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Tuesday, April 1, 1997

COMMENTARY:

Forget Magic Mountain, UCLA basketball offers thrillsMark Shapiro

I've always been afraid of roller coasters.

Monstrous gradients, screaming wheels, bits of metal held together by a few laws of physics.

Even the names are scary: Revolution, The Edge, Batman the Ride.

But if you want thrills, chills and more excitement than can be handled, the name of the ride is the UCLA men's basketball team. Jump onto this blood-chilling, fast-breaking team and hold on for the action-packed, edge-of-your-seat, tantalizingly glorious season that they put together this year.

* * *

There's always that feeling of trepidation before you strap yourself into your seat. That hot drop of fear that leaves you questioning your sanity and faith in the empirical laws of the universe as you gaze upon the rickety structure.

If you had told me in November that this Bruin bunch that was about to be unveiled was safe, I'd have called the police. Even before this ride got rolling, it was condemned to the scrap heap.

A team of underachieving big mouths that no one put much stock in had just been defiled by a head coach whose nose was undergoing a growth spurt. While physics holds a ride together, a coach holds a team together. Without this glue on the brink of the season, the parts and players that would make up this team were in shambles.

Into the breach steps an assistant who gets more press about his sweat and hair gel than anything else.

Oh well, at least this ride will be well-oiled.

* * *

You always know that once the ride begins, you cannot get off. We all had paid for our tickets and we were all ready to scream, shout and get painted. No retreat and no surrender. If you give in to the Grizzly at Great America, you'll end up puking your guts out.

Baby steps are always scary. There isn't much steam and the cars lurch around the likes of Tulsa and Kansas. Always edging forward, inexorably creeping up to speed.

Does a roller coaster ever go backwards or quit in the middle? If it does, you're dead. Did this team? If it did, UCLA basketball, for who knows how long, would be dead. A failed interim coach, no leaders and no recruits.

It was a one-shot deal for the Lavin Express. If it broke down or didn't overcome an obstacle, it was over.

* * *

The scariest part of a ride, for me at least, is the big drop in the middle, when the bottom falls out and your bladder ends up in your ear. When this team's feet came out from under it in Stanford Part I, I was afraid. Afraid for the tournament, afraid for boring games, afraid of the coming ascent.

Would the team tackle it and charge forward into the meaty part of the ride, where Wildcats, Blue Devils and Trojans play? Or would we sit among the middling masses, the once mighty UCLA basketball program hanging out with the Pirates of the Caribbean of the NCAA?

When you uncover your eyes after the big drop, you can see the excitement up ahead. The home games against Arizona, Stanford, the again-mighty USC and the boot that Dick Vitale licks, Duke University.

Our team whipped through the heart of this season, upside down, inside out, high-flying, death-defying, fast-breaking and careening towards the Pac-10 title and the postseason. Always riding the knife-edge of disaster as wheels ground against metal or a clock ran down, but always recovering in time with a last-second compensation.

It's during this part of the ride that fear is overcome and sheer enjoyment takes its place. The camp-outs, the stunning volume of a packed house, the roars of our enthused minions drowning out the squeaks, bellows, and protestations of the machine that is carrying us forward.

I've always loved that part of a ride, especially if it's something I haven't seen before. This was college basketball at a level I had never experienced, even when our ride was the best the country had to offer back in 1995. Ours was a machine that gelled as it moved, propelling the hopes and voices of an entire university forward.

* * *

Every ride has a big finish, one that everyone comes out for. For our UCLA basketball ride, it was the NCAA tournament. All the joy, all the fear, all the pride. It spills out faster than overflowing beer foam. The riders hanging on for dear life as the big finish came to a head. Just when it looks like this thrill ride gets the better of our Bruin chariots, put another Dollar in the machine and it keeps going.

A roller coaster brings out the barbaric yawp in every one of its passengers at some point. The UCLA roller coaster did the same thing as 12 friends leapt up and down as we saw the value of a Dollar, and with only 1.9 seconds left.

There is one thing about these rides that I will never like. The end. The end is always the worst because it invariably comes too soon. It was the lowly Gopher gnawing at our battered but excited ride's works that finally brought it down. But down gracefully, with maximum effort applied to stay afloat.

As the framework collapsed amid tears and sweat, the sturdy patrons of the ride have all gotten their money's worth. I've had my share of pulse-pounding finishes and enthralling play.

I'm proud to say that I was a part of this ride. I'm proud to say I'm a Bruin.

Do not despair this premature terminus, fellow thrill-seekers, because in the next annum, this ride goes around again for another jaunt. A few new pieces, sure, but the same idea: to give UCLA the ride of its life.

Step right up, Bruin faithful, and get your tickets now.

Shapiro is a Daily Bruin sports columnist and the men's tennis beat writer. E-mail responses to mshapiro@

media.ucla.edu.