The exodus of UCLA basketball players for the NBA has reached an
all-time high. That was my opinion after Jerome Moiso and JaRon
Rush both declared themselves eligible for this year’s
draft.
But last Saturday, I turned on the television to discover Jason
Kapono is headed for the NBA too ““ well, he is likely heading
for the draft after he discovers whether he can be selected in the
first round.
All I can say now is that, right before our very eyes, the UCLA
basketball program is quickly becoming a sorry excuse for a minor
league basketball team.
It used to be that basketball at UCLA was something special.
Players cried when they lost and won, because winning and losing
for UCLA meant winning and losing for the tradition of the program
and for the students, faculty and fans that watched it.
That has all vanished.
First Moiso and Rush bolted for the NBA ““ after two highly
successful seasons that saw them win two NCAA tournament games and
secure back-to-back third place finishes in the Pac-10. Moiso
expects to be taken as high as future Hall of Famer Karl Malone.
The Karl Malone that Moiso would have to guard in the NBA, the one
that has more range on his jump shot than Moiso’s fabled
lefthanded turnaround and more power than five Moisos combined.
Sounds like a piece of cake, right?
Rush, meanwhile, assumes that essentially one season of college
ball was enough to get him ready for defending the likes of Vince
Carter and Latrell Sprewell. But he may just be lured by the fact
that in the NBA, there is no NCAA watching your every move, just a
league office waiting to raid your wallet if you mess up.
Kapono followed those declarations with an announcement of his
own: he will at least test the draft waters and then decide if he
will turn professional. Steve Lavin may think Kapono will come
back, but I don’t. The way NBA talent is going these days,
Kapono has a better chance of getting drafted in the first round
than Rush based on talent alone.
While it is understandable that these players would like to have
a shot at pursuing their dreams, it comes at the expense of a
basketball program trying to live up to something it can’t
be. Lavin can recruit great talent, but if he can’t get them
to stay for more than a year or two, he will never add a banner to
the rafters of Pauley Pavilion, and he will never make a serious
run in the NCAA tournament.
This isn’t to say the Bruin program won’t be fun to
watch. Sure, there will be highlight reel alley-oops and
behind-the-back passes, high-flying dunks and first-round draft
choices.
But there won’t be any Pac-10 championships, Final Fours
or national championships. There will just be a lot of high
expectations that can never be met because these UCLA teams will
continue to be beat by less-talented, more experienced,
better-coached teams that play above and beyond their
potential.
Which sounds a little like what UCLA basketball used to be
like.
It’s true, John Wooden had the benefit of players like Lew
Alcindor and Bill Walton. But he also won titles with teams that
didn’t have the most talent or height. He won with teams
whose only advantages were Wooden’s coaching genius,
experience and tradition. So all the talent in the world
doesn’t matter.
How bad is this mass exodus for UCLA basketball then? After all,
isn’t it just an example of a nationwide trend affecting all
Division I programs?
This could end up affecting UCLA more, though, than other
schools around the country who lose a few players every now and
then to the draft. Those teams may lose their dominant players
(like Duke losing Elton Brand) but they still have talent to
develop, the coaches to teach it and upperclassmen to lead. UCLA
only has the talent.
Then again, I guess minor league basketball isn’t that
bad. It’s like 16th-century Shakespeare: fun to watch,
entertaining, but ultimately tragic.
I just hope Wooden doesn’t feel like King Lear, watching
the empire he created fall apart before his very eyes.