BASKETBALL PREVIEW
A familiar
CHALLENGE Coach Ben Howland finds himself with a young, inexperienced team, much like during the Bruins’ successful 2005 season. This year, will the Bruins be so lucky?
BY ANDREW HOWARD
Bruin Sports senior staff
T
ahoward@media.ucla.edu
he year was 2005.
After suffering a sound defeat to Texas Tech in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, Ben Howland entered his second season as coach of the UCLA men’s basketball program, with a team composed mostly of freshmen and sophomores. Entering the 2005-2006 season as the No. 18 team in the country, not much was expected from a Bruin team that finished with a 18-11 overall record and tied for third place in the Pac-10 the season before. Add in the overwhelming presence of youth and inexperience, and the Bruins appeared to be future title contenders, not current ones. But then a funny thing happened. Tomorrow became today, inexperience transformed into experience, and the same Bruin team that seemed too young to contend found itself in the NCAA championship game against Florida. Despite losing to the Gators, that team began a run of three consecutive Final Four appearances for the Bruins, a streak that came to an end last year, and one that this year’s Bruin team hopes it can start again. “We’re young, but still, young don’t mean nothing,” sophomore guard Malcolm Lee said. “We really don’t have the experience as other teams do, but experience comes along with the journey.” This year’s Bruin squad contains a number of similarities to the 2005 team. Like 2005, the Bruins are coming off a humbling loss in the early rounds of the NCAA Tournament, this time an 89-69 drubbing at the hands of Villanova. Much like in 2005, when not much was expected from the Bruins, this year’s team enters the season unranked and picked to finish third in the Pac-10. But perhaps the most important similarity between the two teams is the level of inexperience. Like the 2005 squad, this Bruin team has five freshmen, four sophomores and three seniors on scholarships, constituting one of the youngest teams Howland has had in his six full seasons at UCLA. HOWLAND | Page 6