Jacob Cofie helps USC men’s basketball hold off Washington State

LOS ANGELES — The USC men’s basketball team built up a lead in the first half and held Washington State off in the second half to beat the Cougars 68-61 in a complete-game effort.

“Our defensive metrics have not been good, but we’ve been scoring at such a high rate that we’ve gotten by winning games with our offense,” head coach Eric Musselman told reporters. “The real positive tonight is we had to grind the game out when we weren’t scoring and shooting very well.”

Jacob Cofie recorded a double-double of 21 points and 10 rebounds and Chad Baker-Mazara finished with 19 points. Ezra Ausar added 13 points, mostly off his 9-for-11 free throw shooting.

Rihards Vavers was Washington State’s leading scorer with 13 points on 41.7% shooting.

Cofie was closing in on a double-double by the end of the first half, scoring 14 points on 7-for-8 shooting while pulling down seven rebounds for the Trojans (10-1 overall, 1-1 Big Ten).

The 6-foot-10 sophomore guard was in a scoring slump and had scored just six points in the last two games combined.

“Muss believes in the player I can be,” Cofie told reporters. “For me, it’s just playing hard and just giving it my all, and the game will come. I played as hard as I could today, and then I saw the results.”

Lineups have been inconsistent this season due to injuries, but Cofie has started in every game.

He was part of a starting lineup that was identical to the one that took the floor in the Trojans’ previous game against San Diego, which also included Ezra Ausar, Chad Baker-Mazara, Jerry Easter II and Ryan Cornish.

“We needed him to bounce back,” Musselman said of Cofie. “We felt like we could have gotten way more from him in the Washington game and the San Diego game. And he did not have two of his better games. So tonight was super important. We made a conscious effort to go to him.”

Washington State (3-8) battled in the paint but was only able to put up eight points from that area. The Cougars shifted to the perimeter and five players hit at least one 3-pointer to shoot 35.7% from long range in the first half.

Cofie drained a jump shot from mid-range and then went chest-to-chest with Washington State’s ND Okafor to make another jumper as part of a 17-3 scoring run, and the Trojans made 11-of-14 free throws to build their lead.

The Cougars tacked on nine straight points to close out the end of the first half. They scored from all three levels and had contributions from seven different players in that time frame, but USC still held a 33-26 advantage at the break.

“They continued playing with confidence,” Musselman said of WSU. “But they’re a scrapping team, they’re physical. We watched them play Arizona State in (the Maui Invitational), and they gave Arizona State all that Arizona State wanted that night.”

Jordan Marsh made USC’s first 3-pointer of the game with 16:38 left in the second half on a night of uncharacteristically poor shooting from beyond the arc. The Trojans were shooting 39.2% from 3-point range heading into the game but shot 7.7% on Sunday.

“Adversity, that’s all it is,” Ausar said. “You’ve gotta respond the next game. That’s all.”

Baker-Mazara, the team’s leading scorer at 21.9 points per game, went into the tunnel after being subbed out with 13:46 left on the clock. He returned near the 10-minute mark when the Trojans were leading 47-44.

“He’s been bothered by a hamstring, and so he was on the bike in the tunnel,” Musselman said. “And it’s been bothering him, probably for about two weeks. And I guess on one of his strides, he felt some discomfort.”

USC increased its offensive intensity when Baker-Mazara returned and, on the other end of the court, chased the Cougars off the 3-point line as best as possible in the remainder of the game.

Baker-Mazara leaped for a block with 1:38 on the clock to keep Washington State from making it a one-possession game. Cofie made two free throws when his team got the ball back to give USC enough cushion to win the game.

“He made a crucial block, and he’s got great length,” Musselman said. “And that’s an area that we want Chad to keep getting better at, because I think he’s got the tools to be a really, really good defender or an elite defender.”

USC’s matchup with Washington State was part of a four-game nonconference stretch. Big Ten play will resume on Jan. 2 at Michigan, and the Trojans’ next game is against UTSA on Wednesday.