Irvine Goes NIT-Picking

Pacific won the opening tip.

The NIT isn’t so bad.

Pacific scored the first basket. And the second.

The NIT isn’t so bad.

Pacific scored the first free throws and grabbed the first rebound.

The NIT isn’t so bad.

The UC Irvine Anteaters were playing for confirmation, for validation, for a chance to earn the most momentous moment in their men’s basketball history--an NCAA tournament bid on Sunday.

The NIT isn’t so bad.

The magic left Irvine and when it was gone the Anteaters had nothing left but exhaustion and resignation. Pacific beat Irvine, 74-58, and the arguing can stop.

The 25-4 Anteaters will not have to wait and see if they will get an at-large NCAA tournament bid Sunday. If Irvine had lost in the final tonight against Utah State, a passionate argument could have been made in Irvine’s favor. An argument about making only one slip in the final, an argument about rewarding consistency and about winning over and over under pressure.

But when you lose in the semifinals, when you get overwhelmed for 30 minutes by the fifth seeded team in the conference, then you accept that NIT bid and think about how, if someone had offered that NIT bid in November, it would have been a happy day.

The NIT seems sickening right now. Friday night, in the semifinals of the Big West tournament, all the Anteaters had were missed shots and nobody to rebound. All the Anteaters had were thrown-away passes and a perplexing lack of defense. That’s what they will think about when they wake up this morning.

Jerry Green, the best player in the Big West, was a bit player. Green scored 31 points in the quarterfinal win over Cal Poly San Luis Obispo on Thursday and finished with 12 points against Pacific. Someone joked on Thursday that UC Irvine without Jerry Green was Cal State Fullerton. That was no joke Friday night.

Every bit of luck, every good bounce, every shot that went in, then out, then back in, it all went in reverse for the Anteaters.

The Anteaters aren’t that much better than all the other Big West teams. Beating Pacific three times in a season, that’s awfully hard.

Thirty seconds into the second half Irvine, the Big West regular-season champion, the No. 1-seeded team, the team that had gone 16-1 against conference teams so far, was losing to the Tigers, 45-17. That’s what the Anteaters will remember today.

How they lost it all on one night.

It will take a while for Irvine’s players to remember how much was accomplished this season.

A program that was nowhere two years ago got praised on national television by Dick Vitale this year.

Two years ago the Anteaters had a 6-20 season and were 2-14 in the Big West. A lot of growing up has happened in two years. It has happened sooner than anyone expected.

That was no consolation to seniors Ben Jones, Malachi Edmond and Sean Jackson.

Cutting a 28-point deficit to 11, causing the Anteater fans, the ones wearing blue and yellow wigs, the ones with painted faces and yellow CIA (Completely Insane Anteaters) T-shirts, to go berserk, to get off their feet and cheer until they were hoarse, all that was of little comfort to seniors who came to Irvine to save a program, who never expected to be talking about the NCAA tournament and then almost got to go.

This 16-point defeat was the Anteaters’ worst of the year.

Irvine Coach Pat Douglass spoke of how his team seemed to have run out of gas. When you are one of these mid-major teams your season is always on the brink. Winning the league title isn’t enough. Going 25-4 probably isn’t enough. Every game, as the record keeps getting better, the team keeps thinking about not losing, not losing, not losing. There is no margin for error.

But we shouldn’t remember the Anteaters for this defeat.

We should remember them for the 14 wins they had by five points or less. That tells us about the heart of a team. That tells us about a certain toughness. The way Irvine came from 17 down at Pacific in January to win should mean as much as losing by 16.

There is hope now for the Anteaters. There is a future.

Dozens of Irvine fans waited for the team to come out of its sad locker room Friday night. Most of them had given the players a standing ovation at the end. It was deserved.

And the Anteaters should look at its likely NIT bid as a way to keep learning.

Douglass admitted that had someone promised him in November that Irvine would go to the NIT, “I would have been elated. Right now I’m not elated. We have one of the best records in the country. I’d be more elated if we went to the NCAA.”

“I’m not gonna give up on the NCAAs,” Green said. “But if that doesn’t happen, then the NIT is good. That would be another accomplishment for this team. We’ve made history with our record and that’s what we need to remember. The NIT would be some more history.”

Somebody asked Douglass if he would watch the NCAA selection show Sunday. Douglass said he wasn’t sure. “This whole process kind of wears on you,” he said. “I haven’t had a lot of experience with how the NCAA goes about selecting teams. But I know this. I couldn’t be prouder of any team I ever coached.”

That’s the memory the Anteaters should have of this season.

They should be proud of an NIT bid, accept it happily and then play to make more history.

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Diane Pucin can be reached at her e-mail address: diane.pucin@latimes.com