BY STEVE HANF
SALISBURY POST

The NCAA East Region notebook …

PHILADELPHIA— When starting center Casey Sanders picked up a foul 11 seconds into Thursday night’s game, Carlos Boozer knew his return would come sooner rather than later.

Boozer’s first game back turned out to be a good one. He played 22 solid minutes, and best of all, his team topped UCLA 76-63to advance to the Elite Eight on Saturday night.

Boozer, who missed six games after breaking a bone in his foot, saw his first action at the 17:47 mark. The first time he touched the ball, he ripped it away from Matt Barnes, abruptly halting the Bruin’s drive down the lane. On the following possession, he dropped down a soft shot from in close after Mike Dunleavy found him open.

That early score was his only one all night, but he did add six rebounds, a block and two steals.

“When you’ve been out for three weeks, you’ve got to just throw yourself into it,” Boozer said. “At first I was a little hesitant about my foot, but now I’ve got more confidence on it and I’m just going all out.”

More than anything, though, Boozer’s minutes Thursday ended a long, annoying waiting game.

“It was a little sore, but it wasn’t in pain,”Boozer said of the injury. “It was one of those frustrating types of things: ‘Is it ready, is it ready?’ ‘No, it’s not ready.’

“ ‘I can’t step on it?’‘No, you can’t.’ ”

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SCARY MOMENT: Less than one minute had passed Thursday night before Boozer’s return looked even more important than originally thought.

Sophomore forward Mike Dunleavy raced down the court on a fast-break chance and got hit by UCLA’s 6-foot-11, 248-pound center, Dan Gadzuric. He dropped to the floor like a rock and was in obvious pain.

He favored his right shoulder as he gingerly walked back to the bench. Duke fans breathed a sigh of relief when he reported back to the scorer’s table at the 14:14 mark of the first half.

“I went into Gadzuric and pump-faked him and he came down real hard on me. My body was going this way and my head got knocked back that way,”Dunleavy said. “I got a stinger down my side. First it went numb, then it started burning down the nerve in my arm.”

Dunleavy admitted being bothered somewhat the rest of the game. He only shot 3-for-11 from the field, including an 0-for-6 from the 3-point line.

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DON’T TELL CBS:: Television ratings for the NCAA Tournament are down a bit this year, and CBS just lost another viewer.

“I won’t even look at the tournament no more,”UCLA point guard Earl Watson said. “To me the tournament doesn’t exist past this day.”

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SORRY ‘BOUT THAT: Much of the nation was salivating over a Kentucky-Duke Elite Eight rematch in Philadelphia, a follow-up to Christian Laettner’s game-winning shot at the buzzer in 1992.

Prior to Thursday’s games, the buzz around the arena was that the very floor from that game was still being used. The First Union Center’s home team, the 76ers, don’t have college markings on their court, so the same college court is stored at the arena for events like this one.

As it turned out, Kentucky won’t be around to play another game on the famous hardwood. Southern Cal’s 80-76 victory in Thursday’s first game propelled the Trojans to the Elite Eight, not the ’Cats.

“I’m sure that (the talk of the Duke rematch) affected us,”Kentucky head coach Tubby Smith said.

“When you have a young team like we have, it’s hard to keep their focus. Sometimes, before you can recover it’s too late.”

For his part, Trojans head coach Henry Bibby was more than happy to hear the Duke-Kentucky chatter on the airwaves and read about it in all the papers.

“I thank you guys (the media) for helping us with that,”Bibby joked when asked if he used the Kentucky attention as motivation. “You guys deserve half of this victory as much as we do.”

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LAST TIME: The Trojans’ upset spoiled something else that was pretty special, too.

When Saul Smith walked off the court, it was the final time he would play for his dad, Tubby.

“The last four years of my career and the last four years of my life have been the best of my 21 years,”Saul Smith said. “The opportunity to play for my father is something I’m going to remember my entire life.”

Saul Smith, a 6-2 point guard, was playing in his third Sweet 16 in four years. He’s been part of three Southeastern Conference championship teams and won a national title with the 1998 team. He ranks third in school history for games played (143) and is ninth on the all-time assists chart (363).

“It’s been a real blessing for me for Saul to have been a part of the great tradition that Kentucky has had,”Tubby Smith said. “Watching him develop into a mature young man, some people are not that fortunate. I’m really going to miss Saul.”

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RECORD CROWD: The First Union Center packed 20,270 fans in Thursday night, the largest crowd ever for a college basketball game in the state of Pennsylvania.

The previous record of 20,060 was reached for last year’s NCAA women’s national championship game between Tennessee and Connecticut.