Team Spirit

In the end, as Ben Howland's most troubling UCLA basketball team was slowly disintegrating on the floor, I couldn't keep my eyes off the bench. Every time a player left the court, he returned home alone. No teammate stood up to cheer him. No teammate walked over to slap his hand or pat his back. Nobody said "good job. " Nobody said anything. If the Bruins' 66-58 loss to Arizona in the second round of the Pac-12 tournament Thursday afternoon was their final game this season, it was a chilling final verdict on the state of the program.

In the end, as Ben Howland's most troubling UCLA basketball team was slowly disintegrating on the floor, I couldn't keep my eyes off the bench. Every time a player left the court, he returned home alone. No teammate stood up to cheer him. No teammate walked over to slap his hand or pat his back. Nobody said "good job. " Nobody said anything. If the Bruins' 66-58 loss to Arizona in the second round of the Pac-12 tournament Thursday afternoon was their final game this season, it was a chilling final verdict on the state of the program.

— When Jeffrey Kahane decided to undertake a survey of Mozart's mature piano concertos to celebrate the composer's 250th birthday, he didn't expect to play all 23 of the works himself. But when scheduling conflicts made hiring other leading soloists impractical, the pianist and music director of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra decided to take on the feat on his own. "I didn't think of it as a huge project about me, so I wasn't daunted," the musician said at his home in Sonoma's wine country.

Fostering team spirit in a sport that is largely an individual endeavor is an ongoing challenge for high school tennis coaches, especially among those blessed with the most talented players. The Darwinian mentality and the time and specialized practice necessary for survival--let alone success--at the highest levels of junior tennis doesn't always lend itself to playing for a high school team.

For those who prefer to manage or coach in front of the TV or at the beach, Champs Sports H&H sling rocking chair offers front-row seats. Made of oak for sturdiness, with hardware that's rust resistant, the cotton canvas seat can show off your favorite major league, NBA or NFL team logo, plus those of select NHL and major college teams. The chair ($60), which folds for easy transport and storage, is available throughout Orange County at Champs Sports stores. Play Ball!

The nail polish said plenty. Irvine freshman Amanda Beard, fresh from a dominating performance in the 100-yard breaststroke, had been the star of Friday's Southern Section Division I swim meet. Her lime-green nails were a matter of personal preference. That it was a school color wasn't the initial idea. "I just wanted them green today," she said. El Toro's Lara Reaves, Beard's Novaquatics teammate, had a solid meet, with a little less fanfare. But she had performed well in the 100 butterfly.

Nobody has an answer for what is wrong with San Diego State after Saturday's 17-6 defeat at Wyoming--the second unexpected Western Athletic Conference loss in three weeks. But Coach Al Luginbill acknowledged the obvious Monday. He said his offense--particularly the passing game--is not executing. As the Aztecs (4-3-1, 4-2 in the WAC) prepare to play host to Hawaii (7-1, 5-1) for a Holiday Bowl berth Saturday night, Luginbill apparently will have to be both technician and psychologist.

The loading dock employees at Xerox's El Segundo plant had a problem. Into each 45-foot trailer dispatched from the factory, they had to pack 260 copiers. But their forklifts didn't maneuver well enough to get the job done. Time was wasted as workers shifted around crates. Copiers were damaged by the awkward equipment. Five years ago, the problem might have gone unsolved or been left to managers or engineers to correct.

What will you do, America, if your team implodes Wednesday? What will you do, America, if Algeria runs the U.S. not only out of Pretoria but all the way out of the World Cup? Will you care? Will you cry? Or will you simply shrug and say, "That's soccer," and move along to something else? Your reaction matters. It matters to all 23 players who will be on the field and on the bench Wednesday afternoon at 107-year-old Loftus Versfeld Stadium. It matters to the coaches who have spent four years trying to build this team.

John Wooden hated being called the "Wizard of Westwood," and no wonder. It would offend most men of dignity to be reduced to a cliché. And what dignity he had. Wooden was an exemplar of not just sports greatness but of a type and era in the history of California — the sturdy Midwesterner, modest and industrious, come to Southern California to pioneer and flourish but without forfeiting old-fashioned values. That was an ethos that helped to found Los Angeles, and defined it through the mid-20th century, when this city came of age. No person exemplified it better than Wooden.

John Wooden hated being called the "Wizard of Westwood," and no wonder. It would offend most men of dignity to be reduced to a cliché. And what dignity he had. Wooden was an exemplar of not just sports greatness but of a type and era in the history of California — the sturdy Midwesterner, modest and industrious, come to Southern California to pioneer and flourish but without forfeiting old-fashioned values. That was an ethos that helped to found Los Angeles, and defined it through the mid-20th century, when this city came of age. No person exemplified it better than Wooden.

Scott Z. Burns was nervous. He had sent Steven Soderbergh an e-mail and gotten back a surprising reply: "Please don't ever contact me again. If you do, you can expect to hear from my lawyer." It shouldn't have been like that: Maybe Burns and Soderbergh weren't old buddies, but they had collaborated on two pictures -- in 2004, Burns was one of several writers on "Ocean's Twelve," which Soderbergh directed, and Burns wrote the screenplay for the 2006 HBO feature "The Half Life of Timofey Berezin" (a.k.

Michael Jackson sang about one Billie Jean, and the tennis world has long celebrated the other. Still does. Even though Billie Jean King is 65 now, she is still figuratively rushing the net, going all out, all day, every day. She could easily rest on the laurels of a tennis career that started as a pigtailed public-court player named Billie Jean Moffitt, from a middle-class family in Long Beach, and resulted in 39 Grand Slam tournament titles, 12 of them in singles and six of those at Wimbledon.

It could come down to the "excitement gap." A recent Pew Research Center for the People & the Press poll found that the presidential race could hinge on the difference in enthusiasm between supporters of the two major-party candidates. Although there has been a lot of focus on whether Democrat Barack Obama can corral disappointed supporters of New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, the bigger factor may prove to be the relatively tepid embrace of John McCain by Republicans.

All things considered, the Gatorade was a fitting symbol of the whole disheartening mess. As a thirst-quenching drink for tired competitors seeking an energy refill to carry them through the next grueling stretch of hardship, it made perfect sense that a number of picketing Writers Guild of America members clutched and swigged from the lightning bolt-marked bottles as they marched in front of Paramount Studios last week.