UCLA Wins, Illinois Loses

Illinois 64; Michigan 74

The Illini gave it a good effort, but they appeared to wear down a little bit in the end, failing to execute their offense, failing to keep Michigan from executing theirs. The overtime victory at Purdue may have taken a little too much out of them. But they got a split in their first two conference teams, both on the road against teams that will end up the Big Ten's top half. That's a tough row to hoe, but the road victory at Mackey gives them a nice leg up early.

Michigan is clearly much improved, but I thought the Illini attacked their 1-3-1 pretty well. Much better than UCLA did when they played Michigan earlier in the season. The problem came on the defensive end. Give Michigan credit for creating a lot of confusion on the Illini defensive end. That led to a lot of open looks, and Michigan knocked them down, connecting on over 40% of their three pointers. That's Beilein's offense. Michigan will win when they shoot 40% or better from three. They'll lose when they shoot 30% or worse. And they will have nights like that.

Calvin Brock was the Illini's best player, in my opinion. He's very active. He's their most athletic player. And if he shoots the ball like he did today, he can be real impact player. Tisdale and Davis were solid offensively, but Tisdale really needs to learn to defend. Despite being a perimeter oriented team, Michigan got too many easy baskets when they took the ball to the rim.

Four of their next six games are against ranked opponents, including a rematch with Michigan at the Assembly Hall in 10 days. The good news is that four of those six games are at home.

UCLA 83; Oregon 74

This one was closer than it should have been, but Oregon was fired up after a terrible performance against U$C on Friday. The crowd really gave Oregon a lift, and decent shooting kept the Bruins from pulling away and making it easy. The Bruins led the game wire to wire, but it was never comfortable.

The Bruins built their lead on impressive shooting, going 8-10 from long range in the first half. They finished a blazing 13-22, thanks mostly to Josh Shipp's unconcious 5-6. In fact, the only Bruin who shot less than 50% from the arc was Michael Roll, one of the nation's best long range gunners (he was 1-3). Nikola Dragovic took advantage of open looks to make four deep balls, and scored a career high 12 points. Darren Collison led the Bruins with 22, but did most of his damage from inside the arc and from the free throw line, where he was 9-9. He's shooting better than 97% from the line, and has made something like 40 in a row. But it was really Shipp who made the difference. He made four threes in the second half, all with under 15 to play. Two followed Oregon baskets, squelching their momentum. They all came with the game within six or fewer points. He was clutch tonight. He raised his three point percentage from 21.6% to just over 30%. If he's regained his touch, then this becomes an outstanding long range team, and that means fewer zone defenses, or more open shots.

The Bruins defense was not up to its usual standards. Part of that was due to the way the game was officiated. In the first half, the game was called very tight on the Bruins defensive end, and that may have contributed to some tentative play in the second half. The Ducks got too many good looks, and had too many easy baskets in the lane.

Still, the only player who really disappointed tonight for the Bruins was Jrue Holliday. Turnover numbers aren't on ESPN's box score yet, but he seemed to struggle for much of the game, and showed occasionaly happy feet that led to traveling calls.

We'll see what the future holds for Oregon, but something tells me they're closer to the team that played Friday than the team that played tonight. But UCLA has won the conference three straight years, and they can expect this kind of shot when they go on the road. The bottom line is that there are 16 Pac 10 games left, and more than half will be at Pauley Pavilion. For the 2-0 Bruins, that's a nice position to be in.

UCLA - 80; Oregon - 75

Niiiiiiiiikolllaaaaaaaa!!

Well, we learned this. Oregon students are stupid. They pissed off someone with the ability to really do them in. Kevin Love went for 24 point and 18 rebounds while the piece of shit Oregon fans gave him nothing but vulgarities, apparently oblivious to the fact that their coach doesn't know how to recruit without Phil Knight. Darren Collison added a career high 22 points, along with six assists against one turnover. Russell Westbrook added 15 of his own along with seven rebounds, and a block of center Maarty Leunen.

