The lowdown:
With Nick Rakocevic and Jonah Mathews benched to start the game for a violation of team rules, USC went into a tough matchup with an early uphill climb.
Despite the absences and Josh Green’s triple to open the scoring, USC’s work under the basket kept the Trojans in the game in the first five minutes.
The effort on the offensive side of the ball wasn’t matched on the defensive side though. Arizona used a handful of offensive rebounds to pounce. They pulled away by 11 points with just over six minutes remaining in the first half.