USC men focused on what’s in front of them as NCAA Tournament hopes get slimmer
LOS ANGELES — Success has dropped in for occasional visits with the USC men’s basketball team this season. It traveled with the Trojans to the Maui Invitational in late November and strode into Minneapolis to see them pull off a gritty overtime win against Minnesota.
USC earned these dates with success because of an unwillingness to roll over when injuries had at one point wiped out three key players. Head coach Eric Musselman was squeezing every ounce of talent out of every player, from touted transfer Chad Baker-Mazara to Ryan Cornish, an Ivy League addition.
And yet, a spot in the 68-team NCAA Tournament field might be out of reach for the second season in a row. The Trojans’ hopes of going dancing appear to be crumbling before their very eyes.
“We’re not in the tournament – we’re outside looking in,” Musselman said after Tuesday night’s 81-62 loss to UCLA at Pauley Pavilion. “We have to figure out a way to win a game before we even worry about anything of that magnitude. We have three opportunities left, and then we have the Big Ten Tournament.”
Oregon had pushed USC (18-10 overall, 7-10 Big Ten) to the wrong side of the NCAA tourney bubble on Saturday, leaving them projected as one of the “first four out” teams in ESPN’s latest bracketology on Tuesday morning. UCLA (19-9, 11-6) likely nudged the Trojans a bit further down the pecking order with Tuesday’s result.
However, projections are never guarantees. USC, which is on a four-game losing streak, has three games left against No. 12 Nebraska, Washington and UCLA to make a strong enough case to earn one of the Big Ten Conference’s nine projected bids.
“We’re a team that has been on the bubble with three games left and we haven’t played good basketball in the last four games,” Musselman said. “And obviously, the Northwestern loss and the Oregon loss is going to hurt us for sure.”
UCLA’s Donovan Dent claimed the spotlight with a season-high 30 points on Tuesday, but Baker-Mazara was the star for USC.
He poured his heart into Tuesday’s rivalry game, making four of USC’s seven first-half 3-pointers before briefly leaving the game with an apparent leg injury early in the second half.
Athletic trainers quickly got to work, stretching the Trojans’ leading scorer’s lower body until he re-entered the game roughly five minutes later. He never appeared to fully recover his strength, hobbling at times on the weakened leg, but he still contributed a team-high 25 points.
Musselman said he won’t know Baker-Mazara’s status until Wednesday, and he was dissatisfied with the lack of scoring from the team overall. USC shot 35% from the floor against UCLA and hit just 30.8% of its 3-point shots.
The Trojans have spent almost the entire season without Rodney Rice, who has been out since Dec. 17 due to a right shoulder injury, and Musselman acquiesced to the challenges that his absence has caused.
“It kills our spacing. It kills all the help to the ball,” Musselman said. “And as my wife said, take a 20-point scorer off any team and see what they do. Take Dent off of them, and let’s see what they do. That’s a fact.
“I haven’t brought (Rodney’s injury) up. We got three games left. I’m gonna bring it up now, because to run our offense without a guy like him is problematic, for sure.”
The last time USC made the NCAA Tournament was in 2023, which was coincidentally also Musselman’s last appearance. He was coaching Arkansas at the time and it was his third straight trip to the tournament.
Success has visited the Trojans, but only in spurts. What will it take for it to stay?