ABOVE THE FRAY AS HIS FANS GRIPE AND HIS BOSSES STAY SILENT, STEVE LAVIN SIMPLY WINS AND BEARS IT.

Byline: Rich Hammond  Staff Writer

Steve Lavin can't coach. He's a lazy, backstabbing cheater. His players are undisciplined underachievers and, if he's not fired soon, he surely will reduce the once-proud UCLA basketball program to a proverbial pile of blue and gold rubble.

Anything else, coach?

``I don't carry a game program,'' Lavin added helpfully. ``John Wooden used to carry a rolled-up program during games, so I get people who write to me and say, 'Why don't you carry a program like Wooden did?' Or, 'Why don't you change your hairstyle?' Or 'Why aren't you married?' Or 'Why don't you wear a nice jacket during games?' ''

This should be a time for Lavin to fire back at the long list of critics who have ripped him without abandon on talk radio, in newspapers, on the Internet or from the stands. Lavin's Bruins are in the Sweet 16 for the fifth time in his six seasons at UCLA, a run of recent NCAA Tournament success matched only by Duke's Mike Krzyzewski.

It's not Lavin's style to say, ``I told you so,'' but that doesn't mean he isn't taking some satisfaction in proving people wrong. He jabs at detractors with jokes and one-liners, but those closest to Lavin say the criticism has stung him more than he admits.

Legendary college coach Pete Newell, one of Lavin's closest advisors, said he wouldn't be surprised if the criticism, as well as a perceived lack of support from the UCLA athletic administration, caused Lavin to leave the Bruins for another college job, and soon.

``I could see that happening,'' Newell said. ``The fact that he hasn't shown a sensitivity to the malarkey he's had to put up with doesn't mean it's not bothering him. You get to a point where you say, 'What more can I possibly do to make these people happy?' This guy has a better record than 95 percent of the coaches out there and it's not nearly enough to satisfy people.

``He's done a heck of a job and he could have a lot of appeal to some schools with job openings. The pay is not that great at UCLA and I think a lot of it will depend on who they hire as athletic director (to replace the retiring Pete Dalis).''

Lavin never would comment publicly on the possibility of leaving, especially with his team fighting for an unlikely national championship, but in unrelated conversations he has said UCLA never was his ``dream job'' as a coach.

At the same time, Lavin frequently talks of how much he enjoys the challenge of his job and how he knows that, as the coach of a high-level program, he must endure a certain amount of scrutiny from media and fans. But at some point he could decide UCLA no longer is worth the trouble.

``The people who say that stuff on the Internet, I would bet that most of them never even attended UCLA or don't donate any money to the school,'' Lavin said. ``That's a really odd cult following. The increasing sense of entitlement among fans, not people within the program or close to the program, but fans, the influence they have is kind of scary.

``They have that thing on TV now, a poll, where you can go vote as to whether Joe Torre should take his pitcher out of the game. That's the future. They will just put it up on the scoreboard and every fan in the stands can vote on whether to call a timeout. UCLA won't even need a coach. They can just get a statue of John Wooden, with a rolled-up program of course, and just let the fans or the media decide how to coach the game.''

On the surface, few could argue with Lavin's record. He's won 70 percent of his games and three times has assembled the country's best recruiting class. Lavin is the only coach in UCLA history to win at least 22 games in his first three seasons and was the first Bruins coach in almost 20 years to record consecutive 24-win seasons (1997-98).

But should the Bruins lose today, the catcalls will commence, because Lavin's teams have advanced past the Sweet 16 just once - in his first season - and his teams never have finished better than third in the Pacific-10 Conference.

The bulk of the Lavin criticism is off the court. He takes hits for a perceived lack of discipline in practice that carries over into games, and detractors point out that those excellent recruiting classes have failed to produce any NBA stars, a knock on Lavin's ability to develop talent once it arrives in Westwood.

