Los Angeles, CA – Today the USC Trojans hosted the Arizona Wildcats at the Galen Center chalked full of mystery suspense and nail biting drama, with this enormous 4 OT victory going to USC , final score USC 103 Arizona 101.
And the Oscar for best men’s Pac 12 basketball team that wanted to win so bad they could taste it goes to the USC Trojans!!! But oh baby those Wildcats made the Trojans work for every last one of those 103 points. This game went into not one, not two, not three, but four overtimes! It was incredible.
Let’s start from the beginning both teams came out ready to play which was quite a surprise since Arizona had just played a dogfight of a game against UCLA on the 7th and as well as USC had just narrowly dodged a lost to Arizona State. But neither team showed signs of fatigue everybody looked suited up and ready to get down to business.
That first half for all intensive purposes went to USC. By the end of the first Jordan McLaughlin and Elijah Stewart were both in double digits. But the Wildcats were looking more like the Tasmanian devil with a total of 17 rebounds in the first. 12 of them courtesy of Kaleb Tarczewski. And those rebounds worked as an anchor to on the Trojans ankle as to not let them run to far ahead.
But that second half belonged all to the Wildcats. In the last 5 1/2 minutes of the game Arizona went on a 12 point run to tie the game with 1 minute and 24 seconds remaining. Now here’s where the drama ensued … Nikola Jovanovic put up a layup that would put USC in the lead by two points with one minute two seconds remaining on the clock but in the last 32 seconds of regulation play Kadeem Allen served up a crowd pleasing layup making the score 73 all. The Trojans had two more opportunities to close this out in regulation time but they couldn’t make it happen. Now this is where the orchestra would cue the dramatic music…. Because this battles is officially going into overtime.
Doing four periods of overtime it was a proper street fight. I mean steals, blocks, and showboating dunks on both ends of the court. But at the end it was the team that executed the best fundamental basics that would take home this victory. Yes the whole game hinged who could bring it at the line and the Trojans where hitting them free-throws at a staggering 78%.
This game had it’s fair share of highlights but USC’s Elijah Stewart really stood out tonight hitting five out of eight 3-pointers and four out of five free throws giving him a game total of 27 points. Made props to the Wildcats Allonzo Trier with 25 points and 2 steals and the California export York Gabe shooting 6 for 6 at the line.
USC’s has dodged the big L bullet for second time this week in conference play. Being a young team they still have to learn how to effectively close the game out in the second but I must say they had nerves of steel tonight. Just fearless! Myself and almost 7000 fans all agree this was a great game. The drama continues for USC on January 13 as a meet up with their crosstown rivals UCLA to see who gets bragging rights for the city of Los Angeles.
