This is going to be another sub-par pictures day-- partly due to poor positioning on my part, and partly due to the fact that there really weren't that many exciting plays (except that one where Josh Smith clothes-lined that one guy...which of course I missed). There's a lot of talk about $C getting a moral victory by avoiding the blowout, but I didn't see that. From my perspective, they were never in this game from the first possession, and everyone in the Sports Arena knew it. While I would have preferred us to turn that into the blowout it could have been, I honestly think the team didn't give a crap. This was a cruise-control win for them, and they knew it-- even Ben Howland wasn't as animated as he usually is on the sideline. The Wears bounced back from that abysmal Cal game, and that was great, but I could have used some more Josh Smith. I don't know, I guess I was envisioning a slam-dunk field day on SC's defense, but I'll take the W. Pictures!

From 20120216MBB vs. SUC

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I have read this column by Eamonn Brennan each week with the assumption that UCLA would break into his "Bottom 10" at some point. Well, the wait is over. Brennan must read BN because he darn near hits the nail right on the head with such quips as:

A 14-11 overall record in a bad Pac-12 might be enough to keep, say, Craig Robinson safe, but the folks in Westwood rightfully expect much more, and it's been no surprise to see fans vocally abandon their once-loved coach as this disaster of a season wears on.

For those who care to read more, enjoy this.

We play *$c tonight, so naturally I'm thinking about Eric Affholter.

If there is a number one all-time anti-U.C.L.A. villain for me, it's him. I've hated that guy since he carried on the legendary $c tradition of scoring touchdowns that weren't really touchdowns, most notably when he juggled a ball about 8 feet out of the end zone against the Bruins in 1987, yet was somehow awarded a touchdown to seal a 17-13 trogan win and rip the '88 Rose Bowl from us.

Well, maybe it was closer than 8 feet out of bounds, but not much. The trogies are lucky there were no red flags and coaches' challenges in those days. Especially considering he stepped out of bounds on the sideline on a touchdown run against us the very next season and stole the Rose Bowl from us again. Affholter?! Twice?! Pure hate!

Some might say it is irrational for me to hate someone I never met. I guess it's possible that Affholter is the greatest guy ever, but I doubt it. The similarity between his last name and a certain orifice at the end of the rectum is surely no coincidence. And I'm sure I'll get over it in another lifetime or two, so it's not like I'm completely obsessed. But not yet. That agony hasn't faded. Just a year ago, my friend Todd (who is both a Trojan alum and and attorney, but is still somehow a really good guy) gloated over how Affholter still caused me so much pain after 20+ years.

Okay. Maybe three lifetimes.

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Clearly as a private university, Stanford has a different fundraising profile than UCLA.

I received my master's from Stanford. I give them money. I used to give UCLA more, back when we did not need to register our discontent with Morgan Center.

As a donor to Stanford, I receive a quarterly periodical, highlighting major donations. I can't say that I have seen something like this in the past from UCLA, although there may have been something. But Stanford clearly does a much better job of trying to connect alums with what is going on at their alma mater.

The Stanford document highlights major gifts across the board- undergraduate education, graduate education, the arts, and athletics. They are all treated equally.

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DC Bruins blogged this morning about Southern Cal being one of the worst programs in D-1. The game tomorrow night should be a walk in the park. It is also a game that presents Ben Howland great opportunity to get his bench players real PT and get them ready for one last charge to the Big Dance (if there is one) in these closing weeks of 2011-12 season. Bruins should be stomping all over the Trojans tomorrow night and it should be another edition of UCLA taking care of business vs JustSC.

But that's the short term picture. The long term picture could become disconcerting for UCLA fans if the Trojans make moves to resuscitate the slim credibility of their hoops program after this season. The frustration is "mounting" among two dozen Trojan fans, who actually care about basketball. Okay, we are kidding here but on a serious note - Trojan honks are not happy at all about the current state of the hoops program. Even though at Southern Cal, everything is around football, it is a reasonable bet that their athletic director Pay Haden will make a move, if they think that the atrocious performance of their hoops teams is hurting the Trojan athletic brand.

So what if Haden decides to make a move after this season? That could potentially spell serious trouble for long term interest of the UCLA basketball program, which currently is leaderless and mired "in the abyss of irrelevance".

