Pac-10 misses chance at respect

Tanith L. Balaban Arizona Daily Wildcat UCLA guard Toby Bailey guards Miles Simon last weekend at UCLA. Both USC and UCLA, who beat the UA, lost this weekend against top 10 teams Louisville and Cincinnati.

The Pacific 10 Conference is always fighting for it. Which makes the events of the past weekend all the more discouraging.

Here are the notes from basketball teams around the Pacific 10 Conference:

UCLA (11-5 overall, 6-1 in Pac-10) could not hold off a late spurt by No. 6 Louisville, losing 74-71 at Freedom Hall in Kentucky on Saturday. USC (9-7, 4-3) used a late charge to threaten No. 9 Cincinnati, but succumbed to the Bearcats, by a score of 100-81.

"The loss stings, but we did a lot of good things out there," UCLA assistant coach Steve Spencer said. "We competed in a tough environment, but could not pull the game out towards the end."

The Bruins led 35-32 at halftime but could not stop the hot shooting of B.J. Flynn and DeJuan Wheat. The two Cardinal guards combined for 33 points on 8-17 shooting from beyond the three-point line.

The loss snapped a four-game win streak for the Bruins who had also won 10 of the last 12.

"The team has really responded for us this season," Spencer said. "After we lost a couple early, a lot of people got down on us. In UCLA, you are supposed to win all the games, even against the Arizona's, Louisville's and Stanford's. These guys know how tough a spot they are in when they play here, but they still keep fighting."

USC was flustered early by the Cincinnati press, committing 13 first half turnovers and trailing, 50-24 at the half.

"It was not a good day," USC coach Henry Bibby said after Saturday's game. "We got beat in every category. We didn't come ready to play against the best team in the country, so we got beat."

While the Trojans used strong rebounding by Jaha Wilson to cut the Bearcats' lead in the second half, the team was still outmatched and gave little resistance.

"My concern at halftime was that we would come out and stand around in the second half, and that's what we did," Cincinnati coach Bob Huggins said, following the game. "The sour thing about the win was that we gave up 57 points in the second half. I think everyone wanted to go and watch the Super Bowl."

With teams winning only 10 times in 36 tries, playing on the road in the Pac-10 is becoming a demoralizing experience. In fact, the conference's top five teams have only lost two times in 17 conference games.

"I think that the Pac-10 is becoming a stronger conference because every team got a little better this season," Spencer said. "Road wins are going to be very hard to get."

An example of this home-court advantage can be seen by comparing the games played between the three top conference teams: UCLA, Stanford and Arizona.

The Wildcats defeated Stanford at home (76-75) and the Cardinal dissected UCLA in Stanford (109-61), yet Arizona fell to the Bruins 84-78 in Pauley Pavilion.

California guard Ed Gray, who had his third straight 30-point performance last week against Washington State, was named Pacific-10 Conference Player of the Week.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.