UCLA’S CHANCES: THE LONG AND SHORT OF IT

Self-doubt, a constant companion, gives way to a sudden burst of confidence, the biggest upset of all in this NCAA tournament.

Jerome Moiso is thinking about playing in the NBA.

It gets better.

Jerome Moiso is becoming convinced he can play in the NBA.

They’ll never believe it around the UCLA locker room, where stories of Moiso going on and on about how little talent he has, about how maybe he should see a psychologist, are by now cataloged according to date.

Coaches politely demand that he shoot more. Comes the response: “You sure you want me on the team at all?” Two seasons of that. Moiso, incredibly polite, quick with a smile that can cut the surliest of moods, savages himself three times more than any opponent does.

But there he was Wednesday in the Palace of Auburn Hills, sure enough talking about how the events of the last month, and especially the first two games of the Bruins’ wildly successful tournament run, have him thinking more and more about making himself available for the NBA draft after his sophomore season.

The topic has come up for an obvious reason. Sixth-seeded UCLA plays second-seeded Iowa State tonight in the Sweet 16, and Moiso plays Marcus Fizer.

As gauges go, few are better. Fizer is the Cyclones’ 6-foot-8 All-American, a virtual center because Iowa State has no size, who will be a lottery pick of a power forward if he leaves for the pros after his junior season but who roams to the perimeter enough to show the range of a small forward.

“I think Marcus Fizer is as dominant as anyone in the country,” Bruin Coach Steve Lavin said. “We faced a lot of big people this year, but he’s very versatile, like a Charles Barkley. He can step away from the basket and create for himself and others, but he can also post you up down low and go to work on you. He’s a nightmare, matchup-wise.”

Perfect. Moiso starts at center for UCLA, where Dan Gadzuric is only a titled substitute, is really a 6-10 power forward in college and has a small forward’s game, bordering on the timid, befitting his fragile personality.

So he will use tonight to help him decide about his tomorrow.

“Yeah,” Moiso said. “It’s the kind of game I always want to play. I was wishing I could play Cincinnati this year, so I could go against Kenyon Martin. I want to go against the best guys. Stanford. Arizona and Loren Woods.”

Fizer will not be the only factor, only the strongest indication. Even then, there’s no way of saying how much time Moiso will actually get on him because the Bruins plan a steady diet of man-to-man, straight zone and matchup zone, knowing that changing up the defenses can have its own impact.

And it’s not as if there will be a decision tonight, if the Bruins are eliminated or reach the round of eight for the second time in four years, if Moiso dominates or disappears. But there will be a decision at some point, after the season has ended and he gets a reading from NBA personnel executives.

“I cannot make this a one-on-one match against Fizer,” he said. “Who knows if I will spend much time guarding him? We don’t know. And either way, I won’t be able to say, ‘Yeah, I won over him.’ I want to be most happy that we won the game, not any individual part.

“Right now, it is part of my attention a little bit. A small part.”

Moiso is cautious not to get too caught up in the predicament. That happened earlier in the year and he went into a tailspin, falling into a funk, feeling the pressure of wanting to be perfect every night to boost his draft stock, wondering why UCLA recruited him in the first place.

Conversations with coaches convinced him to put the NBA in the background. Almost on the spot, he soared anew, producing the best stretch of his college career with five double-doubles in eight games. One was against Brendan Haywood and North Carolina, another against Woods and Arizona.

Then he went for 17 points, 12 rebounds and three blocked shots against Stanford. The first-round victory against Ball State was a mediocre offering, but two days later, he hit Maryland for 14 points, nine rebounds and three blocks in 27 minutes.

All of which gets him to tonight. All of which gets him thinking.

“If I can play well, hopefully in the four remaining games, that would be a good influence on if I stay or not,” Moiso said. “But it would still be 50-50 after that.”

With the odds changing all the time. From two months ago to tonight to whatever comes during the rest of March Madness, maybe even into the first Monday night of April. If the Bruins are still playing and Moiso is really playing, it would get tougher all the time not to give a strong look at leaving.

“It seems like if I was playing good,” he said, confidently, “why not?”