Bruins break Cats' streak

LOS ANGELES - UCLA got Reeves Nelson back just in time.

A week ago at Arizona, the Bruins blew a 14-point lead and lost without their tough-nosed freshman.

He returned Thursday after missing four games, scoring 18 points and grabbing 11 rebounds in UCLA’s 75-69 victory over the Wildcats, a Pac-10 Conference tournament quarterfinal between two powerhouses that once ruled the league but have struggled this season.

The loss virtually ended Arizona’s nation-best streak of 25 consecutive NCAA tournament appearances, although with a 16-15 record, the Wildcats could land in the NIT.

“Unfortunately, it’s not the NCAA tournament, but we’re going to take what we can get,” junior Jamelle Horne said.

Unless they can win the tournament, the Bruins (14-17) likely aren’t going anywhere except back to Westwood to contemplate how losing so much of their best talent to the NBA draft did them in.

Kevin Love would have been a junior this season, but he jumped to the NBA. Nelson is no Love, but he is the Bruins’ only solid inside presence on offense.

“He has great strength,” coach Ben Howland said. “When he has the ball, it’s very hard to wedge it from him.”

Nelson has been the gritty heart-and-soul of the Bruins all season, diving for loose balls and inflicting injury on himself. Wearing protective glasses, he played for the first time after missing four games with a slight retinal tear in his left eye.

“My legs were all right. When I first came in, they were really tired, but I got my second wind pretty quickly,” he said, his only complaint being the glasses he wore on loan from the Los Angeles Lakers.

“They fog up sometimes. The nose piece falls out sometimes, and that’s annoying. I just tried not to focus on the goggles.”

Howland said, “He hates them.”

Michael Roll led the Bruins with 19 points and Nikola Dragovic added 18, extending their careers for at least another game.

Nic Wise scored 16 points and Derrick Williams added 14 for Arizona, which lost in the quarterfinals for the third consecutive year.

The Bruins advanced to a semifinal game today against top-seeded California.

Stanford 70, Arizona State 61: Jeremy Green scored 18 points, Landry Fields added 17 and the Cardinal surprised the second-seeded Sun Devils.

The No. 7 Cardinal (14-17) advanced to today’s semifinals against the winner of the late game between No. 3 Washington and sixth-seeded Oregon State.

Arizona State (22-10) swept the Cardinal during the regular season for the first time since 2004-05. But on Thursday the Sun Devils led just once – by one point early in the second half. Rihards Kuksiks scored 15 points, all in the first half, before he fouled out in the closing seconds.

Stanford immediately grabbed the lead back for good, running up a 15-point advantage on a 3-pointer by Fields with 11:43 remaining. It capped eight straight points by the first-team All-Pac-10 senior.

California 90, Oregon 74: Jerome Randle scored 22 points without missing a shot in the first half, and the top-seeded Bears easily advanced to the semifinals by beating the Ducks.

Patrick Christopher had 21 points and five assists for the California (22-9), which followed up its first outright conference title in a half-century by sending home Oregon (16-16) in what could be coach Ernie Kent’s final game.

Randle went 8-for-8 with four 3-pointers in the first half, staking Cal to a 15-point lead. Jamal Boykin then scored all 15 of his points in the second half to finish the eighth-seeded Ducks, who were taken to overtime by Washington State in their first-round game Wednesday night.

Oregon’s Tajuan Porter scored 26 points and broke the Pac-10 career record for 3-pointers, but the Ducks’ defense couldn’t slow the Bears, who made 16 of their first 22 shots.