SBSUN.com
Posted: 12/05/2012 10:13:19 PM PST
This is likely old news by now, with UCLA basketball having already suffered three losses through eight games - the most embarrassing of which was a 70-68 home upset to Cal Poly.
Barring a miraculous turnaround, the Bruins aren't going to the Final Four.
Barring significant improvements, they might even have trouble making the field of 68.
But should the season have opened with such lofty expectations? Through the summer, it was easy to envision another banner dropping down from the Pauley Pavilion rafters and new trophies filling its gleaming, renovated halls. UCLA had one of the top recruiting classes in the country, and all that stood in the way was getting NCAA clearance for its two biggest talents, Shabazz Muhammad and Kyle Anderson.
Kentucky, after all, ran to a national title less than a year ago on the backs of its own set of super freshmen, two of whom were the first names called out in June's NBA draft.
"We're no Kentucky," UCLA sophomore guard Norman Powell said Monday. "We don't have Anthony Davis. We don't have Michael Kidd-Gilchrist. We don't have those types of players.
"With Shabazz and Kyle, they're great players. But Shabazz isn't Anthony Davis. Nobody is Anthony Davis."
Indeed. Davis and his famed unibrow made for one of the most startling phenomenons ever seen in college basketball - a defensive force whose shot-blocking talents extended even to the 3-point line. In addition to earning a ring, he became the second freshman to win the Wooden Award as the nation's best player.
Anderson, a versatile 6-foot-9 point forward, has led the team in rebounding but struggled to hit shots. He is shooting 32.8 percent from the field and - more shockingly - 51.8 percent from the free-throw line.
"It was hard for us," Muhammad said Tuesday after the Bruins' 83-60 exhibition win over Cal State San Marcos. "We really dominated on the high school level. Guys are way quicker and stronger. (There's a) different mindset on defense and offense.
"We're getting acquainted."
The relative weakness of this year's freshman class didn't help the inflated expectations, either. Jonathan Givony, founder of DraftExpress.com, said some scouts thought it to be the weakest freshman class in the past 25 years.
Had the Bruins reeled in another top group in 2013 - a stacked class that includes Andrew Wiggins, a player many feel would have been the top recruit this year, last year and the year before that - the team might look a little different.
Throw in the transfers of guard Tyler Lamb and forward Josh Smith, two juniors who left within the same four-day span last week, and you get a group of freshmen who look, well, like freshmen.
"It's a brand new team," Givony says. "These guys, most of these guys have never been asked to play the style of basketball they're being asked to play right now.
"I think it's kind of inevitable that a team that's put together like this is going struggle."
Even so, he still expects Muhammad to leave for the NBA after one year. DraftExpress.com still has Muhammad pegged in its top overall spot, but plenty could change between now and next spring.
The Bruins certainly hope that's the case for the team as a whole.
"Patience," head coach Ben Howland said this week. "We've got to be patient. Keep pushing hard. A team with youth, you've got to be patient.
"Everything is new to them. You can't take anything for granted."
Added Givony: "It's always like this, honestly. If you turn the clock back like a year ago, people were saying Austin Rivers stinks, he can't make a shot. All these guys, they grow up slow."
Rivers, by the way, led Duke all the way to - a first-round tourney exit.
The Blue Devils, a No. 2 seed, fell to 15 th-seeded Lehigh in one of the tournament's more dramatic upsets. The freshman led his team with 19 points, but did so on 5-of-14 shooting.
He declared for the NBA draft 11 days later.
jack.wang@dailynews.com twitter.com/thejackwang
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