A Former Bruin Likes Lavin

If and when UCLA fans and boosters begin their annual spring ritual of calling for Bruin Coach Steve Lavin’s head, Lavin has a supporter in an unlikely place.

“I think Steve Lavin has done an excellent job,” USC Coach Henry Bibby said. “People talk about Steve and he’s had a lot of 20-plus seasons of winning basketball. I’ll take his record, I’d be very happy to.

“There are people over there [at UCLA], I think they’re getting greedy at times, think they should win a national championship [with regularity]. He gets his teams ready to play. You can’t win every game ... but I think he gets his team up to play for games that they need to get up to play. And that’s a good sign.”

Another good sign for Lavin: He’s 9-2 against Bibby.

Bibby has not heard from the Pacific 10 Conference regarding his complaints Saturday on the Oregon fans’ derisive chants of “Deadbeat dad” and “Your son hates you,” in reference to his strained relationship with his son, Sacramento King guard Mike Bibby.

“Why would they contact me about that?” the elder Bibby said. “It’s been going on for six years and no one’s contacted me about it, so I don’t assume they’re going to do that now.”

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TONIGHT

No. 25 USC at No. 15 UCLA

7:30, Fox Sports Net 2

Site--Pauley Pavilion.

Radio--KMPC (1540).

Records--USC 16-5, 8-3 in Pac-10; UCLA 15-6, 7-4.

Update--USC and UCLA have scored the same number of points (1,615) in the same number of games (21)

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Paul Gutierrez