Yet the biggest plays of the night came from unheralded Nikola Dragovic, a shooter who hasn't found his shot, and hasn't been able to play strong enough defense to crack Ben Howland's regular rotation. In the game only because of injuries to LRMAM and Lo Mata-Real, and foul trouble from James Keefe and Alfred Aboya, Dragovic hit a pick and pop three pointer with 3:21 to go and the Bruins trailing by four. To the casual observer, it looked like an important shot at an important time. But to the discriminating Bruins fan, it was a huge three from a guy who so far really only has one skill, and even that has been debatable. It was the type of shot that make you cringe, because you know it's a huge momentum swing if he makes it, and possibly a back breaker if he misses it. But it rattled home, and as things turned out, it was a back breaker. Oregon, coming off two Leunen free throws, wouldn't score again until the game was all but over. Part of the reason was a big Dragovic rebound just a minute after his three pointer.

Kevin Love survived the classless and oh so clever (Love's a pussy? Really?) Oregon fans, and basically made the Oregon front line his collective bitch, equaling the offensive output of Leunen and Joevan Catron, while dominating both on the glass (18 rebounds against 11 combined), and was never in foul trouble. Booed every time he touched the ball, he sent the home crowd home very disappointed. Oh, and he did that without Mata-Real, and without LRMAM, two stalwarts in the UCLA frontcourt. He was awesome, and in what may be his only game ever at Mac Court, he earned this win.

Russell Westbrook brought himself back to down to the right level. After trying to make the highlight reel on every possession against U$C, he settled down tonight, made big shots when the Bruins needed him to, and took the ball to the hole on the basket that gave UCLA the lead for good.

And I'd be remiss if I didn't mention Josh Shipp. The numbers are uninspiring: 2-8 from the field, three rebounds, seven points (along with six assists). But honestly, I'm a little surprised he took eight shots. Sometimes you're not on your game, or your opponent is focused on taking you out of the game. And in those situations, the best thing you can do is keep yourself from forcing things. That's not easy to do when you're often the team's offensive focal point. But Shipp let the game come to him. He didn't try to make himself the story. When a leader like Shipp isn't a factor, and UCLA wins a close game, you know they didn't do it in spite of him. You know he let his teammates do what they needed to do to win.

Quite a show of resiliency tonight, especially after Oregon had started to separate a bit, taking a seven point lead with under eleven minutes to play. All in all a great win for the Bruins, and with awful OSU on tap for the weekend, the Bruins are looking for a second consecutive road sweep, the home loss to the women of troy being their only conference blemish.

Oregon 57; UCLA 69

Well, that was a little more like it. The big difference between this game and the Stanford game was the Bruins came out with a sense of urgency at the beginning of the second half. On Sunday, the Cardinal went in down by 12, but came out and controlled the game from the beginning of the second half, and the Bruins could never stop the bleeding. Tonight, UCLA came out and scored the first nine points of the second half, opening up an 18 point lead that they would never relinquish. Oregon got as close as nine points following a UCLA turnover and a Josh Shipp botched dunk, but the Bruins responded by scoring eight of the next ten points, and never looked back.

Four UCLA starters finished in double figures, as they utilized a balanced attack against a small opponent. Aaron Afflalo led the way with 17, while Collison added 12, Shipp 11. But the player of the game for the Bruins was probably LRMAM, who had his best game in a while, with 15 points and 12 rebounds. He also played excellent defense. Marty Leunen had 18 points in the game at Euguene. The Bruins defense cut that in half tonight, and Malik Hairston, missing from the first tilt, was vitually a non-factor with eight points and three rebounds.

Both teams run the floor so well defensively that transition wasn't really a big factor. On top of that, UCLA had a large enough second half lead that when the opportunity to run presented itself, UCLA often wisely pulled the ball back out. For a game that featured a lot of half court sets, the Bruins shot a blazing 57%, holding Oregon to only 37%. That was the difference.

So for the moment, the Bruins are all alone at the top of the conference, a place they'll likely be going into next Wednesday's game against U$C. They currently sit one game ahead of $C, Oregon, and Washington State, who delivered another blow to the mildcats tonight in Tucson. I think the Cats will rebound on Saturday against Washington, mostly because Washington isn't that good, but lose that one, and U of A could drop below .500 in the Pac 10.

*Note: stats are based on preliminary box score, which is probably inaccurate, and subject to change.