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Arizona Wildcats vs USC Trojans Basketball Recap

Arizona 82, USC 73

If you were taking bets in December on the Pacific-10 Conference team with the best chance of getting an at-large invite to the NCAA Tournament, you probably would have opted for the USC Trojans. Now, at the end of the month of January, it’s hard to respond to that question with the same answer. The boys from Arizona now have a leg up on everyone else in the race for a second Pac-10 NCAA bid, with the Washington Huskies being nearly assured of a ticket to the Big Dance.

The Arizona Wildcats, plainly put, are off to one of their best starts since the 2004-2005 season after dispatching the Southern California Trojans in Pac-10 matchup from the McKale Center in Tucson, Arizona. The Wildcats – who were a No. 3 seed in the 2005 NCAA Tournament and won the regular-season Pac-10 title during that campaign – aren’t lighting up the world the way they did six years ago, but they’re certainly doing a lot better than last year’s team, which failed to make any postseason tournament and missed the NCAAs for the first time since 1984. This year’s Cats are now 7-2 in conference play, a half-game behind Pac-10 leader Washington. The Trojans fell to 4-5 in conference on the not-so-young season, which has taken a bad left turn for the kids from SoCal.  In December, USC knocked off both Texas and Tennessee to wipe away the ugly stain of November losses against Rider and Bradley. When early January arrived, the Trojans had a solid NCAA resume with non-conference scalps Arizona plainly lacked. USC eclipsed the U of A in terms of overall quality; all the Trojans had to do was stay the course in their conference.

They’ve clearly fallen short; Arizona, meanwhile, is steadily doing what it needs to without a whole lot of fanfare.

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While the Wildcats dominated the first half and built a nine-point halftime advantage, it was star Derrick Williams who stole the show in the second stanza. Williams scored 17 of his 20 points in the second half to lead head coach Sean Miller's ballclub to its six win in the last seven contests. The final score was much closer than the flow of the game suggested. Lamont Jones contributed 17 points as Arizona blistered the nets to the tune of 61 percent shooting.

The Trojans continued their uneven play on Saturday in Tucson. After defeating Arizona State on Thursday evening, head coach Kevin O'Neill's squad was outclassed against the Wildcats. Nikola Vucevic had 18 points while Donte Smith added 14 for the Trojans. USC trailed by as much as 22 and shot just 13-for-25 from the charity stripe. Those 12 missed points really could have come in handy; then again, Arizona was much more dominant than nine points.

These are two teams headed in distinctly different directions. December feels like three months ago, not merely one.

By Matt Zemek
DFN Sports Senior Staff Writer