USC students were lined up two and a half hours before tipoff, eager to get into the Galen Center on Thursday night for the rivalry game against UCLA. Once inside, they were handed a black t-shirt to “blackout the Bruins.”
The Trojans fans didn’t have to wait long for the party to start, as their team jumped out of the gates with a quick 9-0 run.
It was the first sellout game at the Galen Center since January 2011 – when USC defeated UCLA 63-52 – and it showed. The crowd was loud right from the beginning, and somehow got even louder during timeouts as fans danced along with the music blaring out of the speakers.
The Trojans led comfortably from start to finish to the tune of a 80-61 final tally, not letting the Bruins crash the party.
“The Galen Center is just a terrific atmosphere for college basketball when it’s like this,” said USC coach Andy Enfield. “It’s loud and the fans are on top of you.”
For the Trojans, the game had it all. It was fast and exciting as USC outran UCLA 13-0 in fast break points. The threes were raining down as the team shot 40 percent from distance.
And then there were the highlight dunks, including an alley-oop off a turnover from freshman guard Aaron Holiday’s lazy post-entry pass that pushed the Trojans’ lead to 14 with just over three minutes to go in the first half.
RT to vote this unbelievable alley-oop with the violent finish from @Lou_weezy_ana the #SCBestPlay from tonight’s W! pic.twitter.com/kFHGSsZe3w
— USC Men's Basketball (@USC_Hoops) February 5, 2016
It’s quite clear that USC and UCLA basketball are on different trajectories – at least for this year. The Bruins have fallen to 4-6 in conference play for just the third time in 65 years and are now fighting to just sneak into the NCAA Tournament.
It sounds like UCLA is just trying to get through the season, already looking ahead to next year when the No. 4 recruiting class in the nation joins the team.
“We know we’ve got a lot of help coming, so we just got to make sure this year we’re getting better,” said coach Steve Alford.
On the other side of town, USC have just swept its rival in basketball for the first time since the 2009-2010 season and is looking to improve on its seeding for March Madness – CBS Sports ranked the Trojans as a No. 6 as of Monday.
While Thursday night was the first sellout of the season, USC has played a perfect 14-0 at home and holds a 7-3 Pac-12 record.
“At this point, people around certainly know who we are as compared to the last two years,” said USC junior guard Julian Jacobs. “It’s fun to be talked about in the same light as football. Now we expect to win.”
The winds are changing, and the crowd at the Galen Center sensed it Thursday night. The Victory Bell – painted red for the first time since 2012 after the Trojans ended three years of Bruin football dominance last November – rang loud along with the crowd as the final seconds ticked down to zero.
The student section smelled blood, serenading the visiting UCLA team with chants of, “Just like football!” After the final buzzer, the dejected Bruins walked slowly back into the locker room as the party continued on the court.
The Trojans will try to extend the party all the way to the Big Dance in March. UCLA on the other hand, will be outside looking for a way to sneak in.