There’s No Joy at USC: Casey Strikes

Spent the day traveling down basketball’s famed Toxic Fumes Road.

Started in Westwood with the junior varsity.

Continued at the Sports Arena with the varsity.

Finished at Staples Center with that late-night cult favorite, the Clipper Horror Picture Show.

A great day.

Well, OK, not really.

It involved so much running around and going nowhere, you would have thought I just left a Steve Lavin huddle after a timeout.

11:55 a.m.--Walked into Pauley Pavilion before UCLA played California to discover half the students wearing the white headband favored by Jason Kapono.

Don’t laugh. In the intricately designed Bruin offense, they sometimes have a better chance of touching the ball.

12:17 p.m.--A UCLA student is shown on the video scoreboard wearing a JaRon Rush Countdown T-shirt, adorned with a notation for each game Rush must miss because of NCAA rules violations.

Rumor has it, the student didn’t make the shirt himself, it was given to him. Officials from the NCAA are expected to punish him just as soon as they can convince a beer company to buy space on the back of it.

12:32 p.m.--Jerome Moiso slams in an airball from Ray Young.

12:34 p.m.--Moiso knocks Nick Vander Laan’s shot into the first row.

12:35 p.m.--A quick scan of the crowd reveals that no students have begun wearing Moiso’s trademark knee-length thin white socks. This is a good thing.

12:57 p.m.--Billy Knight and some guy from Cal come crashing over the press table in front of me. Co-workers scatter, pens fly, a soda topples, but I remain unmoved.

This is not because I am brave. This is because when it comes to recognizing imminent danger and potential catastrophe, I am slower than Pete Dalis.

1:33 p.m.--Nearing the midway point of the second half, Kapono makes a three pointer, Moiso blocks a shot, Kapono makes another three-pointer. They have become the Bruins’ two-man team and Pauley is roaring.

In my notebook I write, “Everything has changed.”

1:55 p.m.--UCLA runs a play in which Moiso and Dan Gadzuric nearly collide at the top of the key because apparently they were both running precisely the same route.

In my notebook I write, “Nothing has changed.”

2:10 p.m.--Trailing by one point with 30 seconds left, UCLA takes possession after a Cal miss--TIMEOUT! TIMEOUT!--and hustles down the floor--TIMEOUT! TIMEOUT!--and Kapono throws up a shot that is blocked, then grabbed by Gadzuric--TIMEOUT! TIMEOUT!--who then throws up a wild follow attempt.

I open the UCLA media guide and adorn a photo of Lavin with big ears and a mustache.

2:16 p.m.--With Cal trying to throw the ball in-bounds while protecting a one-point lead in the final seconds, Watson stands on Shantay Legans’ feet. Legans pushes him off. Watson jumps back on.

Afterward Legans says, “I’ve never seen that before.”

I tell him to stick around.

2:30 p.m.--On the way to Lavin’s postgame news conference after the Bruins’ 73-70 loss, fans shout, “Get Lavin! Burn him! Bury him! Be merciless!”

Like they really need me.

3:40 p.m.--Drive from Pauley to the Sports Arena while listening to talk radio callers shouting, “Get Lavin! Burn him! Bury him! Be merciless!”

Well, OK, not all of them.

Some of them also want to fire Dalis.

4:07 p.m.--Arrive at the Sports Arena, run into a buddy who just purchased a $5 ticket for the USC-Stanford game.

Wanted to introduce him to two other friends who paid $33 apiece for a nosebleed ticket at Pauley.

5:04 p.m.--USC takes the floor to a 10,000-person standing ovation, which feels as strange in this place, for this team, as one might imagine snow would feel in Miami.

5:11 p.m.--Jeff Trepagnier jumps into the smog to score on an alley-oop dunk to give the Trojans a two-point lead, and you’re thinking maybe this ovation will last all night.

5:34 p.m.--Ryan Mendez ducks inside and whips a pass around Trojan backs to Mark Madsen, who makes a layup over the USC frontcourt, and you realize the Trojans are too depleted for anything to last.

5:42 p.m.--Trojans have not connected on a field goal in nearly six minutes, but they are still hustling on defense, moving on offense, still making Stanford furrow its intelligent brows.

6:32 p.m.--Trepagnier kicks a pass into the stands, and about half a dozen red-sweatered fans instinctively raise both hands.

Yup. Still a you-know-what school.

6:57 p.m.--Nate Hair makes a three-pointer with about six minutes left in the game, his team is down 11, but the fans are back on their feet, and the Trojans stay on their toes.

There is no cheering from the press table, so you bite your lower lip. It will not be the first time you have left a Trojan game this year with a slightly swollen lower lip.

7:07 p.m.--USC loses by 10 in a game that might have been much closer if Sam Clancy and Jarvis Turner were sound.

“Besides,” a fan shouts, reiterating what really matters around here, “UCLA lost to them by 15!”

9:15 p.m.--Write most of my column, pack up bags, rush toward Sports Arena exit for quick drive to the Clipper game.

9:16 p.m.--On second thought, nah.

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Bill Plaschke can be reached at his e-mail address: bill.plaschke@latimes.com.