Arizona Likes Where It Is Now

Yes, the Pacific 10 tournament is back.

So is Arizona.

Lute Olson never liked the tournament, but he has always owned it.

Before this one began, he called it “asinine” for the conference’s teams to beat up on each other any more.

Now if USC doesn’t end Arizona’s run in the title game today, the Pac-10 will have to call Olson champion.

The Wildcats advanced to the final with a 90-78 victory over California on Friday night at Staples Center, completing a three-game season sweep of the Bears--though somewhat less convincingly than last week’s 46-point victory in Tucson.

It can be a delicate thing to be philosophically opposed to something and still excel at it--just ask Stanford--but Olson has mastered it.

His record in Pac-10 tournaments is 11-1, and Arizona (21-9) has won three of the previous four, in 1988, ’89 and ‘90--losing only in a 1987 quarterfinal game to Oregon.

Standing in Arizona’s way today is a Trojan team the Wildcats split with this season, winning, 97-80, in Tucson, and losing, 94-89, in Los Angeles.

The winner will earn the conference’s automatic NCAA bid. (A record six Pac-10 teams are expected to make the NCAA field: Arizona, USC, Oregon, Cal, UCLA and Stanford.)

“As everyone knows, USC is playing great basketball,” forward Luke Walton said after a 20-point, six-assist performance that helped hold off a Cal rally at the end.

Point guard Jason Gardner, who scored 25, put it stronger.

“They’re playing better than anybody in the country,” he said.

Olson is concerned about one statistic.

“We were a very bad rebounding team and ‘SC is rebounding as well as anyone. That has to be our No. 1 concern.

“We had 16 defensive rebounds and Cal had 15 offensive rebounds. Those are bad numbers.”

The semifinal between Arizona and Cal (22-8) came only six days after the Bears’ disaster in the desert--a staggering 99-53 loss.

As Cal Coach Ben Braun noted, it wasn’t as if his players could have forgotten.

In that game, Arizona led by 19 at halftime, then went on a 30-4 run to open the second half.

Friday’s game felt nothing like that.

Arizona once led by 15, but with 31/2 minutes left, suddenly it was down to six.

Cal’s 6-5 Joe Shipp got an offensive rebound under the basket and scored to make it 77-71.

But Walton answered--as he did so often down the stretch--banking in a shot on the other end.

Shipp missed a free throw that could have made the lead six again, and Arizona freshman Will Bynum sank a baseline jumper with 2:44 left to make it nine again.

When Shipp was called for on an offensive foul with 2:26 left, Arizona finally seemed in control.

Cal, which held teams to 41% shooting, allowed Arizona to shoot 58%.

Guard Brian Wethers led the Bears in the first half, scoring 17 of his 22 points by halftime. Shipp finished with 25.

Olson’s objections to the conference tournament are about additional missed class time and the lack of necessity for having a tournament--even the possibility it will tire the Pac-10’s teams excessively going into the NCAA tournament after already playing an 18-game conference schedule.

Despite his objections, he wins.

“We treat it like a game. Every game we play, we try to win,” he said. “Guys have a lot of pride in wearing the Arizona jersey.”

His group of freshmen is also a lot wiser than when they started the Pac-10 season being swept by Oregon, and Walton is a far more brilliant player than anyone knew then.

Believe it or not, even Olson seems to have softened on the tournament, if only a tad.

“I think a lot of good things have happened,” Olson said. “This is being handled like a first-class affair. I think the difference--then and now--is the organization that has gone behind this. It’s very different from what it was, frankly.”

Not in one way, however: Arizona, once again, has a chance to end up the champion.