USC Gets It Back in Time for Victory

Their swarming defense was leading to easy fast-break baskets. Their post players were converting never-before-seen moves. Their biggest nemesis suffered an injury and had to be helped off the court.

Everything was going the USC Trojans’ way against Stanford midway through the second half Saturday afternoon at Staples Center.

And then nothing was.

The Cardinal whittled what had been an 18-point deficit to four on a turnaround jumper by Lawrence Hill with 3 minutes 19 seconds left, leaving the Trojans teetering on the edge of collapse and a second consecutive defeat to open Pacific 10 Conference play.

Then something truly unexpected happened. USC freshman forward Jeremy Barr, who had already badly missed two free throws and was shooting 18.2% from the line, made two consecutive foul shots.

After the inbounds pass, Trojan freshman guard Ryan Francis stole the ball from normally sure-handed guard Chris Hernandez in the backcourt and went in for a layup. Just like that, USC was safely on its way to an 82-71 victory that took some of the sting out of a disheartening loss to California.

“That Cal game, that bothered us, so we came back and played real hard,” said Francis, who had a career-high 15 points, four steals and no turnovers in 33 minutes. “We wanted to show everybody we’re no fluke, so we came out and played hard defense.”

The Trojans, who improved to 10-3 overall and 1-1 in conference play, had 13 steals and scored 27 points off 18 Stanford turnovers to defeat the Cardinal for the first time since the 2003 Pac-10 tournament. All five USC starters scored in double figures for the first time this season.

Junior guard Lodrick Stewart had 18 points and eight rebounds for the Trojans, who outrebounded Stanford, 39-31. The Cardinal played the final 14:11 without leading scorer Matt Haryasz, who sprained his left ankle.

Stanford (4-6, 0-2) trailed by 18 points when the 6-foot-11 Haryasz departed and faced the same deficit with 11:20 left after Barr made a baby hook shot to give USC a 60-42 lead. The Cardinal then went on a 20-6 run, capped by Hill’s turnaround shot, before Barr and Francis restored order for the Trojans.

“They went exclusively to a pick-and-roll game and did a great job executing it and really cut the margin without Haryasz in the game,” said USC Coach Tim Floyd, who got his first Pac-10 victory. “It just had to do with their guard play and their execution.”

Floyd received the usual strong play from guards Nick Young (16 points) and Gabe Pruitt (14 points) as well as surprising contributions from big men Abdoulaye N’diaye and Barr. N’diaye scored a career-high 11 points and had seven rebounds, and Barr scored eight points in 20 minutes.

“Jeremy really did good this game,” Stewart said. “He was showing me some moves in the post I didn’t know he had.”

Stewart said the Trojans, off to their best start since opening the 2001-02 season 11-2, were able to withstand Stanford’s rally because of their offensive poise.

“Last year if we were in the same situation we probably would have jacked up some crazy shots on a lot of one-on-one plays,” Stewart said. “But we look for each other now. Now everyone’s not ball hogging and trying to shoot the ball. It’s a team, and that’s the only way we’re going to win.”

Hill had 20 points off the bench and guard Dan Grunfeld added 17 for Stanford, which ended USC’s 11-game streak of holding opponents under 70 points. The Cardinal also made 41.7% of its shots, becoming only the second opponent in the Trojans’ last 11 games to top 40%.

Nonetheless, it was the Trojans’ defense that sealed the victory, especially the late steal by the scrappy Francis.

“We love him,” Floyd said of the 5-11 freshman. “He gives us some heart and some toughness, and he doesn’t take a play off.”