As West Virginia built a 19-point lead against UCLA, all sophomore Darren Collison could do was hold his head in his hands and watch his Bruins go down in defeat.

The point guard was reduced to a spectator for the first time this season due to a left shoulder injury. The point guard was replaced in the lineup by freshman Russell Westbrook, who made his first career start.

It is unclear when the injury took place, but Collison said he didn’t feel any pain in the shoulder until after the USC game.

“I want to play every game, but the best thing is to try and stay healthy for the near future,” Collison said. “I’m going to continue to do my rehab and treatment. I think the best thing was to stay out for this game.”

The decision to hold Collison out was a game-time decision, as he came out with the team and attempted to warm-up to see if he could play with the injury.

“(Collison) wasn’t even using his left hand when he was warming up,” Coach Ben Howland said. “When you’re out there and you’re not trying to use your left hand at all then obviously you’re not ready to play.”

In Collison’s place, Westbrook played a career-high 32 minutes and had a difficult time facing West Virginia’s unique 1-3-1 trapping zone defense, turning the ball over in the first minute of the game.

“I made a decision to keep (Collison) out and be conservative to err on the side of caution because we don’t want him to be out for a long period of time,” Howland said. “Obviously that put Russell in a tough situation on the road where he played a lot of minutes today.”

The freshman eventually fouled out after scoring just four points on 1-of-11 shooting and recording four assists and five rebounds.

Afterward, a somber Westbrook answered questions leaning on a wall and seemingly looking for answers to explain his poor play.

“I feel like it’s my fault,” Westbrook said. “I should have come out and stepped up, and I didn’t step up like I should. It was just like, I had to go out there and play. I didn’t get my teammates involved like I should have.”

Collison had been the spark plug for the Bruins all season, averaging 13.0 points (second on the team) and led the team with 5.7 assists and 2.2 steals. Perhaps more than stats however, Collison had provided the steady hand in steering UCLA to a No. 2 national ranking. That presence was clearly missing in Saturday’s loss to the Mountaineers.

As a team leader however, and just a sophomore himself, Collison knows that the Bruins will need Westbrook to step up in the future.

“It’s a learning experience,” Collison said. “(Westbrook) has to look past this game. It’s his first start. He’ll learn from this. (The loss) wasn’t just Russ, it’s a team thing. It’s not his fault. He’s got many games ahead of him.

MATA OUT: In addition to the loss of Collison, the Bruins also lost the services of junior center Lorenzo Mata for the second half.

Mata had woken up in the morning with a sore left hip, but played through the injury for 11 minutes in the first half, scoring 2 points and grabbing 2 rebounds. At halftime however, he said he felt the injury tighten up again.

“I aggravated (my hip) during the game,” Mata said. “I just couldn’t keep on going.”

In his place, Alfred Aboya played 26 minutes, and little-used sophomore center Ryan Wright also saw 2 minutes of action.

“(Mata) came in at halftime and said, ‘I can’t play,’” Howland said. “In the middle of the second half he said, ‘I can play again.’ I just elected not to use him.”