 seconds left.

“Basically, he dropped it and I just picked it up,” Rush said.

That meant UCLA (15-4, 6-2) didn’t even generate the biggest play on its own.

“It’s frustrating,” Baron Davis said in victory after making two of 10 shots from the field and seven of 13 free throws. “But you could just see it coming. We weren’t playing well even when we got the big lead. They were missing a lot of shots they started to hit in the second half. If that wasn’t the case, we would have been down by 20.

“We just played bad. We weren’t into it. Our intensity wasn’t there.”

Fortunately for the Bruins, neither was Washington State at the start.

Whatever concerns existed regarding the Cougars’ last-place standing in the conference in scoring defense and shooting defense gave way at the outset to the more pressing worry.

The Cougars’ offense.

Or what passed for one.

Washington State scored first with 36 seconds gone, on a free throw, and then not again until 4:56 had elapsed, again from the line.

On the opening 15 possessions, the Cougars it missed all 10 shots and committed five turnovers.

The first Cougar field goal didn’t arrive until 12:16 remained in the half.

They went about four more minutes without scoring again, by which time UCLA had increased its advantage to 23-7 and appeared set for an easy night.

Even the Bruin coach seemed to find humor in the approximately 25 Washington State students across from the Bruin bench who called themselves the “Lavin Look-alikes” and for the second year in a row showed up in ties and mirrored his every gesture on the sideline.

But when the second Washington State basket came, it triggered a veritable offensive explosion.

Starting with that field goal--and including the next one that finally got them to double figures, an accomplishment that took only 12:41--the Cougars scored on seven of their next eight possessions.

In all, they made 19 of their final 35 attempts, including 12 of 19 in the second half, to finish at 42.2%. UCLA, after shooting 55% before intermission, ended at 41.8%.

Jerome Moiso had 14 points and nine rebounds in 23 minutes for the Bruins.