Trojans Fine From Line, Beat Huskies

USC continues to cut down contender after contender in its quest for the Pacific 10 basketball championship.

The Trojans knocked off Washington, 61-50, Thursday night at Hec Edmundson Pavilion to retain sole possession of the conference lead with an 8-2 record.

Friday night, USC beat UCLA, 78-77, in double overtime. Then, the Trojans squeezed by Oregon State, 60-58, Monday night at Corvallis, Ore., on guard Larry Friend’s awkward shot in the final second.

The Trojans found another way to win Thursday night. They just set up shop at the free-throw line, making 31 of 44.

USC was particularly effective at the line from the 9:28 mark until the final minute. During this stretch, the Trojans converted 16 of 20 free throws and wrapped up the game when wingman Ron Holmes made two free throws for a 57-50 lead with 1:43 left.

Amazingly, USC went 11 minutes without making a basket in one stretch of the second half.

USC has a 5-0 record on the road in conference play. Hostile crowds don’t seem to disturb the Trojans.

At the outset of this trip, USC might have been considered fortunate to win one of three games since it was playing the Beavers and Huskies, preseason favorites to win the conference, on their home courts.

But USC, 14-5 overall, is in a position to sweep in the Northwest if it beats Washington State Saturday afternoon at Pullman, Wash. The Trojans have already swept the Arizona and Oregon schools on their home floors this season.

Washington, 6-4 in conference and 15-7 overall, easily beat USC, 66-50, last month at Cal State Dominguez Hills. But West German Olympian Detlef Schrempf, who has almost singlehandedly beaten the Trojans in the last three meetings, wasn’t a factor Thursday night.

The 6-9 forward scored only eight points, eight below his average, while making only 3 of 8 from the field.

USC forward Wayne Carlander tracked Schrempf for a while in the first half. Then, Holmes went after him in a box-and-one defense. the Trojans were in a 3-2 zone most of the second half.

“We had no plans to use the zone that much,” USC Coach Stan Morrison said. “They had to work hard for a shot, and it pretty much took Detlef out of the game.”

So the logjam is breaking up a bit in the Pac-10. USC has a one-game lead over Arizona (7-3), while Oregon State is 6-3, and UCLA and Washington are each 6-4.

Not only did Carlander do a creditable job of guarding Schrempf in the first half, he also made 9 of 11 free throws to finish the game with 13 points.

Holmes was even more accurate from the line, 9 of 10. He also hit 6 of 9 from the floor to finish with a game-high 21 points.

“I think the key ingredient to this game was the very thing we didn’t have in the second half of our game with Washington at home,” Morrison said. “We had offensive patience, and we picked at them, taking the good-percentage shot. I’ve said all along that we are a good free-throw shooting team in the last 10 minutes of a game.”

The Huskies certainly didn’t benefit from any home-court officiating. Washington went to the free-throw line only 10 times, making 4.

The officials, Richie Ballesteros, Charlie Range and Carter Rankin, kept the game at a slow tempo with their frequent calls.

This was a half-court game. Fast breaks were at a minimum.

The Trojans led at halftime, 30-25, and moved ahead by seven points early in the second half. But Washington went on a 9-0 run to lead at 34-32, and it seemed that USC was about to cave in as it did when Oregon State blitzed the Trojans, 16-0, at the outset of the second half.

But Clayton Olivier hit a jump shot in the lane, Holmes sank two foul shots, and the Huskies never led again.

The Huskies lost some offensive and rebounding muscle when 7-foot Christian Welp, Schrempf’s countryman, fouled out with 9:28 to play.

That seemed to trigger USC’s steady parade to the foul line. Carlander got things going by making 5 of 6 for a 46-40 lead. The Huskies couldn’t get any closer than four points thereafter, and the Trojans distorted the final score when Holmes made two layups in the last 18 seconds.

Take away Holmes’ two window-dressing baskets and the Trojans made only four field goals in the second half. Yet, they were in control of the game.

Washington Coach Marv Harshman, who is retiring at the end of the season after 40 years of coaching, said his team was beaten in many different ways.

“USC played more intelligently and with more intensity,” he said. “This loss makes it just about impossible for us to win the conference championship unless we win all the rest of our games, and I don’t think we’ll do that, the way we’re playing now.

“USC just played better defense on us than it did in the first game. We shot the ball real well in the first game (a school-record 73.3%) and made them shoot it from far away. This time, they got ahead, spread us out, and we had to chase them. It was just a game of a different tempo.”