Beach Ball

Team headquarters for the hottest basketball squad in Southern California is a trailer.

Granted, it’s a nice trailer.

In three hours, you guess, a team of workers could dissemble operations and, like a guy late for the circus, you’d be kicking sawdust.

Hey, where did Long Beach State go?

How one gets a taste of the action:

* From the north, drive past the pyramid of successes in Westwood and get a visual fix on the Pyramid. You can’t miss it. It looks like that hotel in Vegas.

* From the city, proceed past Staples Center (pick up some staples!), toot your horn as you pass USC (tough luck against Cal!) and head toward San Pedro.

* From the south, ignore exit ramps to UC Irvine--nothing basketball-related going on there--and keep the pedal to the metal until you see signs for the Queen Mary.

This isn’t the first time Long Beach State has played noteworthy basketball, and not the first time few have noticed. Jerry Tarkanian went 120-21 in five years and nearly shocked John Wooden’s UCLA Bruins in the 1971 West Regional final, losing, 57-55.

In 1974, Lute Olson’s lone season at the beach, the 49ers finished 24-2.

Long before there was a Pyramid, Coach Tex Winter (1978-83) was ringing up wins with his triangle (offense).

Ed Ratleff, a two-time All-American in the early 1970s, was one of the Southland’s greatest collegiate players.

That’s Ratleff, R-a-t-l-e-f-f.

Problem?

Setting up basketball shop in L.A. is sort of like opening a pineapple stand next to Dole.

Long Beach State won its 13th consecutive game Thursday night, 69-60, at Irvine. The school record is 19, set by Tarkanian’s 1969-70 team.

Thirteen consecutive wins is big college basketball news in Bloomington, Lexington or Lawrence, but here, Long Beach mania doesn’t crack some sports section covers.

Fourth-year Coach Wayne Morgan must know he’s a long way from Syracuse, where he served 12 years as an assistant under Jim Boeheim in a fiefdom where hoops is king.

“When I was at Syracuse, every day at practice there were two or three TV stations, and five or six print media people,” Morgan said.

And here?

“Southern California is Southern California,” he said. “It’s what it is. I’ve been here four years now, so it’s not strange anymore. It’s just the way it is.”

Too many schools to cover, too much sunshine, too many distractions--not enough news hole.

Yet, of all the Southland schools, the 49ers (15-3) might have the clearest path to the NCAA tournament.

Long Beach leads the Big West Conference’s Western Division with a 7-0 record and will be favored to earn the conference’s automatic NCAA berth, awarded to the winner of the Big West tournament in March.

The Big West isn’t the Big East, but the 49ers have lost only three games this season, by a total of 15 points--Stanford’s margin of victory over UCLA on Thursday.

Long Beach scored a nice win at Kansas State, made an astounding 32 consecutive shots from the field in a rout of Cal State Monterey Bay and, in a feat all but forgotten, defeated USC by 10 points on Dec. 16.

When USC recovered to knock off UCLA and shock No. 2 Arizona, Long Beach players thought they’d get some respect.

“Nobody even said, ‘Hey, didn’t Long Beach beat USC?’ ” senior forward D’Cean Bryant said. “I think people thought it was a fluke.”

It was no fluke. The 49ers play hard and are stocked with talent, led by senior Mate Milisa, a 6-foot-11 center from Croatia, who’s averaging 20 points and seven rebounds.

Milisa is the biggest Big West recruiting coup since England’s Michael Olowokandi randomly picked Pacific out of a college directory.

“We got very lucky there,” Morgan said of Milisa. “He’s a good player.”

With most of the top programs mining Southern California for talent, Morgan has gone elsewhere to pluck key players. Guard Ron Johnson is from San Diego, Ramel Lloyd from the Bronx, Antrone Lee from Georgia, Charles O’Neal from Michigan.

Morgan knows how to recruit. As Boeheim’s lead talent scout, Morgan was responsible for getting Sherman Douglas, John Wallace and Otis Hill, among others.

Wayne’s World

Morgan’s transition from assistant at Syracuse to head coach at Long Beach was anything but smooth.

Unlike predecessor Seth Greenberg, a media-friendly glad-hander who used Long Beach as a springboard to South Florida, Morgan can be a tough nut.

He is smart--”I have a 140 IQ,” he says--yet has burned key members of the local media, which is not smart for a program craving publicity.

Twelve years of media study under Boeheim at Syracuse sharpened Morgan’s edges.

