Q&A: Washington coach Lorenzo Romar talks ahead of game against UCLA

SEATTLE — Washington coach Lorenzo Romar is the Pac-12’s longest-tenured coach, and hasn’t lost to UCLA in Seattle since 2004. It wasn’t long ago that Romar was on the UCLA sideline as a part of the Bruins’ last championship team (1995). He was an assistant in Westwood from 1992 to 1996 under Jim Harrick. Romar is also a Los Angeles native, born and raised in Compton, and attended Cerritos Community College before transferring to Washington.

Romar sat down with the Daily Bruin’s Sam Strong on Friday in advance of Saturday’s game against UCLA (11 a.m. on CBS).

 

Daily Bruin: Being that you spent four years on the UCLA bench, does this game take on any special significance for you?

Lorenzo Romar: Not as much anymore. When I played here at Washington, the first time I played at UCLA, I couldn’t wait. I marked that game on my calendar, being from Los Angeles and watching them all those years, I was fired up. I told my buddies, if you were going to miss a game, don’t miss that one. Coming back as an assistant at UCLA coming here it was special because this is where I went to school. Then, maybe the first three or four times going back there as a head coach I would get pretty excited, but I’ve done this for so long now it doesn’t really mean anything different. I’ve been here for 11 years.

 

DB: It seems like this game always has something on the line. Either one or both of the teams is usually in the conference title hunt. Your team is in a three-way tie for sixth place. Does this one seem less significant because you’re not in a position to win the league?

LR: Not really. I remember when they came up here in 2008 with Kevin Love. They were very highly ranked, we weren’t and the game went our way.

 

DB: Ben Howland has not won here since his first season as coach. Is that something you take pride in as a coach, to have not lost a game to the Bruins here since 2004?

LR: I don’t know about that. Streaks are a funny thing. They end. UCLA had not won in Pullman in 19 years until the other night. I don’t get into the business of saying, “We own UCLA.” No. That’s not how it is. Anyone can beat anyone in this league.

 

DB: Funny you say that because UCLA was in a position to control its own destiny before the loss on Wednesday. Then it came down to depending on Oregon to lose, which it did. Is that kind of the way the league is going this year? Just a lot of parity?

LR: It really is. People keep telling me we should try to get this seed or that seed to play such and such a team in the tournament. I don’t know if it really matters and I’m not saying that because I think we’re unbeatable or anything like that. Next week in Las Vegas should be very interesting.

 

DB: So you haven’t talked to your team about trying to play the role of spoiler or what it could mean to knock UCLA out of the conference title picture?

LR: No. Our biggest emphasis is to continue to see improvement among our team and we’ll take whatever the result is of that. Hopefully it’s continued success. If that means a win tomorrow, we’ll take it.

 

DB: Your team always seems to play well on Senior Day and I know you inherited the tradition from Jim Harrick to start all your seniors. Would you prefer to play a game like this on Senior Day? Does it motivate your team more?

LR: It’s a special day, that’s for sure. These guys don’t realize how special it is to be playing their last home game here until they’ve been gone for a couple of years and they’ll look back and say, “That was alright.” We hope we play well but the opponent is really irrelevant.