SoCal College Game Report

UCLA Squeaks By NBC
Thunder 76-74--(November 19, 1997)

UCLA managed to get by the NBC Thunder in a game which came down to the last shot. On that last shot, NBC brought the ball in under the Bruin basket, with 5.5 seconds remaining. Shann Ferch, who had the hot three point hand (29 total points in the game, and a ton of very long three's), was the likely inbounds target, but he was double teamed by Brandon Loyd and Toby. That left Nico Harrison wide open, and he quickly brought the ball up court, ala' Tyus, and just when he looked like he had a sure 2 point slam dunk at the basket to tie the game with maybe 1 second showing on the clock, he decides to go for the win instead, and kicks the ball out to the right hand far corner so that a teammate can shoot the game winning three. Only two little problems with that thought. . .First: His NBC teammate had no clue that he was going to get the ball, and it immediately sailed out of his hands and into the stands. . . Second problem: The buzzer. Game over. End of story. Bruins win.

Like the Lithuania game, this was not pretty, and the Bruins were, at best, erratic. J.R. Henderson did not play, and the reason was not announced until half time ("middle back spasms"). Baron Davis and Earl Watson played tenacious defense, spectacular offense, and Baron got into foul trouble early. Brandon Loyd was the most erratic, and was probably 1 for 10 on his threes (used to be his specialty, didn't it?), and he looked very tentative during the entire first half, passing up maybe a half-dozen wide open looks at the basket. Toby did his usual Toby, over dribbling, forcing shots, and in general being very effective on the inside, and elevating nicely when he penetrated. And Toby even hit a nice long three before the half to give the Bruins a comfortable 10 point lead (33-23) at the half.

For this first 5 minutes of the game it didn't look like it would be much of a contest, and the Bruins led 7-0, then 9-0. Finally, NBC scored, and then scored again. Then they made two foul shots, and Ferch hit the first of his many three pointers (I swear it was from close to 27', a clear NBA three), and suddenly it's 9-9. UCLA hits two free throws and its 11-9. The lead continued to see-saw, but the Bruins never trailed again in the first half. One thing the Bruins can do is move the ball. And move it. And move it. A little more shooting, and a bit less passing might have made the margin of victory a littler bigger, and the Bruins looked like they kept passing up open looks at the basket to make the spectacular pass time and again. Not one pass, but two or three passes. Sometimes it worked; more often it didn't, and UCLA missed lots of opportunities to score down low.

And the Bruins are just damn lucky that NBC also missed so many shots in the paint. During the first half, they probably missed 20 easy lay-ups, even though they appeared to be controlling the boards both offensively and defensively; they had a number of fast breaks, but just couldn't finish. The big exceptions were Shann Ferch and Nico Harrison, who picked the Bruins several times and scored the easy transition hoops.

Travis Reed played credibly well, scoring easily inside, but he couldn't buy a free throw to save his life. He clanked four in a row with less than a minute to go, and had two opportunities to put the game out of reach, but did not come through. Travis, man, work on your free throw shots. . .Stop watching Shaq. . . In fact, get together with Shaq. That's the only thing the two of you need to practice.

Rico Hines had a good game, with several key assists, some nice lay-ups, and some good defense. Shaun Farnham didn't play, Billy Knight may have been out there, and other than one very nice lead pass to Toby for a slam after an Earl Watson steal, he seemed pretty much invisible. And interesting strategy: Lavin starts five guards with no J.R. So Baron starts out playing on the block with Rico Hines. Very interesting move. But he proved he can play inside, outside, anywhere.

Baron had a couple of nice, very impressive slam dunks, and he also proved that there are very few (any?) people who can actually defend him in the one-on-one situation. Whenever NBC Thunder went into a man-to-man defense when Baron was in at point (Thunder did a lot of zone D tonight), Lavin would signal for a "four-low" play. Basically a lay-up drill. The point stays up top, just above the key; the other offensive players all move to at or near the baseline, spread out "four-across". The point's job is to simply beat his man, and either drive for the lay-up, or be able to dish to an open man when the help defender is drawn to the point driving to the hole. The Bruins ran this four or five times for Baron, and each time he would drive to the hole, beating his man badly, and scoring, sometimes making it a three by drawing the foul.

It may just be that he's one of the best points in the country. Not the best. . .not yet, he's still too young, but then I can't think of many who are better and still playing college.

This game turned out to be a lot better than it promised to be. Good competition, a nice close game. Came down to the wire. And the Lakers also won. Big. A good night in LA for hoops.

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