The power of the press
By Daily Bruin Staff
March 14, 2001 9:00 p.m.
 DAVE HILL/Daily Bruin Senior Staff Junior center
Dan Gadzuric is an integral part of the Bruins’
full court press, which is the backbone of the UCLA defense.
By Chris Umpierre
Daily Bruin Staff
Their season was going down the drain faster than you could say
NIT.
They were 4-3 with losses to Cal State Northridge and Georgia
Tech. Another defeat was just twenty minutes away, and this time
North Carolina was on pace to hand the UCLA men’s basketball
team its worst loss in Pauley Pavilion history.
With the squad struggling to keep its head above water, Bruin
Head Coach Steve Lavin threw the team a life preserver in the form
of a full-court press. Down 16 points at halftime against North
Carolina on Dec. 23 Lavin installed the trapping defense.
Poof: A number of turnovers and a memorable comeback versus the
Tar Heels.
Voila: A six-game winning streak and a season resurrected.
The full court press gave the Bruins an identity, hope and much
more importantly, wins. UCLA ended up winning 17 of their last 21
games, largely because of the defense that coaxed opponents into an
average of 18 turnovers a game. They now sit pretty as a No. 4 seed
in the NCAA Tournament.
“I wouldn’t have predicted the press was going to be
such an effective weapon coming into this season,” Lavin
said.
UCLA senior guard Jason Flowers remembers that season-changing
moment at halftime of the Carolina game.
“It was a situation where we were playing conservative, we
were back on our heels,” said Flowers, whose team was down
46-30 at intermission. “So Coach is like “˜We’re
going to go on the attack. We’re going to let loose, we have
to do something to get back into this game. We’re going to
play all out.'”
Play all out they did. Running a 1-2-1-1 press with forward Matt
Barnes as the catalyst, UCLA began to dictate the game.
They increased the tempo and forced Carolina into a number of
mistakes.
Utterly perplexed by the press at one point, Tar Heel forward
Jason Capel mistakenly threw the ball to his coach Matt Doherty on
the sideline. North Carolina ended up with 22 turnovers, 11 in the
second half.
UCLA would go on to erase the Tar Heels’ 16 point lead,
and led by two late in the game before eventually falling to North
Carolina 80-70.
Behind a suffocating full court press, UCLA ran off six straight
wins after the loss to UNC. Two of those were over USC, which
coughed up 28 turnovers in the rivals’ first meeting, and
Villanova, which had 26 turnovers.
“The turnovers were absolutely horrendous,” said
Villanova coach Steve Lappas, whose team was trounced 93-65 by UCLA
on Jan. 13. “To have that many turnovers, you don’t
give yourself a chance to win. That’s the big story in the
game.”
“(The press) was what we practiced for three days, but we
have guys running (the UCLA press) in practice who don’t run
it like they run it. Their pressure has helped them to get up a
notch lately. We just didn’t respond at any point.”
A lot of times it isn’t about the number of turnovers the
press creates but the overall fatigue it creates for opponents, who
must struggle just to get the ball over half-court the entire
game.
“If we get turnovers that’s great but sometimes
there’s a cumulative effect over the whole game that wears
teams out,” Lavin said.
Washington State point guard Marcus Moore learned about that
“cumulative effect” after he had to single-handedly
beat UCLA’s press all game long on March 8.
“We just got tired,” said Moore, whose team had 18
turnovers in their 86-76 loss to the Bruins. “I
couldn’t get off the floor to get a rebound at the end. They
really wore us down.”
The press is expected to come in handy during tournament play
because teams which normally don’t face a full court press
during the season will have just a couple of days to prepare for
it. Last season, a pressing Florida team was able to upset Duke
largely because the Blue Devils had not faced a press all year.
In addition to forcing turnovers that lead to easy baskets and
wearing down opponents, the press puts the Bruins on their toes
defensively. Instead of being passive defenders, the press forces
the team, a poor half-court defensive team, to guard
aggressively.
The press hasn’t been as effective in the team’s
last seven games. Not coincidentally, UCLA dropped two of those
games and nearly lost to California and Oregon State.
“There are things within the press that we’ve got to
clean up,” Lavin said. “The biggest thing being is not
to lounge and reach. We need to let our position defensively work
for us. We shouldn’t try to gamble and go for steals on the
ball.”
“A lot of times when the press is most effective
it’s position that gets steals,” he added.
“It’s not on-the-ball steals but it’s
off-the-ball steals. It’s like defensive backs when they sit
in passing lanes and pick balls off.”
Nevertheless, Hofstra Head Coach Jay Wright knows the Bruin
press will be a big challenge for his team.
“What amazes me with their press is when they force
turnovers, the next play is such a great offensive play,” he
said. “They’ll get a steal, make a great pass and make
an alley-oop dunk. It’s not just what they do to create
turnovers, but how they finish after the turnovers.”
