Bruins almost get fouled up

PHOENIX – Western Kentucky hasn’t lost often, and when it has, not by much.

Someone should have reminded UCLA of that at halftime of tonight’s West Regional semifinal at U.S. Airways Center.

What was a Bruins cakewalk at the half turned into a race to the finish as top-seeded UCLA withstood second-half scoring outbursts by Tyrone Brazelton and Courtney Lee to hold off the 12th-seeded Hilltoppers, 88-78, and advance to the regional final against Xavier.

Brazelton had 31 points, including 25 in the second half, and Lee had 18, 13 after a two-for-13 first-half shooting performance.

The Bruins almost let a 21- point halftime lead get away when they committed 12 turnovers in the first 15 minutes of the second half.

UCLA was led by freshman center Kevin Love, who scored a season-high 29 points, but was ignited by reserve forward James Keefe, who had career highs of 18 points and 12 rebounds.

Love’s output was the second most ever scored by a UCLA freshman. But the night belonged to Keefe, a sophomore forward from Santa Margarita who had the crowd cheering his every move – and there were many of them – and chanting his name as he spurred the Bruins.

His offensive rebounding helped the Bruins (34-3) survive despite playing the last 5:39 without point guard Darren Collison, who fouled out.

UCLA led Western Kentucky, 41-20, at halftime. A three-point baseline jumper by Brazelton forged a 13-13 tie barely eight minutes into the game, but it was all Bruins after that.

UCLA scored the next 10 points and then seven more unanswered points after two free throws by Western Kentucky’s C.J. Anderson.

Meantime, Western Kentucky missed its next 12 shots and committed four turnovers before Jeremy Evans scored on a layup with four minutes left in the half. But by then UCLA led, 30-17.

Western Kentucky made only six of 32 shots in the half compared to 16 of 31 by UCLA, which got scoring contributions from six players.

The game started with Love and Collison scoring the Bruins first six points. They combined to score 40 of the Bruins’ 51 points in a second-round victory over Texas A&M last Saturday, but they soon had help. And it was a good thing for the Bruins, because Collison, after an early free throw, made only one more basket – a three-pointer late in the second half.

Josh Shipp and Russell Westbrook – both coming off horrible shooting performances in last week’s regional at Anaheim – each had eight points in the first half. Keefe had seven.

Brazelton had six points to pace Western Kentucky (29-6), which had lost only one game by more than six points this season. Lee, the Hilltoppers’ 20-point-a-game scorer, was held to five.

Looming for UCLA is a regional final matchup against Xavier, a 79-75 winner in overtime over West Virginia.

Xavier led West Virginia by as many as 18 points in the first half, blew it all and fell behind, then used two key three-pointers by B.J. Raymond in the final minute of play to advance to a regional final for only the second time in school history.

UCLA and Xavier last met in the tournament in 1997, when the Bruins downed the Musketeers, 96-83, in a second-round game at Auburn Hills, Mich.

mike.hiserman@latimes.com