A sellout at Galen. 10,258 tickets sold. The stands were the loudest and most electric I have seen in years.The upper deck was full as was the student section (who were visibly seen waiting 2 hours before the game outside). Only some of the Founders seats showed vacancy signs. Whether UCLA fans there or not, only about 5 % of the attendees showed powder blue colors.
USC dominated tempo, and jumped off to a racehorse 9-0 lead and never relinquished it in the game. Though they did well on offense it was the defense that set the tempo holding UCLA to 61 points and 27% 3 point shooting. Jacobs led the team in points with 17, Stewart came off the bench and scored 16 and calmed the waters with a 3 pointer after UCLA got it down to 6 points with 4 minutes remaining. Reinhardt had 13 and did a good job along with others in holding the Bruins top scorer Alford to 3-13 shooting. JMac subjugated his normal game to be the catalyst with passing for 10 of the teams 17 assists and disrupting UCLA with 5 of USCs 8 steals, most ending in a USC score. And he added 10 points near the end of the game. The last 3 points were controversial as he ran out the clock but literally threw up an underhand shot and it rainbowed in. There would have been 4 seconds left at shot clocks end and a hitting the rim would have killed it.
Miscellaneous: The Refs let the guys play calling 9 fouls in the first half. The they upped that and called 16 in the second half. Bennie Boatwright showed his propensity to shoot when not in the groove and was 2-9. And a lot of passes fired into the key ended in turnovers.
USC dominated tempo, and jumped off to a racehorse 9-0 lead and never relinquished it in the game. Though they did well on offense it was the defense that set the tempo holding UCLA to 61 points and 27% 3 point shooting. Jacobs led the team in points with 17, Stewart came off the bench and scored 16 and calmed the waters with a 3 pointer after UCLA got it down to 6 points with 4 minutes remaining. Reinhardt had 13 and did a good job along with others in holding the Bruins top scorer Alford to 3-13 shooting. JMac subjugated his normal game to be the catalyst with passing for 10 of the teams 17 assists and disrupting UCLA with 5 of USCs 8 steals, most ending in a USC score. And he added 10 points near the end of the game. The last 3 points were controversial as he ran out the clock but literally threw up an underhand shot and it rainbowed in. There would have been 4 seconds left at shot clocks end and a hitting the rim would have killed it.
Miscellaneous: The Refs let the guys play calling 9 fouls in the first half. The they upped that and called 16 in the second half. Bennie Boatwright showed his propensity to shoot when not in the groove and was 2-9. And a lot of passes fired into the key ended in turnovers.
