ucal v. taiwan

Say what you will about the level of competion, but these fellas from Taiwan were no patsies. UCLA played it close during portions of the first half, but then came out smoking in the second half to defeat the Taiwanese National team 98-65 as JaRon Rush finally made his presence felt as he slashed, jammed and alley-ooped his way to 21 points, 11 in the first half and a game-high 4 steals. Jaron was just amazing, and he and Earl Watson displayed some of what made the CMH 76'ers so exciting to watch two summers ago. Watson picked up 16 point and 7 assists, at least 4 of those to JaRon on incredibly timed alley-oop dunks off the transition.

And while JaRon got most of the fan adulation, this game also marked the slow emergence of Dan Gadzuric, who finally exhibited some of the strength down low that he's capable of playing with,. Gadzurirc had 11 points including two monster dunks toward the end of the game. "I've got to work on my other moves down low," Gadzuric told us after the game. "I'm really happy about the chemistry we have here, and with me and Jerome in the lineup at the same time, we're going to be really good." When we asked him about who he was looking forward to playing against in the Pac-10, his eyes lit up and he said "Marc Madsen and the guys from Stanford. That will be fun." Gadzuric looked better than we've seen him, but he still needs to work on his timing coming off the turn around drop step, and he will need to vastly improve his footwork and ability to move guys out of the paint, but he's got a couple of months to get that down. For now though, it was just nice to see that he's shown up with the power and game that we heard about for the last year. He led the team in rebounding tonight with 9 overall, five offensive and 4 defensive boards, adding his to UCLA's overall 47-21 rebounding advantage against the Taiwanese, who fielded a team who's biggest man on the floor was 6'-7", so we're not sure just how much the rebounding totals really tell us about how well this young team will do against teams like Stanford, Arizona or Washington.

Dan Gadzuric

Earl again got the most minutes of anyone on the floor (28), and his point production showed it, as he had 16 and 1 steal, shooting 7-15 from the field and 1-3 on three pointers. He was just everywhere, playing aggressive defense, and smooth passes and finding the open man, mostly JaRon on the fast break. It's pretty clear that he's going to be the designated floor general, at least until Baron returns, sometime we would expect in late December. Baron has been cleared to practice in contact drills, but won't be at full strength for a while. When we talked to him after the game, he was looking at the stat sheet, and noticed Ryan Moose Bailey's point total (15), Earl's 16 points and JaRon's 18, and he said, half-jokingly, "If this keeps up, I might just red-shirt."

Bailey, in addition to his point total, played stronger than we've seen him before. "I'm really happy with the maturity he brings to the team, as a former starter from Penn State," said coach Lavin after the game. "His court skills are obvious, and he, and the rest of the guys, give us options that we could only dream about in the last few years. We've got so many talented players, it's going to be difficult just finding ways for everyone to get time," Lavin told us. "But it's a nice problem," he added.

One of the nice things about having Bailey was the chemistry that is beginning to develop with him and Ray Young, who appeared to be a bit shaky at the beginning of the game, but then warmed up and started to hit from outside, going 4-7 from the field and 1-3 from three-point range for 10 points in 14 minutes, just about the most productive player on the floor per minute of playing time, and from what we saw, Ray should be getting a lot more time than some others during the regular season. He's very athletic, a somewhat streaky shooter, but he has incredibly strong calves, and a huge vertical, which gives him great elevation on the jumper. When we talked to Ray after the game in the locker room, he was really excited, "I'm really happy that things are starting to click. We're going to get a lot of things done here." When we told him that we had talked to his high school coach, Gordie Johnson a couple of weeks ago to profile St. Joe's he said, "He's such a great coach and a really nice man. I hope they do well this year, and they should with Justin." And speaking of Justin Davis, despite rumors to the contrary, we now understand that his visit to UCLA went really well and that he is still on target to sign with the Bruins; our earlier story which indicated to the contrary was clearly in error. And we know that Young would not be at all disappointed to see his old teammate from the State Championship runners-up at Westwood next year.

Other Bruins who looked good were Travis Reed, who played strong down in the low post, playing for 20 minutes and getting 8 points on 3-8 shooting from the field and going 2-2 from the line.

Jerome Moiso continues to amaze with his soft shooting touch, even though he didn't hit any shots from the field last night, and his rebounding ability is impressive; he picked up 6 rebounds, 2 offensive and 4 defensive boards. He's very fluid on the floor, and a smart player.

Todd Ramasar continues to impress the locals as well, playing strong, faster and bigger than any believed he was capable of playing last year when he walked on to the team. He picked up 5 points in 11 minutes of play. Brandon Loyd, the only senior on the team, had 3 points, shooting 1-3 from behind the arc in 12 minutes of playing time.

Matt Barnes played fast and strong, getting 11 minutes of play and scoring 6 points on 3-5 shooting from the field, and he was also an impressive rebounder picking up 5 overall, three offensive and 2 defensive, and his hustle was nice to see, diving for loose balls and generally playing with speed and quickness.

Only two Bruins didn't score: Sean Farnham played 9 minutes and never took a shot, while Billy Knight continues to fade into oblivion, playing only 7 minutes, the least of any on the bench last night, and he just doesn't seem to have any confidence to shoot the ball. He passed up several open looks, and only took on shot from behind the arc, missing. He did get two defensive boards, and generally played capable defense, but when Rico Hines and Baron come back, it's going to get even harder to find minutes for him, and for now unless he starts to impress someone with his fine shooting ability and regains his confidence, we wouldn't expect to see him a lot during the regular season, which would be a shame because he's a fine player with great athletic ability, and he used to be a fine outside shooter. Hey, it's still early, and 7 minutes is hardly enough to base an entire season on, and we're certain he'll improve against Santa Clara in the opener on November 19, 1998 at 7:30 at Pauley Pavilion.

Baron Davis and Moose (21) talk it over dring a timeout, while Moiso (0) gets some advice from Lavin