Jan. 13--Among USC's basketball players, there is no consensus. Asked what the team's low point was last season, there was no lack of candidates.
How to choose among 20 losses?
Elijah Stewart said his came at Arizona State.
"We really wanted that one," he said.
Then he reconsidered: "Oh, I forgot about Cal, too!"
Jordan McLaughlin: "Sheesh, it was all of them. The Colorado one? That one went to, like, three overtimes."
Julian Jacobs: "The whole season was sort of a low point."
This season, the search for a low point remains elusive, but for a different reason: there hasn't been one.
USC plays UCLA on Wednesday at Pauley Pavilion in the rivalry's most significant basketball iteration in years. The Trojans enter the game second in the Pac-12 Conference standings. They are 14-3 overall, 3-1 against league opponents, and they are hovering just outside the top 25 in the national rankings.
So what has changed? On that, the players agree. They're older. They're mentally tougher -- not in an abstract sense, but in small ways they demonstrate on the court. And they've added freshmen rim protectors, Bennie Boatwright and Chimezie Metu.
Despite last season's misery, the players do not consider this season's early success a surprise.
McLaughlin said he committed to USC because he believed in Coach Andy Enfield's vision, which has not wavered.
"Any time you're building something there's frustrations along the way," Enfield said. "But there's never been any doubt."
Last season, the coach recognized that USC had the youngest roster of any power-conference school. And, he added, the Trojans lost eight games by five points or fewer.
This season, the players say, they know how to win close games. The major difference may just be experience. Stewart said last season's team wasn't mentally strong, which led to small breakdowns at the end of games. They forgot to close out on shooters or they didn't know what moves an opposing player leaned on during crunch time.
That weakness has turned into a strength. For example, in the fourth overtime against Arizona on Saturday, McLaughlin had studied Arizona guard Gabe York, anticipated his crossover in the final seconds, and batted the ball away.
"That's just being mentally aware and just mentally tough throughout the whole game," Stewart said.
