Loss to UCLA wasn't disastrous, unless Arizona State allows it to be

Kevin Shiflett, "the amazing chin balancer," entertained a near-sellout crowd at Arizona State's Desert Financial Arena on Thursday night by successfully balancing a variety of items on an as-advertised chin, including a chair, a shopping cart, a wheelbarrow, a bicycle and a ladder, while standing on a ladder.

For ASU's men's basketball program, there are a number of potential metaphors within that act.

Like how every coach there for the last 40 years has performed a balancing act, trying, and mostly failing, to sustain success.

Like how the Sun Devils will react if their version of an 8-foot folding table slipped off their chins in front of 13,363 fans, including more than 5,000 students, believed to be a school record.

Because that's what happened Thursday night.

With 6:13 left, the Sun Devils led No. 5 UCLA, 60-58.

With 0:00 left, UCLA led, 74-62. That 16-2 run put ASU in its place, in second place in the Pac-12, two games behind the Bruins.

Read more: UCLA surges past Arizona State to keep stranglehold on first place

For ASU, the loss was not disastrous, unless the Sun Devils allow it to be. UCLA has won 14 consecutive games. It has seniors who have played deep into NCAA tournaments. It has a rich basketball history. Losing to the Bruins on Thursday is no reason not to show up to classes Friday.

"I’m sure it probably helped a lot," ASU coach Bobby Hurley said of the Bruins’ experience.

The Sun Devils, in contrast, are relying heavily on transfers, who, to their credit, have bonded quickly. ASU is deep, athletic and has played so well of late that the departure of forward Marcus Bagley, once thought to be the Sun Devils’ best player, from the program seems as if it happened years ago, not in November.

Coaching basketball at ASU is not an easy job. Since Ned Wulk left in the early 1980s, success has been fleeting. It's a challenge to motivate fans to get off their couches and into the arena. In too many seasons, the Sun Devils didn't give them much reason to.

And the arena needs to either be renovated or razed. It turns 50 in a year, and it's amazing, and scary, to watch older fans have to carefully navigate stairs because there are no handrails.

Crowds the size of Thursday night's happen once a season or so if the Sun Devils are fortunate.

"I came to a couple games last year," ASU freshman guard Austin Nunez said Thursday night, "and it was not like this at all. The atmosphere was crazy. It was super loud in here."

Hurley said the size of the crowd and the atmosphere gave him goosebumps when he first entered the court from the tunnel. This is a good thing on at least two counts: 1.) ASU fans will pay to watch good basketball, even on a weekday evening, and 2.) Hurley, one of the best players in college basketball history, can still get goosebumps from a big crowd.

Two-and-half hours later, Hurley sat in a media room that hasn't changed in 30 years and gave his view of what had just happened to the Sun Devils.

"You play teams like that, have been to Final Fours, have those types of guys that have won so many games, they know how to turn it up a little bit down the stretch," he said. "Those guys aren't fazed by anything."

The Sun Devils were fazed. As impressive as they have played lately, winning 15 of 18 games, including six of seven in the Pac-12, they don't have the calluses from playing elite opponents in front of packed houses.

The best coaches don't hesitate in beginning to try to repair the damage done by a loss like the one ASU suffered on Thursday. Hurley's post-game press conference was as much about being ready for USC on Saturday as it was losing to UCLA on Thursday.

"You just don't know, as a coach, the damage that gets done," he said. "These guys went to the well. They played their butts off today, so now it's about damage control and building them back up."

That started immediately after the game. Hurley told his players "they’re the reason that the crowd was here like that. They earned the right to be in this game."

"I thought we went toe-to-toe with them for a while," he told reporters.

They did, for about 34 minutes of a 40-minute game. Then, the wheelbarrow on their chins teetered and fell. How the Sun Devils respond to that Saturday night against USC will tell us a lot about what they’re capable of for the rest of the season.

Read more: New lineup produces as Arizona men's basketball knocks back USC