UCI coach Turner just focused on improvement

Russ Turner is in his 11th season as head coach of the UC Irvine men’s basketball program. Along the way he has guided the Anteaters to two NCAA Tournament appearances, the second in 2019 leading to their first NCAA Tournament victory with an upset of fourth-seeded Kansas State.

Furthermore, two-time defending regular-season champion UCI has not been lower than the No. 3 seed in the Big West Conference Tournament since Turner’s third season in 2013-14 when the Anteaters were seeded fourth.

A losing performance at Long Beach State this Friday and Saturday in the final regular-season games could change that. The seedings for this season’s fiveday, 10-team conference tournament will be based on winning percentage because teams will not have played the same number of games due to a number of coronavirus-related cancellations. The math shows that depending on what other teams do, UCI could finish as low as the No. 5 seed.

The second-place Anteaters (14-8 overall, 8-4 Big West) could also finish with the top seed, but that’s highly unlikely because first-place UC Santa Barbara (17-4, 11-3) plays its final two games against last-place Cal Poly (317, 1-13).

That said, Turner apparently is not focused on seedings.

“Well, I’m not thinking about that very much, to be honest,” Turner said Tuesday morning. “I don’t think we’re going to finish first. I think the overwhelmingly most likely thing is that Santa Barbara will and if they do they will have earned it, deserve it.”

UCI beat UCSB both times they met this season in late December at UCI.

“And I’m not worried about where we finish if we don’t finish first because in the Big West Tournament, you’ve gotta beat everybody to reach your goal and that’s going to be hard for any team that does it,” Turner said. “So what we’re focused on right now is trying to get better. Our players are, too.”

One thing’s certain, Turner knows he can’t sleep on rival Long Beach State (59, 4-6). LBSU is sitting in ninth place but has a talented team that has been hit hard with injuries and multiple pauses to the program because of COVID-19 protocols.

Additionally, five of Long Beach’s six conference losses are by three points or less, including a pair of heartbreakers last weekend in Hawaii.

And, this is a rivalry.

“We’ve got a tough assignment to finish in playing at Long Beach, who’s good and talented and capable and we’re going to have to play well to beat them,” Turner said. “And if we’re not able to do that, then we’ll try to get better for the following week when the chips are all down.

“And that’s the nature of this conference. Everybody’s going to have to feel that pressure that comes with playing when your season is all on the line. That makes this year a little bit more unusual than any other.”

The conference tournament is slated for March 9-13 at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. The Anteaters were the No. 1 seed for the 2020 tournament, but it was canceled because of the pandemic.