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1. Reality

Any talk of making the NCAA tournament last week as an at-large was nuts. Let's manage expectations people. An RPI in the 80s with 0 quality wins is not going to happen. If we somehow beat a Cal their RPI would have plummeted below 50 anyway. The reality is the PAC 12 will be lucky to have 2 teams at this point much less our having had any chance of an at-large. 16-2 or 17-1 in conference was our only shot and those dreams died somewhere in Oregon.

2. Composure:

This team is more frustrating than our crappy team 2 seasons ago. We were just bad then. This team is less than the sum of its parts. How else can you explain our record and our kenpom of 46? My eyes tell me the reason for this is we lack composure.

We look great at times almost like a tournament team. But when we get punched in the mouth or we faceadversity we melt down like chernobyl. I really think it's part system and part players. Howland's systemsdemands a guards that are NBA caliber. Our success came having guards like Farmar, Afflalo, Collison, and Westbrook.

Although I believe we have enough talent in Jones, Anderson, Lamb, and Powell to be more competitve the Howland system places too much pressure on them to make plays. Jones and Anderson simply lack the composure necessary to win games. They have played well when we are rolling as a team, but they lose it on the road and when we face adversity. Jones is a hot head and resorts to 1-on-1. Sure Anderson can make a shot down 10 to cut it to 7 with 3 minutes to play then get overamped like he did something special, but the reality is he is mediocre at best. He is the poster child for this last era of Howland basketball. They are seniors that don't lead.

I think this creeps over to the rest of the team. We complain on every foul call. Bad call or not one should reserve complaining to the head coach (who incidentally never does.. had he ever been T'd up?) Only on rare occasions should our players be glaring at refs. That is a loss of focus and mentally allows you to make excuses. It also leads to a team that can't win on the road.

Josh Smith not only needs to lose weight, but gain composure. Honestly I think with composure he would be great tomorrow more than the weight. Howland has brought up his going too fast which I agree with it. He also lets hard fouls on him go to his head. Some people play better mad, but Smith is not one of them. Smith always need to maintain his composure. He needs to not get mad, but also to not be so nice. Get that spot in the lane son without feeling sorry for that 220 lb boy guarding you. And get 4 players on the court that know how and when to deliver that ball to you.

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The fanshot at SBNation's Falcoholic framed Mora's comments this way:

Jimmy L. Mora Jr. Talking Up His Legendary Falcons Career
The third greatest coach the Falcons have had over the past decade is using his good year in Atlanta to recruit at UCLA, of course doing so in a respectful and artful and not at all crude fashion.

Ouch. Mike Florio of NBC's Pro Football Talk blog (perhaps the most influential NFL blog) read in that industry made the following observation:

It's the latest example of Mora's ability to be blunt and brutally honest. In fact, if he didn't possess that blessing/curse, he'd possibly still be coaching the Falcons. After all, it was a shockingly candid radio interview regarding his desire to return to the Seattle area - and his willingness to dump the Falcons if an opportunity arose at the University of Washington - that contributed to his dismissal.

The comments in reaction to Florio's posts are not pretty. I will share three after the jump:

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I've spent this past season lamenting, like many, that the cold, hard truth that was staring us in the face regarding Coach Howland. I held on to the past, and hoped against hope that he'd bend, that the team would suddenly take a major step and that we'd have the building blocks for another run over the next few years. Except, as I was sitting in the Sports Arena on Saturday it was someone who was never going to play that made me realize what so many have already figured out. Let me explain...

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Not sure how I stumbled upon these...I think it was from a picture in wikipedia. Regardless, these are from an amazing photo archive at the LA Public Library. Its main search page is here:

Royce Hall on the first day (week?) of classes. The building was ready. The grounds? Not so much.

I ended up searching for pictures of campus and Westwood from prior to 1940. Here are some of my favorites. Frustratingly, I opened a new window to write this so I could easily bounce back and forth from this to the window where I had 20+ tabs open of pictures and descriptions...and their system kicked me out of most of the windows back to the main search screen, so I can't copy their descriptions as I had planned. Anyway, here's at least some of the good stuff I found.

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That game was ugly, so I don't even really want to recap it. I'll limit it to this-- the shots weren't dropping, and we weren't adjusting. I was even conflicted about posting pictures, but I decided that you could always not look, so if nobody wants to remember this game, I won't be offended. Turns out that today was the day of Josh shots. *shrug*

From 20120211MBB vs. Cal

More after the jump.

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