Matt Freed, Post-Gazette UCLA's Darren Collison shoots free throws during practice yesterday in San Jose. Collison was at the center of the Bruins' surge into the Sweet 16, flashing for 15 points, swishing two critical free throws, exploding for the winning steal in a fitful second-round victory against Indiana. Click photo for larger image.

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- At the epicenter of these UCLA Bruins is Darren Collison, not just strategically, but literally.

He's at the center of the floor as they stretch before practice, the other Bruins fanned out around him in a circular kaleidoscope of limbs. He was at the center of their surge into the Sweet 16, flashing for 15 points, swishing two critical free throws, exploding for the winning steal in a fitful second-round victory against Indiana.

And on the eve of the Western Region semifinal against Pitt, Collison was the calm eye in the little hurricane of media angles magnetized to the collision of Jamie Dixon and Ben Howland, a former Pitt coach and the current Pitt coach's mentor and friend and the father of Dixon's baby sitter and Pitt graduate student and, frankly, enough additional proximities to exhaust actual interest.

But maybe that's just me.

Collison was digging it.

"I think it's pretty unique and pretty interesting," said the 6-1 Bruin sophomore from Rancho Cucamonga. "Eighty percent of our plays are pretty much the same. It helps a lot when you know where a play is going. You can gamble a little bit more."

You can't be sure that Howland even wants Collison gambling on defense against Pitt tonight, but you can be sure Dixon wants it even less. Collison has 73 steals this year. No Pitt player has 40.

	Matt Freed, Post-Gazette UCLA head coach Ben Howland watches his team during practice at HP Pavilion in San Jose yesterday. UCLA will take on Pitt at 9:40 p.m. today. Click photo for larger image.

How quick is this kid? Difficult to quantify, but the answer would seem to lurk somewhere between physiology and geneology.

Collison's parents were world-class sprinters. His father, Dennis, ran the 200 meters in 10.1 seconds and represented Guyana in the Pan-Am Games. His mother was, if not a hair quicker, then a slice more accomplished as an Olympian. June ran in the 400 for Guyana in the 1984 Games in Los Angeles. No wonder Collison is one of those kids who just can't wait. Even yesterday, he left the stretching session too soon, grabbing a basketball and shooting until Howland turned away from a courtside interview to scold him.

"Hey," yipped the coach. "Four more minutes!"

Back in the circle, Collison did some smiling semi-ballet exercises until it was finally time to shoot.

In a matchup where differences are few, Collison might be the split hair that Pitt can't overcome.

"He looks like a great guard," smiled Pitt guard Ronald Ramon, "but in our conference, we have great guards, and it seems like we're playing a great guard every night. We're going to do the same things we've done against everyone."

Last week in Buffalo, N.Y., the Panthers minimized Wright State sniper DaShaun Wood, and two nights after Virginia Commonwealth hero Eric Maynor scalded Duke by hitting 6 of 8 3-pointers, Pitt limited Maynor to one shot from behind the arc. He missed it.

The Sweet 16 being the Panthers' customary point of egress from the NCAA tournament, the litany of similarities between Pitt and UCLA seems to buoy the Pitt-smitten. The teams run similar systems out of similar philosophies, with Pitt center Aaron Gray yesterday raising the possibility of running from one end of the court to the other and hearing both coaches yelling about the same things. They've made similar runs in this very tournament, each blowing out an inferior opponent but following it with a major emergency resulting in a five-point win. UCLA shoots 48 percent from the field, Pitt 47 percent. Pitt shoots 38 percent from behind the arc, UCLA 37 percent. UCLA shoots 65 percent from the free-throw line, Pitt 66 percent.

Did I mention that the coaches actually know each other?

"They run a lot of little quick-hitting sets that we don't use," Howland said when asked specifically for evident differences. "That starts with Aaron Gray. The closer he can catch the ball to the basket the harder it is for us and everybody they play. The other thing is, they'll play zone sometimes, and we don't play any."

Neither Howland nor Dixon's team is built to come from behind like Virginia Commonwealth, but the Panthers have more recently shown a penchant for that which is crucial to avoid tonight: the miserable first half. Like when the Panthers got 19 against Louisville and 17 against Georgetown before intermission. You know what killed Indiana last week against UCLA? A 13-point first half.

"They just kind of stick with their principles and grind it out," Pitt's Levon Kendall said of the Bruins. "I can't think of a team that plays the game just about the same way we do."

By most lucid analyses, UCLA's athleticism inside and out is superior to Pitt's, although not substantially. If they played four times, it says here, Pitt would win once. Maybe tonight's that fourth night.