A Bay City Roller Coaster

Having no discernable memory can be a plus.

UCLA’s listless loss 40 hours earlier? Never happened.

Dropping five of the last seven road games? No recollection.

Facing Stanford without suspended forward Matt Barnes, the team’s third-leading scorer and second-leading rebounder?

Matt who?

UCLA bounced carefree into Maples Pavilion and lived in the moment, crashing Stanford’s senior day and the probable last home game of stellar junior Casey Jacobsen, winning, 95-92, Saturday in front of a sellout 7,391.

The final score was close only because Stanford made a three-point basket at the buzzer, capping a 31-point Cardinal blitz over the last 3:41. But UCLA answered with poise, making 17 of 20 free throws during the same stretch.

Astonishingly, this is the third year in a row UCLA has won here. Of course, the Bruins don’t care to remember.

“The past doesn’t matter,” guard Billy Knight said. “We just threw all our little strategies out the window and played like it was a pick-up game.”

It is also the seventh consecutive week the Bruins, 18-9 overall and 10-6 in the Pacific 10 Conference, have gone 1-1. But who is going to recall that if they put together a winning streak now?

They remain in the hunt for a share of the regular-season title with only home games against first-place Oregon and Oregon State ahead.

“Hopefully we don’t go home and lose,” said forward Jason Kapono, who had 22 points on eight-of-12 shooting and five assists. “Maybe we can get a streak going instead of this win-lose-win-lose thing.”

Continuing the toughness and intelligence displayed against Stanford (17-8, 10-6) would help. UCLA had 13 offensive rebounds in the first half while building a 49-40 lead and shot 66.7% in the second half while building on and then protecting the margin.

Bruin freshmen played with the savvy of veterans and Bruin veterans played with the exuberance of freshmen.

“Our coaches stressed to play freely and have fun,” Kapono said. “We felt [bad] the last couple of days and went out today like we were starting over.”

Freshman guards Cedric Bozeman (11 points, three assists and no turnovers), Dijon Thompson (13 points, one turnover) and Ryan Walcott (six free throws in the last 2:09) were solid. So was freshman forward Andre Patterson, who played 11 minutes in Barnes’ absence and had four points, four rebounds and no turnovers.

Senior center Dan Gadzuric posted his third double-double in the last four games with 15 rebounds, 12 points, four assists, three blocked shots and only one turnover. He also helped contain Stanford center Curtis Borchardt, who scored 17 points but made only five of 11 shots.

“They collapsed down the middle with their zone defense and we couldn’t find any passing lanes,” Borchardt said. “That’s OK if we are making threes, but they didn’t fall.”

Stanford launched a school-record 42 three-point tries, making 14.

“They invited us to shoot jump shots and we couldn’t make them,” said Jacobsen, an NBA prospect who was three for 11 from long range and seven for 19 overall, scoring 24 points.

UCLA employed the 1-4 motion offense that worked well in a victory over Arizona nine days ago.

“They didn’t run any set plays,” said Stanford Coach Mike Montgomery, although he wouldn’t have noticed if the Bruins had. Montgomery spent the game badgering the officials and was called for a technical foul seconds after Knight made a three-point shot at the buzzer ending the first half.

Kapono made the foul shots before the second half began, stretching UCLA’s lead to 51-40. Stanford soon cut the margin to five, but with seven different players scoring, UCLA embarked on a 22-7 run and led, 75-55, with 5:35 to play.

Stanford went to a full-court press and began fouling on every UCLA possession, eventually producing a tense moment. Cardinal guard Chris Hernandez made a three-pointer with 50 seconds left and an offensive foul by Kapono on the inbounds pass led to two free throws by Jacobsen, cutting the lead to 89-83.

Hernandez stole the ball from Knight in the backcourt, but the UCLA guard remained aggressive on defense, altering Hernandez’s errant layup attempt. Walcott ended up with the ball and made two foul shots with 37 seconds left to stretch the margin to eight.

Watching intently was Barnes, who sat in the first row behind the UCLA bench, exhorting the team and sticking his head into timeout huddles. Throwing a forearm at Shantay Legans of California on Thursday sidelined him with a one-game suspension, and he was reduced to taking mental notes and providing his teammates with feedback afterward in case their memories fail again.

“I think I’ll keep this one in mind,” Bozeman said. “This will have to be the way we play from now on.”

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Even Steven

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