Nice game for the Bruins

I must confess that after the USC blowout I was about ready to give up on this year's version of UCLA basketball and write this off as a rebuilding year. But I decided, since the electricity had come back on, to watch tonight's game. Well, the Bruins came out with energy and played Washington pretty evenly throughout the game -- 13 lead changes, neither team able to pull ahead by more than about 6. Made for an exciting game. The Bruins were able to cut down on turnovers and played tight defense in the second half. And it came down to 3 lead changes in the last 8 seconds, with walk-on Mustafa Abdul-Hamid (boy have the names of athletes gotten more diverse since I was in college, which says something nice about America, I think) sinking the final shot with 0.2 seconds left to win it for the Bruins.

Marques Johnson on tonight's broadcast jokingly suggested the Pac-10 might end with all the teams at 9-9. A super longshot, of course, but the league does seem to be balanced and unpredictable -- no dominant team has emerged yet -- and a lot of the games are cvlose, which makes for good watching, especially if you don't have a favorite in your mind.