Bruins Cut Off at the Pass

The game was theirs for the taking.

Or the giving, as it turned out for the UCLA Bruins.

With 2.4 seconds remaining, UC Santa Barbara’s Casey Cook took the Gauchos to a place they had never been before Wednesday, moving alertly to cut off UCLA mere feet from the winning basket at Pauley Pavilion.

Cook’s interception of Cedric Bozeman’s inbounds pass to Trevor Ariza under the basket preserved the Gauchos’ 61-60 victory over the Bruins in front of a stunned crowd of 7,432.

The victory was UCSB’s first in 19 games against UCLA.

With 18.4 seconds remaining, Cook had shouldered his way past several Bruins to take a rebound, draw a foul and make two free throws. T.J. Cummings, academically eligible again after sitting out the Bruins’ first four games, seemed to have the angle to block out Cook, but Cook slipped past to gain the pivotal rebound.

Cook made the winning free throws after Cummings hacked him and then was able to fling the ball out of trouble as the clock ran out.

“I’ll take that on my shoulders,” said Cummings, who had a team-high 14 points on five-for-five shooting, but only one rebound in 26 minutes as the Gauchos outrebounded the Bruins, 25-20. “I’ll take the responsibility on that. I should have been a monster on the boards, but I really slacked off out there.”

Cook, a junior forward, led the Gauchos (5-2) with 15 points on six-for-10 shooting. Josh Davis added 13 points.

Dijon Thompson added 13 points and Bozeman had 10 points and six assists for the Bruins (3-2).

Near the end, and especially at the end, the Gauchos seemed to come up with every loose ball and every rebound. It was not a pleasing development for UCLA Coach Ben Howland, although UCSB Coach Bob Williams delighted in the Bruins’ inability to keep their feet moving.

“It does make it sweet to come into Pauley and beat one of the most storied programs in NCAA history,” Williams said. “They will be very good again, but for us right now, this was a very sweet win.”

Said Howland, a former UCSB assistant: “They were diving on the floor and we were not. They got to the ball quicker. They were making plays and we were not, on pure hustle. They hit a number of tough shots.... They made their breaks. We didn’t.”

The Bruins got the good news on Cummings at 3 p.m. He had been academically ineligible for the first semester, but he passed his classes and suited up for the first time Wednesday. He had been cleared to practice with the team, but going through drills with his teammates and playing against others were two different things.

Cummings, one of only three seniors on the Bruin roster, entered with the score tied at 9-9 5:02 into the game. He fed Thompson for an easy layup the first time he got near the basket. His first jump shot took a tour of the rim before falling through to give the Bruins a 19-13 lead.

By halftime, Cummings hardly showed any rust at all, making all five shots and scoring a team-leading 12 points in a crisp 15 minutes. Only Bozeman and Brian Morrison, with 17 minutes apiece, played more for the Bruins.

“I was really excited,” Cummings said of making his 2003-04 debut. “I love to play the game. It’s kind of a heartbreaker because we really wanted to get this game, but we didn’t bring what we needed to bring to this game. I blame myself.”

Who knows where the Bruins would have been without Cummings in the first half, however? As it was, they held a tenuous 35-31 lead over the Gauchos at the break.

UCLA’s 58.3% shooting (14 for 24) might have seemed sufficient to shed UCSB, but the Gauchos countered with 63.2% shooting (12 for 19).

In fact, UCLA had fared about as expected while Cummings sat out, getting narrow victories over Vermont, UC Riverside and Loyola Marymount and sticking to Kentucky like lint before falling, 52-50, in the Wooden Classic at Anaheim.

It’s going to get tougher before the Bruins begin Pacific 10 Conference play. The Bruins play host Saturday to Michigan State, then hit the road to play Michigan on Dec. 27.