Mbah a Moute is keeping on

Luc Richard Mbah a Moute rolled down his sock and showed off the swollen knot that hides under his shoe and sock and thick tape on his left foot.

“My ankle is still bad,” Mbah a Moute said. “When I push off it, I feel kind of slow a little bit. But I can play, especially if there’s a chance to help my team.”

Mbah a Moute has played three games after sitting out two because of a badly sprained ankle, and he is helping his team.

In UCLA’s 75-65 victory over Oregon on Saturday, the junior forward had a spring in his step and a smile on his face, and that is good news for the Bruins. Mbah a Moute doesn’t mask his emotions. If he is not feeling physically able, Mbah a Moute is more likely to scowl than smile.

He had been smiling a lot until the final minutes of UCLA’s 82-60 victory over Arizona last month. Mbah a Moute had regained his timing and his touch after another injury-list stint stemming from a concussion he suffered in UCLA’s loss to USC in January. The sprained ankle was one of those accidental things. Mbah a Moute was trying to grab a rebound, he landed, his ankle rolled.

“Right when it happened I knew it was bad,” he said. “I didn’t know how bad.”

Mbah a Moute said he has treatments every day, takes Celebrex, a pain medicine often prescribed for arthritis sufferers, and gets the foot and ankle taped or retaped at halftime of every game. “When the tape gets loose,” he said, “I feel it more.”

If Mbah a Moute doesn’t have his timing down on his jump shot yet, the 6-foot-8 forward certainly has full range of motion when he’s playing defense. Several times in Saturday’s game, because of the way Coach Ben Howland has players make switches to counteract screens, Mbah a Moute found himself guarding 5-foot-6 Oregon point guard Tajuan Porter on the perimeter.

On one second-half possession, Mbah a Moute stayed in front of Porter for at least 20 seconds. Porter probed for a weakness with his dribble, back and forth. Porter tried to go around Mbah a Moute and tried to back him off with a pump fake. Mbah a Moute had none of it. Finally, Porter tried to drive the sideline and fumbled the ball. Bruins point guard Darren Collison recovered.

“I was just trying to stay focused,” Mbah a Moute said. “I didn’t try to reach or anything. He’s very quick, and I was focusing on getting low, staying in front of the ball. No way he’s going to beat me. I knew exactly what he was trying to do. There was no need for me to switch off him, especially at that time of game when the crowd was into it and everything.”

Mbah a Moute also opened up Saturday’s game by feeding center Kevin Love with a precise pass, good enough to get Love a two-handed dunk to open UCLA’s scoring. It seemed a purpose pitch, made to perk up Love’s spirits. The freshman wasn’t full of energy and said he had felt sick for almost two weeks.

“Kevin’s a good player,” Mbah a Moute said. “He makes good stuff happens when he gets the ball. When he gets frustrated, I do try and get him the ball because he can make plays. He does get frustrated a little bit. He’s young, that’s all.”

--

Russell Westbrook has a nice little collection of dunk videos collected on the YouTube website.

His newest addition is the one-hander he put down over Oregon’s LeKendric Longmire in the second half after he made a steal. His legs were resting on Longmire’s head. A similar dunk over California guard Jamal Boykin has drawn nearly 31,000 hits on the video-driven site. Westbrook said he would wait to rank his favorite dunks until the season is over.

“I’m not finished yet,” he said.

--

diane.pucin@latimes.com