Online Extra: Houston’s McCallum faces power of Bruins yet again

By Dylan Hernandez
Daily Bruin Senior Staff

MAUI, HI. “”mdash; Ray McCallum had been here before ““
halftime, still in contention against UCLA.

As his players’ sneakers squeaked on the Lahaina Civic
Center gym’s court during their mid-game shootaround,
McCallum stood on the sideline and clung to his clipboard, intently
staring at whatever he had inscribed.

This time he was down, yes, but not by much. It wasn’t
much different than last time.

McCallum was in a similar predicament two years ago when he was
Ball State’s head coach, facing the Bruins in the first round
of the NCAA Tournament in Minneapolis, Minn. There, his 11th-seeded
Cardinals led the fourth-seeded Bruins, 26-22 at half.

Staring at his clipboard Monday night in Maui, McCallum surely
remembered what Lavin’s team did to him in Minneapolis: they
came out with a 15-0 run and blew his team away. Jason Kapono
scored all of his 17 points in the second half, hitting four
three-pointers in the process, and leading UCLA to a 65-57 win.

McCallum may have known what was coming Monday night, but his
clipboard, and all that was written on it, couldn’t stop it.
UCLA, like last time, erupted early in the second half, and put
McCallum’s team in a position it would never recover
from.

“It was the same thing,” McCallum said. “It
was what we were concerned about.

“Kapono is one of the best shooters in the country, and we
tried to keep tabs on him,” he added.

And again, the three-pointer, which Kapono used to slay McCallum
two years ago, was a key weapon. Only this time, Kapono
wasn’t the only one shooting it. While Kapono nailed four
threes, Dijon Thompson hit two and Cedric Bozeman and T.J. Cummings
had one each.

The Bruins, too, had a good memory of the war they waged with
McCallum in Minneapolis and paid the coach their proper respects
before the game.

“Houston is a reflection of their coach,” Lavin said
in the pre-tournament press conference Sunday. “They’re
tough, just like their coach, and they play great
defense.”

After the game, it was clear that Lavin was thinking more about
McCallum than he was of Houston’s players, when he mistakenly
referred to his opponents as “Ball State.”

“Ah,” Lavin said, “same thing.”