Pac-10 Men | Mouton says he's ready for trial with OSU

When the history of Pac-10 basketball interim coaches is written, Kevin Mouton figures to be more Bob Schermerhorn than Todd Bozeman.

Schermerhorn, you probably don't recall, coached the final seven games of the 1988-89 season at Arizona State after Steve Patterson resigned under pressure.

He went 2-5 and served as a mere footnote in stories a few weeks later when ASU hired Bill Frieder, little remembered since.

Bozeman, meanwhile, took over for the fired Lou Campanelli at California 18 games into the 1992-93 season and when a team led by Jason Kidd made it to the Sweet 16, Bozeman became the permanent coach, though he was eventually fired himself three years later for NCAA violations.

Mouton, 42, was named the interim coach at Oregon State on Sunday after the Beavers fired Jay John — one of just five in-season firings or resignations since the formation of the Pac-10 in 1978.

And while he's unlikely to get the permanent job, Mouton was quick to make a splash, kicking center C.J. Giles off the team Monday.

Mouton made that one of his first moves upon taking over, telling the former Rainier Beach High star he could keep his scholarship for the rest of the year but not play for the team.

"His past behaviors, in my view, made it a situation where there would have been issues going forward with the way we need to run this program," Mouton said Tuesday during the weekly Pac-10 coaches conference call.

Mouton was closely associated with John, having been a player at Oregon in 1986 (he was a guard) when John was an assistant there, then later playing for John at Jamestown Community College and serving on a staff with John at Butler. John hired Mouton as an assistant when he got the OSU job in 2002.

Mouton isn't considered a serious candidate for the full-time job. Head-coaching experience is all but a must, according to OSU athletic director Bob DeCarolis. Candidates could include former UW assistant Ken Bone, now head coach at Portland State.

But Mouton has at least 13 games to state his case, and he said he thinks he's as well-prepared as could be under the circumstances.

"Jay gave us the reign to do a lot of coaching during practices, so the guys are kind of used to us," Mouton said. "We just have to get these guys to be intense, to be held accountable for playing hard and being disciplined. Once that happens, I think we will be fine."

Mouton is the first assistant to take over a Pac-10 program during a season since Jim Saia at USC when Henry Bibby was fired four games into the 2004-05 season. Interestingly, Bibby is one of the four previous Pac-10 coaches to take over midseason, getting the call when USC fired Charlie Parker 21 games into the 1995-96 season.

Washington coach Lorenzo Romar noted that such firings seem to be more common and worried that "this doesn't become a trend like the NBA" where midseason changes happen all the time.

Mouton actually becomes the second interim coach in the conference. Arizona's Kevin O'Neill has that title with Lute Olson on a leave of absence, though O'Neill's situation is different in that he has already been named as Olson's eventual successor.

O'Neill also had a completely pragmatic take on the firing of John, who will be paid $1.1 million on the way out.

"As long as they are paying [coaches] big money, teams can do whatever they want," O'Neill said. "If somebody fired me midseason, as long as they paid me my money, I wouldn't have a problem with it."

Giles redux

Because Giles is a fourth-year junior and would be forced to sit out a year if he transferred to another Division I school, his only options are to play at a lower division or turn pro.

An NBA scout on Tuesday, however, said, "I don't see it happening" when asked if there was any chance Giles would be drafted if he were to go that route despite the fact that he was once thought to have lottery-pick ability.

"I don't think anybody would take a chance on him," the scout said. "Even if he'd lasted through the year and been productive and done what he's capable of doing, there still would have been question marks because of the baggage and knuckleheadedness.

"Somebody would invite him to rookie camp, just because of what his potential is. When I saw him at Kansas, he was a shot-block waiting to happen. When I saw him at Oregon State, he was wasting everybody's time."

Rim shots

• The game of the night Thursday might be in Eugene, where the Ducks host No. 7 UCLA, which has lost four of its past six games at Mac Court. The game could be the only visit to Eugene by UCLA center Kevin Love, the son of former Ducks standout Stan Love, who spurned Oregon to head south.

Oregon coach Ernie Kent insisted he didn't think the notoriously rowdy Mac Court crowd would have any extra venom in store for Love. "Oregon fans are different," he said. "They are not fans that turn into hatred and all that kind of stuff."

• At 15-3, Stanford is off to its best start since coach Trent Johnson took over for Mike Montgomery four years ago. The Cardinal swept the Arizona schools last weekend behind sophomore center Brook Lopez's 38 points and 22 rebounds.