I’m still bullish. We were outplayed and out coached, but had every opportunity to win this. We simply could not make a clutch play. We missed our FT and open 3s, Arizona did not. Rushed shots in the end when we did get the stops.

I hope this is the game that humbles us to finish strong.

I don’t know..the final stretch of games are going to be the true test and going into it UofA should’ve been the least of our worries. Worst game of the season by far.

I'm of two minds here.

#1. Good teams lose and we always knew we weren't a perfect team. Sean Miller is an experienced coach so he drew something up that really shattered our game plan and our confidence which is impressive.

#2. However, I think your title nailed it - no one else showed up today besides Evan. Tahj quietly had 17 (maybe more?) pts but who knows how many shots he took to get there and no one else really played like they wanted it. I don't think chevez or white played poorly, but they need to do more if they have to pick it up for the rest of the team.

Drew, Ethan, I Mobley, Max, Noah all didnt show up today.

Good part about losing this way NOW is that we got the film and it wont happen in the first round of the tournament - at least we won't get shut down in the same way I hope.

I'm still bullish on this team like PxPxTrojan . This will humble us, we'll learn from it and bounce back.

This game definitely had the energy and feel of a tournament level game and USC did not rise to the occasion. Evan and Eaddy were their steady productive selves, Goodwin also had a few nice plays but all in all everyone else just went through the motions and were out hustled at home. Very disappointing.

Goes to show how far the program has to go if role players can't do their job and expect the stars to take over a game just to stay competitive. No gimmes left on the schedule, so hopefully this is the wake up call the team needs to lock in and not take any more games off.

I look at this game the same way as I did the Oregon state road loss. Another game they let slip away, perhaps also because they were looking ahead to what they thought would be the big Oregon game?

We were very much outplayed, but it’s not like we didn’t have the opportunities. 6 freaking free throws when down 7 and we make 3! It’s game that I hope the team looks back on and is angry at themselves for wasting every chance they had between not controlling defensive rebounds and missing out on every tip ball, missing FTs, and wide open 3s.

We are still in the drivers seat if we beat Oregon.

I just wonder how we will look against a team like a Creighton, Tennessee, West Virginia or a Texas in the tournament? Making your free throws are detrimental to winning games & losing games like how we lost today is very concerning leading up to the toughest part of our schedule...you know the whole..”you’re only as good as your last performance/game” mantra...we’ll see because Oregon is as close to a team like a Creighton, Tennessee, West Virginia or a Texas, while UofA is not.

Well Eaddy showed up.
But not the others.
POOR fts. Anderson can finish a lay up.
isaiah M back to contributing only a little, Peterson in a slump, and so forth.

We play like today, we will lose again.

Come on boys, fight on.

More in terms of the 2H but yes Tahj went above his scoring average. I really thought he was going to go on a little tear when he and James Akinjo started trading baskets. Very tough for us to win games vs quality opponents when Isaiah Mobley, Isaiah White and Drew Peterson aren’t contributing.

Nobody showed up in the 1st half. There are things I watch in every game that tells me if the Trojans are going to be in a dog fight or have an easy time of it:

1. Free Throws: Are we getting to the line? Are we making out "and 1" opportunities? Are we hitting the front end of the 1 and 1 opportunities? Are we keeping the other team off the FT line?
2. 2nd Chance Opportunities: Are we getting offensive rebounds? Are we keeping other teams off the boards when on defense? Are we getting to the loose balls?
3. 3-pt Shooting: Are we getting open looks? Are we making those open looks? Are we forcing any 3-pt shots or taking outside of the offensive flow? Is the other team getting too many open looks? Are they making their shots? Are they even making forced 3-pt shots?
4. Overall shooting: Are we getting good shots inside the arc and paint? Are we keeping the other team outside the paint?

What I saw in this game:

1. FTs - We were missing them early on the back end of "and one" opportunities. Plus we were not getting to the line enough and were fouling Arizona too often. The game was virtually in our hands when we got 6 FT opportunities when down 8, to only make 3. Instead being down by 2 we were still down by 5. The mind blowing part of that is the only guy to hit both his FTs, Isaiah Mobley. USC shot 59% (13/22), while Arizona shot 82% (19/23).
2. 2nd chance opportunities: We were getting killed on the boards on the defensive end. And almost every loose ball was going to Arizona. Someone said we were out coached? No, we were out hustled. Arizona was hungry on the boards, hungry for loose balls. We were a step slow everywhere. We were better in the second half, but the above mentioned missed FTs sealed our fate. Arizona outscored USC 17-11 on 2nd chance points.
3. 3-pt Shooting: Arizona seemed like they could not miss. We could hit the ocean in the 1st half, often missing wide open looks. We finished 7/20 (35%) while Arizona was 8/17 (47%).
4. Overall shooting: Again, in the 1st half, we could not hit the ocean. USC also could not seem to get open looks.

The energy was not there in this game, for whatever reason. Some of that was Arizona's aggressiveness. I think the way they lost to ucla had a lot to do with that. They came out aggressive and USC did not respond. USC played much better the 2nd half, was already in a large hole. But that lost 6 FT opportunity sealed USC's fate. We lost by 9. We were outscored by 6 at the FT line and 3 behind the arc, while being even inside the arc.

That being said, even great teams have off nights. Let's see how they bounce back on Monday before we start throwing dirt on our boys.

DBMitch great analysis, that sums up the game pretty nicely. Enfield (post game) and shotgun both noted lack of physicality, refs being a little loose on the whistle, and lack of effort as being key contributors to our loss. I think this is great film to review to prepare us for the future.

I'll submit my rebuttal for being "out-coached" last night. I didn't pay much attention to what defensive scheme they were running or what plays WE were running, but it looked like we were scouted well. I can't remember if we had a dunk last night, but we had very few easy layups outside of White's very early in the game.

The last few games I noticed we had nice lobs/passes from Tahj to Evan and lots of nice interior passes between The Mobleys. Somehow last night AZ shut all that down. I don't know how, but that same fodder we used for going on a run and getting a chance to setup our defense wasn't there.

I watched our guys set picks and make cuts to no avail, like AZ knew where our guys were going. Maybe we just weren't playing hard enough, but it looked like there was more to it to me.

Swim of this reflects on rebounding too, if their defensive scheme put them in a better position for the rebounds, that's a huge advantage.

Can't wait to see how we respond tomorrow.

i put everyone on double secret probation including evan. our interior toughness and presence was just awful. killed on the boards and making tubelis look like dirk and jordan brown look like an actual 5-star.

and that's all i kept thinking about when watching michigan & ohio state. good GOD. and the ducks are built a lot like those 2 teams, for the record.


the hope is that saturday was a huge learning lesson. and the best way to get over a bad loss is to play again almost immediately. we have that opportunity tonight.

but the ducks scared me more than the wildcats. i fear they smell blood in the water and will come out on fire. we are about to see what this team is made of.