Los Angeles, CA (News4UOnline) – It was a tale of two halves for the USC men’s basketball team in its Big Ten Conference matchup against the Washington Huskies. The Trojans dominated play in the first half, nearly doubling the scoring output of the Huskies during the first 20 minutes of action.
Things then went in reverse for the Trojans in the second half. Washington came out of the locker room from the intermission and played like they finally got the memo to attend the party.
After trailing 48-30 at the break, Washington outscored USC 54-28 in the second half to pull off a stunning 84-76 win at Galen Center. In the process, the Huskies was able to knock the Trojans (8-1) from the unbeaten ranks.
USC had entered the game with an unblemished mark, winning its first eight games of the season. Thanks to the Huskies, the Trojans’ win streak is no more. Now, some regrouping has to be done and figuring out what went wrong for USC in those final 20 minutes.
USC got off to its big start because they shot the ball with efficiency in the first half. The Trojans made 14 of their 28 field goal attempts (50 percent) in the opening half. They also shot 41 percent of their 3-pointers. It’s too bad that they were not able to sustain their hot shooting.
That percentage cooled considerably in the second half of the ballgame. After converting 14 field goals in the first 20 minutes, the Trojans made only eight shots in the second period. For the game, USC made 22 of 60 shots from the field, a mere 37 percent.
The Trojans shot worse from behind the arc, making 35 percent of their treys (8-23). The Trojans were paced by the 21 points scored by Chad Baker-Mazara. Jordan came off the bench and contributed 17 for USC. The Huskies were led by Hannes Steinbach, who scored a game-high 24 points.
Desmond Claude added 22 points as Washington recorded its sixth (6-3) win on the season.
Dennis has covered and written about politics, crime, race, sports, and entertainment. Dennis currently covers the NFL, MLB, NBA, NCAA, and Olympic sports. Dennis is the editor of News4usonline.com and serves as the publisher of the Compton Bulletin newspaper. He earned a journalism degree from Howard University. Email Dennis at dfreeman@news4usonline.com
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