There are whispers Lavin doesn't work hard because he doesn't arrive at his office at the crack of dawn every morning, and that he plays favorites among his players.

A well-publicized phone call - from his friend, former Dodgers general manager Kevin Malone, to a recruit - has caused Lavin's honesty to come into question, and some even blamed him for the scandalous ouster of former Bruins coach Jim Harrick.

``The amount of stuff he's had to put up with is amazing and I don't know how he does it,'' said Purdue coach Gene Keady, for whom Lavin worked as a graduate assistant from 1988-91. ``I think it's totally unfair and even though I know it doesn't seem to bother him, it does. He's kept a wonderful attitude through all this stuff.''

Lavin's outlook comes from a lifetime of feedback from his father, Cap, as well as coaches Keady, Newell and Wooden, and he has learned to keep a strong sense of humor through the tough times - or, as Cap puts it, ``I'm most proud of the way he has kept a positive outlook and remained thoughtful and kind toward other people.''

That's not easy when anybody with a phone or a modem can declare you to be an idiot.

``If it's not one thing, it's another,'' Lavin said. ``When I first got the job, my reputation was that I could coach, but I couldn't recruit. Now I can recruit, but I can't coach. At first I was too easygoing, and all we did was play dodgeball and hopscotch in practice, and now all the players hate me. It's amazing how quickly things can turn around.''

Through all the flak, no statement of strong support has come from Dalis or anybody in the UCLA administration, which flirted with hiring Rick Pitino during one bad stretch last season.

Dalis will retire at the end of this school year and Newell said Lavin's future at UCLA could depend on an improved relationship with the new athletic administration.

``He's out there by himself,'' said Newell, who coached Cap Lavin at the University of San Francisco. ``(Dalis) has never put his arm around him and said, 'He's my man.' With the way they treated Harrick, it's like you're in quicksand over there.''

Since Wooden retired following the 1974-75 season, none of his six successors before Lavin have lasted longer than eight seasons.

Lavin accepts the pressure of the job and the fact that ``every time we lose two out of three games, the Bruins are in ruins and it's clearly time to change coaches,'' but he wonders what it will take to gain acceptance from alumni and fans.

``The ironic thing about this job is that people think every coach was just lacking one little thing,'' Lavin said. ``(Gene) Bartow didn't fit in, he was from the South and he was too dry. (Gary) Cunningham didn't like the recruiting pressure. Larry Brown was too high maintenance. Larry Farmer was too young. Walt Hazzard was too militant. Jim Harrick had that West Virginia drawl and he never fit in either.''

Somehow, Lavin has endured, longer than all of the post-Wooden coaches except Harrick, and should the Bruins reach the Final Four or beyond, Lavin's detractors will have to put up with him for a few more years, unless the coach decides to leave town.

For now, Lavin will continue to do things his own way, piling up the victories and the criticism like perhaps no other college coach.

``A couple years ago, we went back to St. Ignatius (High School) for a father-son banquet,'' Lavin said. ``It was a great night and we had just come off losing to Detroit, our only first-round (tournament) loss, so we're driving back from that event across the Golden Gate Bridge on one of those classic Bay Area nights with the skyline lit up.

``My dad calls the UCLA job 'a bugger,' so he says, 'The key to that bugger down there is not winning or losing games. It's not losing who you are, your spirit, your faith, your sense of humor and your dreams,' and that was one of those powerful moments because it's your father and it's one of the critical stages of your career.

``It just stuck with me, because that's the main challenge. If you can stay true to who you are, then you've won. True success will be continuing to keep alive and maintain who you are. If you don't lose that, then you've won.''

CAPTION(S):

7 photos, box

Photo:

(1 -- color) no caption (Steve Lavin)

(2) Steve Lavin

(3) Lute Olson

(4) Tubby Smith

(5) Jim Calhoun

(6) Tom Izzo

(7) Mike Krzyzewski

Box:

LAVIN vs. CHAMPS