Road is not-so-well traveled in the Pac-10

Blame cardboard-consistency airline food, unfamiliar beds and large quantities of opposing fans.

But blame something, because Pacific 10 Conference teams don’t travel well. Home teams are 44-19, with USC’s Thursday night’s matchup with Washington in Seattle featuring a paradoxical pair:

Washington is 16-1 at home and 1-6 on the road. USC is 11-3 at home and 1-6 on the road.

USC Coach Kevin O’Neill said the conference’s lack of teams with veteran players, aside from California, the Pac-10 leader at 9-4, is why no team has fared well on the road.

“And the other thing is, because everybody is so bad on the road . . . you play [hard] every second you’re at home, [saying] ‘Well, we can’t lose this because we’re going to lose back out there,’ ” he said.

Yet at this point, with every league team having already faced each other, unfamiliarity is gone.

“We’ve seen everybody already, so it’s a lot different,” USC forward Marcus Johnson said. “We know what happened the last game that we can fix this game.”

O’Neill said it’s common to change things the second time around.

“Some of them work, some of them don’t,” he said.

He said adjustments are necessary when facing Washington, which averages 15.8 more points per game at home.

“Their energy at home, in that building, is unbelievable,” O’Neill said.

It’s not as if USC hasn’t been close to winning on the road in conference play.

The Trojans lost at Stanford on two missed tip-ins at the buzzer, at California and Oregon State despite leads midway through the second half and at Oregon when, as O’Neill said, “manager-gate” happened with a few minutes left and the score tied.

“We’ve been competitive in every single game we’ve played in the conference,” he said.

USC has tied or led in the second half of all 12 of its Pac-10 games, but Johnson said the key is playing a “full 40 minutes.” O’Neill agreed, and said that if there is another factor at Washington, a place USC has lost four of five games, it’s tempo.

“If we try to play their tempo, we’ll lose, but we still have to make sure we attack their pressure to get easy baskets,” O’Neill said.

Etc.

Johnson guarded Washington star Quincy Pondexter (20.4 points per game, 8.1 rebounds) when USC beat the Huskies, 87-61, last month and held him to two points on.

O’Neill said Johnson will defend Pondexter again, but he expects more from the Husky star.

“Quincy’s a great player,” O’Neill said. “I would think he’s going to be super-aggressive based on what happened in the last game.”

baxter.holmes@

latimes.com