UCLA grinds out sloppy victory over Pittsburgh

	#2 UCLA #3 Pittsburgh 64 55   Box Score Recap All Scores
	SI Writers at the Tournament WAHL: What we learned from Thursday's games TAYLOR: Kansas too athletic for Southern Illinois WINN: Tournament's two 'clutchiest' players fade MORRILL: Memphis keeps proving skeptics wrong TAYLOR: UCLA grinds out victory over Pittsburgh DAVIS: Reaction to Thursday's regional semifinals GALLERY: Highlights from all the Sweet 16 games March Madness Archive | Tourney Homepage

By Phil Taylor, SI.com

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- "The grind-it-out regional" is the way that Kansas coach Bill Self described the West region after his team did just that in beating Southern Illinois on Thursday night. Then, UCLA and Pittsburgh went out and reinforced his point. After the Jayhawks' ragged 61-58 win, the Bruins earned a spot in the Elite Eight with a rather unsightly 64-55 victory.

Though the Bruins won, don't expect this game to make up a big part of their season highlight film. Granted, UCLA and Pittsburgh both exhibit tremendous pride on defense, but there was more than tenacious D at work here. For long stretches, both teams looked as if they'd forgotten the object of the game was to put the ball in the basket. During one sequence of 12 possessions in the second half, the Bruins and Panthers combined for exactly one point.

That dry spell included a missed layup by Pittsburgh 7-footer Aaron Gray, who for some reason decided not to dunk the ball. But Gray wasn't the only player to suddenly develop an inexplicably bad shooting touch. The usually reliable Arron Afflalo, the Bruins' leading scorer, pulled up for a 12-foot jumper and somehow shot an airball, and if there was a tournament record for most shots missed inside five feet, Pittsburgh and UCLA might have broken it. But in the end, UCLA managed to find some semblance of an offensive game, a huge part of which was getting to the free throw line, where the Bruins made 23 of 26, compared to Pitt's 7 of 12. UCLA built a 54-42 lead with under four minutes to go, and the lead might as well have been twice as big, because there was no way the Panthers were going to generate enough offense to erase it. In fairness to UCLA, the Bruins have made a habit of winning this way. Their games are rarely pretty to watch, but they could care less. In the grind-it-out regional, nobody grinds better than the Bruins.

Player Who Impressed Me

Do we have to pick someone? If so, we'll take UCLA center Lorenzo Mata, who was a defensive force in the middle and energetic on the boards, grabbing eight rebounds in addition to keeping several other balls alive with his hustle. The 6-foot-9 Mata's presence was partly to blame for several of Pitt's point-blank misses, and he was a big reason that Pittsburgh center , that focal point of the Panthers' offense, finished with only 10 points and five rebounds. Afflalo scored 17 points and teammate Josh Shipp had 16; but this was a night for defense and Mata played it as well as anyone.

Courtside Confidential

UCLA coach Ben Howland and Pitt coach Jamie Dixon, whose close friendship had been much discussed in the days leading up to the game, seemed intent on not showing any signs of their relationship on the floor. Their handshake after the game was quicker than an eye blink. ... Five Pittsburgh fans wore T-shirts with lettering that spelled out L-E-V-O-N for Pittsburgh forward Levon Kendall. They were slumped in their seats late in the second half, which was understandable. Kendall missed all four of his shots and didn't score a point. ... After the game, some of the UCLA players who were doing TV interviews interrupted them to watch the final moments of the Ohio State-Tennessee game on the courtside monitors.

Big Picture

In Kansas, the Bruins will face a team with much more firepower than Pittsburgh. They'll have to keep the athletic Jayhawks from getting their fast break in high gear and they'll have to cut off the slashing drives of Kansas' speedy perimeter players. The good news for UCLA is that those are the kinds of things the Bruins have been doing all year. Still, UCLA has looked offensively challenged for much of the tournament, and the Bruins haven't faced a team as equipped to take advantage of that as Kansas is. We picked the Bruins early in the tournament to get to the Final Four and we won't switch now, but after watching UCLA struggle to score, we don't feel as certain about it as we once did.