FanHouse Renardo Sidney

Will the last person please turn out the lights at the Galen Center.

USC headed into April as a likely preseason Top 25 team with a strong core coming back and a talented recruiting class coming in. The Trojans enter June with most of the core gone and that recruiting class dwindling. Oh, and a coach that appears to be hanging by a thread while the NCAA circles closer and closer.

On paper, it looks like the Bulldogs may be loaded up front in 2009. Forward Jarvis Varnado, the nation's leading shot-blocker for the past two seasons, has decided to return for his senior season.

Last week, the program added a commitment from Renardo Sidney, one of the top power forwards in the 2009 recruiting class. Plus, John Riek, a 7-foot-1 center, has signed a letter of intent with Mississippi State instead of Cincinnati. Mississippi State has size and talent up front that compares favorably with Kentucky and anyone in the nation.

That is, if they all make it on to the court.

UCLA finally did something that it hadn't done all season: beat a ranked opponent. Doesn't seem right, does it? It's not like the Bruins play a Utah State-like schedule, dodging powerhouses and choosing to beat some of the Weak Sisters of the Poor. And Cal Poly.

Yet, here in late February, the Bruins finally notched that elusive win over a Top-25 foe, beating Washington, 85-76. UCLA was able to avenge an earlier loss in Seattle, when the Huskies made a conga line to the charity stripe -- something reminiscent of a Bugs Bunny cartoon, only not as funny.