Highly Regarded Odom to Redshirt for UCLA

Rodney Odom, the tallest but least advanced of UCLA’s highly regarded freshmen recruiting class of 1989, will sit out this season as a redshirt, Coach Jim Harrick said Wednesday.

“I’m a little blue,” Odom said Wednesday night before the Bruins’ 102-89 exhibition victory over Athletes in Action. “I think it might be best for me, but I have to be disappointed because I worked all my life to come in here and play as a freshman and start as a sophomore.”

Returning starter Kevin Walker and former walk-on Keith Owens will share the center position for UCLA, Harrick said.

“When I recruited Rodney, I didn’t plan on the emergence of Keith Owens as a (regular) player for us,” he said. “I just don’t think I have enough minutes (for Odom) at the forward and center spots and I don’t want to waste a year on a kid as talented and as skilled as Rodney Odom.”

Odom hasn’t played as well as he thought he would after averaging 20 points and 11 rebounds last season at Kingwood (Tex.) High School.

“I haven’t played as many games as most people on the team,” said the 6-foot-11, 215-pound Odom. “In (Texas), we could only play 20 games in the summer. In California, they can play an unlimited number of games.

“I need to put on 15 or 20 pounds, get a little stronger and next year, hopefully, I’ll be fighting for a starting spot.”

Bruin Notes

Coach Jim Harrick said before the game that freshman Mitchell Butler was pushing sophomore Gerald Madkins in the battle for the starting off-guard spot. Madkins responded with nine points and seven assists in 30 minutes. Butler scored seven points in 13 minutes. “Gerald’s experience is the thing that’s put him over the hump right now,” Harrick said. . . . Don MacLean made 11 of 19 shots and led the Bruins with 25 points and nine rebounds. Trevor Wilson had 20 points and six rebounds, Darrick Martin had 14 points and four assists and Kevin Walker had 10 points, 10 rebounds and five assists. . . . Freshman Tracy Murray made only four of 13 shots, scoring nine points in 13 minutes. . . . Said Harrick: “We’re probably a lot farther along than we were a year ago. It’s easier to teach four (new) guys than it was to teach a whole squad of guys.”

Rodney Zimmerman, a 6-10 forward from Colorado Springs, Colo., who signed with UCLA this week after visiting Arizona, Georgia Tech, Providence and Kansas, said of his decision: “It came down basically to location, the academics and the business opportunities after college because I want to stay there in California.” . . . Harrick told the Colorado Springs Gazette: “We only offered two scholarships in the fall, and one of them went to Rodney.” The other was offered to Shon Tarver, a 6-4 guard from Santa Clara High in Oxnard. Tarver did not commit during the early signing period, which ended Tuesday at midnight. . . . UCLA plays the Australian national team Tuesday night before opening the regular season against Santa Clara Nov. 25 at Pauley Pavilion.