M. basketball: Bruins fall to Troy, losing 76-69

The lack of passion. The turnovers. The sound of “Conquest” blaring from the rafters of Pauley Pavilion.

And the losing.

It’s all getting old for UCLA.

Never mind that the Bruins nearly completed a comeback from 22 points down. Their ultimate 76-69 loss to crosstown rival USC on Wednesday marked a bad turning point in their season.

UCLA has now lost four games in a row after starting off 5-0 in the Pac-10. The Bruins concluded the first half of the conference schedule on a sour note and will now have to suck it up in order to earn a bid to the NCAA tournament.

This wasn’t the way the rivalry game was supposed to go for the Bruins, whose biggest victory was just coming back to make the game close. USC has now won the last three contests, including the last two at Pauley.

“I’m tired of it,” UCLA coach Ben Howland said. “I can’t stand to lose. We’ve got to break out of this slump.

“It’s a disappointing effort. We didn’t play with the passion and aggressiveness we showed in the second half.”

Though it didn’t seem quite right, UCLA never led in the contest, getting within three points before USC guard Desmon Farmer made two free throws with 17.2 seconds left to seal the win.

UCLA guard Brian Morrison didn’t necessarily agree with Howland that the team wasn’t ready to go.

“Coming into the game, I was really excited to play,” said Morrison, who returned to action after missing nine games due to a strained left hamstring. “We got up for this game. We were talking a little bit in the locker room before the game.”

But that didn’t carry onto the court.

UCLA looked lost in the first half when USC used its trap and zone defense to cause most of the 18 Bruin turnovers on the night.

It didn’t help that UCLA couldn’t score when it got the ball past halfcourt, shooting 33.3 percent in the half, including 1-for-9 from 3-point range.

The only Bruin starter who scored before halftime was new starting center Ryan Hollins, who poured in 13 of his career-high 21 points in the half and also finished with a game-high eight rebounds.

Still, USC led 44-24 at the break and by as many as 22 points after making the first field goal of the second half.

“We were tentative, and we really didn’t play mad until we were getting embarrassed,” Howland said.

Then Pauley rumbled as USC began to crumble.

The Bruins gave the Trojans some of their own medicine, slapping on their own version of the zone for the first time all season.

The Bruins did so because they couldn’t keep up with freelancing guards Farmer and Errick Craven, who scored 28 and 18 points, respectively.

The Bruins then went on runs of 12-3 and 11-2 as guard Dijon Thompson scored eight-straight points.

After a Cedric Bozeman free throw cut the Trojan lead to three, Craven blew the front end of a 1-and-1 with 27.4 seconds remaining. But on the ensuing possession, UCLA guard Janou Rubin drove the lane and traveled.

Were it not for the dispassionate first half, Rubin’s blunder wouldn’t have mattered.

“Our defense is our Achilles heel,” Howland said. “We have to defend and rebound.”

Rebound being the key word here, as the Bruins lost the battle on the boards 35-34, giving up two key offensive rebounds in one of the Trojans’ final possessions.

If the Bruins don’t rebound now, they won’t be going anywhere.

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