“He comes from an East Coast mentality,” Long Beach Athletic Director Bill Shumard said. “He has a mistrust of the media.”

Shumard says he has encouraged Morgan to be more open, but admits, “He is not of that bent.”

Winning solves many problems, so maybe it’s a good thing Morgan started winning.

He posted losing records in each of his first three seasons--13-14, 10-19, 13-15--before his breakout year.

“This is exactly what we were pointing to when we got here,” he said. “It just took a little bit longer to happen.”

There was speculation late last season that Morgan’s job might be in jeopardy, but he turned the corner with three late-season victories.

“That was enough for me to say, ‘He deserves to continue on,’ ” Shumard said.

Morgan is in the fourth year of a five-year contract and it appears Shumard’s patience has paid off.

Thursday, with the victory over Irvine, Morgan evened his record at Long Beach at 51-51.

“It was a steep learning curve,” Shumard said. “He’s certainly had his battles and struggles. A lot of people questioned his knowledge of the game, his strategies, but he gradually proved himself there.”

Morgan said he has never doubted himself.

Ever.

“I had no question we were going to win this year,” he said. “I knew what we had. If you check my statements in preseason, I said, ‘No doubt we’re going to win. It’s just a matter of how many games. Will it be 15, 17 or 20?’

“That’s not hanging it out there, that’s knowing what you have and what you’re capable of.”

And the questions about his job security?

“Nobody puts more pressure on me than I put on myself,” Morgan said. “I expect to win. I’ve always won, everywhere I’ve been. Nobody can speak to me, or say anything about winning that would have any impact on me that comes close to me staying up all night, and talking all night, watching film all night, reliving every play all night.”

In bad times--and now good--Morgan always had a mentor to lean on in Boeheim, whose Orangemen are off to an 18-0 start.

“I talk to Wayne every couple of weeks,” Boeheim said. “I’m tremendously happy for him. He’s a good, solid coach. It’s taken a little longer, but sometimes that happens when you get into a new situation. Things have to be changed, moved and turned around.”

Morgan missed the chance to coach against Boeheim when Long Beach lost to St. Joseph’s in December in the opening round of the Syracuse Carrier Classic, but he gives his mentor much credit for his success.

“Jim’s been a major influence on me, and a major influence on my philosophy,” Morgan said. “I think he’s a very smart man.”

The Next Step

But what about Shumard?

Despite the intense competition for players and publicity, Shumard has raised the bar for Long Beach basketball.

Is it realistic?

Shumard wants to take on all comers in a crowded and competitive market.

“We want to knock on the door and get on the field with USC and UCLA any chance we get,” he said.

With Long Beach on the rise, though, you wonder if USC and UCLA will want to risk the loss.

Shumard says Long Beach should consistently be ranked among the top 100 programs, meaning he expects the 49ers to be an annual participant in either the NCAA tournament (64 berths) or the NIT (32).

“We expect to be successful,” he said.

Morgan too is thinking big.

“It happened at Louisville when Denny Crum went there, at Georgetown when John Thompson went there,” Morgan said. “It happened at UMass when [John] Calipari went there. It can happen anywhere.”

The players hope it can happen on campus.

Despite this year’s success and an attractive on-campus arena--the basketball offices will be moved there eventually--the team has averaged only 2,095 fans a game in the 5,000-seat Pyramid.

“It’s picked up a little bit,” sophomore guard Ron Johnson said of student interest in the basketball team. “It would be different if everybody lived on campus. There’s just so many things to do.”

Should Long Beach extend the streak at Cal State Fullerton tonight, it will be be going for for win No. 15 at home Thursday against Pacific.

Johnson, who scored 18 against Irvine, is a realist when it comes to fan support.

“If they don’t come, we’ve still got to play,” he said.

But what if they did come?

The way they packed the Pyramid for a high school game between Compton Dominguez and Artesia?

“I’d love to walk out and see 6,000 fans, not one seat empty,” D’Cean Bryant said. “I want to see people fighting for chairs, I want to see people fighting for tickets.”

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Long Beach State at Cal State Fullerton

Tonight, 7

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Just Beachy

Long Beach State has won 13 in a row and has outscored its opponents by more than 20 points during the streak:

Streak

49ers: 83.1

Opponent: 62.3

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Before

49ers: 75.0

Opponent: 71.2

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Total

49ers: 80.8

Opponent: 64.8