FanHouse Alfred Aboya

This week, FanHouse is taking a look at the top teams heading into 2008 with a BlogPoll decided on by our college hoops bloggers. To help with the team capsules, we've brought in some of the top fan bloggers around the internets to give us insights on their teams.

We could have gone for one of the pretentious UCLA blogs out there, but instead we went to a real fan, Insomniac, of the appropriately named Insomniac's Lounge. Hey, anybody who took the time to make this post must be a great fan.

UCLA coach Ben Howland has found the road map to the Final Four, having now guided his Bruins basketball team to play games in football stadiums (RCA Dome, Georgia Dome, Alamodome) in three consecutive years. While this is certainly a remarkable achievement in its own right, at UCLA success is ultimately only measured by national championships, and that is where Howland has been hitting a dead end. With a restocked lineup, Bruins fans have reason to hope that this is the season their team finally breaks through with a title. But this year, the journey will be missing the contributions of three players (Russell Westbrook, Kevin Love, and Luc Richard Mbah a Moute) who left early for the NBA.

UCLA lost to Washington Sunday, and the play everyone is talking about is this inbounds pass with 47 seconds left, when Washington guard Tim Morris threw the ball directly into the face of UCLA forward Alfred Aboya:

Was it a dirty play on the part of Morris, or a heads-up move to avoid a five seconds penalty? I'd vote for dirty, but I appear to be out-voted by the participants themselves. The Seattle Times reports:

Morris immediately tried to apologize to Aboya, who noted the apology after the game. But some UCLA players began riding Morris about it, prompting Bruins coach Ben Howland to intercede.

"I threw it off his face and one of their guys said something like, 'Don't do that again,' and I said something back to them. And Howland said, 'Back up,' just trying to cool down the situation a little bit," Morris said.

Said Aboya: "They were doing everything they could to win. It's allowed."

Howland asked an official to penalize Morris but he said he was told that "there was nothing he could do."

If the referee says it's OK, and if Aboya says it's allowed, maybe I shouldn't have a problem with it. But it seems like a bush-league move to me.

ESPN's Andy Katz reports that UCLA junior forward Alfred Aboya suffered an orbital floor fracture below his right eye during Friday night's win over Yale at Pauley Pavilion, putting yet another Bruins player out of commission.

It is not clear yet whether Aboya, who has played about 22 minutes a game in the Bruins' first five games, will be able to play with a mask or whether he'll need surgery, which would keep him out for a significant time.

As Katz notes, injuries UCLA is going through a rough stretch with injuries. Darren Collison hasn't played this season because of a sprained knee, Michael Roll hasn't played this season because of a ruptured plantar fascia, and James Keefe is out after shoulder surgery.

Still, UCLA should be fine. Everyone is expected back this season, and with the exception of next weekend's game against Texas, the Bruins' schedule features about six weeks of cupcakes before things get difficult.