LOS ANGELES — For all the flaws, for all of USC’s dead stretches and drastic slumps, one fact has become fairly apparent: this is a fairly decent basketball team when its starters actually, well, start.
Freshman Isaiah Collier. Stalwarts Kobe Johnson, Boogie Ellis and Joshua Morgan. Transfer DJ Rodman. When Trojans coach Andy Enfield has sent those five out for tip-off – heck, when he’s been able to – USC is 9-4, a reality starkly different from the injury-riddled disappointment this season has brought. And Enfield has reminded reporters at virtually every opportunity of how the Trojans’ season changed once Collier, Ellis and Morgan went down at the same point midseason, a firm belief that has suddenly taken light across a recent stretch of good health.
“This is the team,” Enfield said earlier in practice this week, “we thought we’d have.”
And USC outlasted Arizona State, 81-73, on Thursday night at the Galen Center, continuing a recent 4-2 stretch of drastically improved basketball. When season-long issues of stagnant offense and lackadaisical defense sapped momentum in strange bench-heavy lineups, much of that starting unit buoyed USC (13-17 overall, 7-12 Pac-12) through key second-half stretches, Ellis and Johnson making key plays down the stretch to close out ASU (14-16, 8-11).
This is not a team turning over a new leaf, perhaps – a team suddenly able to close games and gelling at the perfect time with the Pac-12 tournament approaching. This is the team the Trojans could have always been.
That group often rides on the back of Ellis, the super-senior captain in perhaps his final days in a USC uniform and wholly unwilling to go out without a fight. He hit a 3-pointer shortly into a close-knotted second half, then nailed three more within a three-minute span midway through the second half. On the final 3-pointer, he relocated behind the arc off a turnover on pure muscle memory and buried a quick-trigger shot without so much as setting his feet.
With smoke off his fingertips, his confidence grew audacious, catching the ball out beyond the 3-point line on one second-half possession and visibly waving off any teammate within a 5-foot radius to attack ASU’s Jose Perez in isolation.
Ellis rimmed a floater off the iron. Can’t win them all. But he missed just four more shots on the night, finishing with 28 points, a ridiculous 6-of-8 showing from long range and an 8-of-12 mark overall.
From the tip, USC’s offense hummed, everything from Collier and Ellis’ fingertips turning to gold as the Trojans went on an early 18-9 blitz. With about 13 minutes left in the half, though, Enfield went on a rapid-fire swing of substitutions, finally subbing out Collier for junior forward Harrison Hornery, who had largely fallen out of the rotation in February. Suddenly, USC had a lineup of Bronny James, Oziyah Sellers, Kobe Johnson, Hornery and Vincent Iwuchukwu – Sellers, who like Hornery had seen his playing time slashed in February, perhaps the most natural scorer of the bunch.
USC scored exactly two points in the next 7:57.
Sellers made a pretty baseline jumper, then went quiet. James, a guard who somehow previously avoided taking a 3-point shot for four straight games, hardly much as looked at the rim. Hornery missed a couple of shots. By the time Enfield signaled for Collier and DJ Rodman off the bench, ASU was already on a 7-0 run; with all momentum lost, USC headed into the break tied at 32.
Ellis got hot in the second half, however, and fellow captain Kobe Johnson made a couple of timely 3-pointers and defensive stops, finishing with an efficient 15 points. As a parade of ticky-tack fouls from a particularly zealous referee group sent the final minutes into a free-throw battle, Ellis drove down the lane with seconds waning, dropping in an and-one finish for a cherry on top of a recent USC surge.
Perez scored 22 to lead Arizona State. USC finished 25 for 30 from the free-throw line and outrebounded ASU 32-22.
More to come on this story.