It seems fitting that on the 100-year celebration of Arizona’s first basketball game at USC — Feb. 23, 1922 — the Trojans are ranked the second-highest they’ve been at any time in the 117-game history of UA-USC basketball.
Maybe “celebration’’ is a bit of a stretch, but it still seems hard to believe.
Why, in the last 20 years alone, Arizona has played No. 3 ASU, No. 6 Washington State, No. 7 Washington and No. 2 Stanford, but USC has only once entered a game against the Wildcats ranked higher than its current No. 16 in the AP poll.
That came 30 years ago, when the No. 10 Trojans beat the No. 2 Wildcats 70-69 on a buzzer-beater in Los Angeles in the final game of the 1991-92 regular season.
What makes Arizona’s visit to USC so special — a centennial of sorts — is that (1) the Trojans are staging a “White-Out’’ and expect a rare capacity crowd of 10,258 at the Galen Center, and (2) this could be USC’s best team since conference expansion 44 years ago.
Typical of USC’s tepid modern basketball history, the Trojans have won a single Pac-10 championship, 1984-85, but were unranked that season, start to finish. This USC team has climbed as high as No. 5 in the AP poll this year but an explicable pair of losses to Stanford diminished the Trojans’ 13-0 start.
Now, after winning at Oregon on Saturday and building a 6-0 streak since losing at McKale Center on Feb 5, the Trojans are back on the radar, one of those you-don’t-want-to-play-’em teams that surface each March.
One question should be answered Tuesday at Galen Center: Are the Trojans the real thing?
If USC beats Arizona and is able to complete a memorable weekend by winning Saturday at UCLA, it will without question be USC’s best regular season of the last 30 years. How did this happen?
Soft-spoken USC coach Andy Enfield, who has the Pac-12’s most composed sideline demeanor, has built a roster that should be considered the blueprint for success in college basketball of the 2020s.
Harold Miner helped USC to the national basketball stage in the early 1990s. This year's team may be even better than those Trojans.
USC is old, in college hoops terms. There is not a freshman or sophomore among the Trojans’ six leading scorers. Enfield has craftily built a winning roster that includes three double-figure scoring transfers: Drew Peterson from Rice; Boogie Elis from Memphis and Chevez Goodwin from Wofford, yes Wofford.
If the season ended today, Peterson would be a first-team all-conference player. So would 6-foot 11-inch junior Isaiah Mobley, who wisely chose to stick around for a third season rather than gamble with the NBA before he could improve his draft position.
Whatever happens Tuesday, USC won’t win its first Pac-12 title in 37 years. That possibility fizzled with those puzzling losses to Stanford, but whenever you are in the conversation with “best this’’ or “best that’’ it gets deserved attention.
Do you realize how difficult it is to become your school’s best basketball team since the Pac-10 expanded in 1978. Take a look at those I consider the best at each school since ’78:
Arizona. Best team: 1987-88. Record: 35-3 and 17-1 in conference. Ranked No. 1 for six weeks. Outscored opponents by 21 points per game, a league record since John Wooden’s UCLA Bruins of the ’70s.
ASU. Best team: 1980-81: Record: 24-4, 16-2 in conference. Typical of ASU’s choppy basketball history, the Sun Devils have since been unable to win a conference title or finish better than 12-6 since.
Cal. Best team: 1993-94: Record: 22-8, 13-5 in league. The Jason Kidd-Lamond Murray team was superior to Cal’s 2010 league champion, 13-5, accomplished during a depression of Pac-10 basketball.
Colorado. Best team: 2011-12. Record: 24-12, 11-7 in league. The Buffaloes haven’t been more dangerous since that ’12 team led by Spencer Dinwiddie and Andre Robertson.
Oregon. Best team: 2016-17. Record: 33-3, 16-2 in league. The Ducks of ‘17 lost in the Final Four with a loaded roster: Dillon Brooks, Tyler Dorsey, Jordan Bell, Chris Boucher and sixth-man Payton Pritchard.
Oregon State. Best team: 1980-81: Record 26-2, 17-1 in league. The No. 1-ranked Beavers lost their regular-season finale, to ASU, and didn’t recover, losing at the buzzer in their first NCAA Tournament game.
Stanford. Best team: 2000-01: Record:31-3, 16-2 in league. Often ranked No. 1, Stanford and star guard Casey Jacobsen’s shot at a national title was ruined by Maryland in the Elite Eight.
UCLA. Best team, 1994-95: Record 31-2, 16-2 in league. National champs.
Utah. Best team: 1997-98. Record 30-4. The WAC champs blew out defending national champ Arizona in the Elite Eight and reached the national title game, losing to Kentucky.
Washington. Best team: 2004-05: Record 29-6, 14-4 in league. The Huskies drew a No. 1 seed with its best starting five of the Pac-12 years: Nate Robinson, Tre Simmons, Brandon Roy, Bobby Jones and Will Conroy. Lost in Sweet 16.
WSU. Best team: 2007-08. Record: 26-9, 11-7 in league. Tony Bennett’s senior-laden, final Cougar team reached the Sweet 16.
Now comes Enfield’s Trojans, bidding to become the best USC team of the last 44 years, moving past George Raveling’s No. 2-seeded NCAA Tournament team of 1991-92 — the Harold Miner season, 15-3, runner-up in the Pac-10 — with that victory over Arizona.
On paper, the Arizona-USC game matches the century-old, first-ever UA-USC game, played Feb. 8, 1922 at the old Tucson Armory. On the day of that game, the Star wrote:
“Never before has such a fierce struggle between two high-class teams ensued on a local court.’’
Arizona won that night, 36-28. Tuesday’s game should be but every bit the fierce struggle played those two high-class teams of 1922.
