USC, Oregon to Decide Who Is Cellar-Dweller

There will be an atmosphere of desperation clouding tonight’s basketball game between USC and Oregon at McArthur Court in Eugene, Ore.

Both teams have 4-12 records in the Pacific 10, and the loser will have the ignominious distinction of being the sole occupant of the conference cellar.

The Trojans have yet to win a league road game this season--they have lost seven--in contrast to last season, when they won eight of nine and shared the conference championship with Washington.

USC (10-16 overall) will end its season Saturday afternoon against Oregon State at Corvallis, Ore.

USC will be playing without forward Derrick Dowell, whose suspension was extended through the remaining two games of the regular season.

Dowell, the team’s top rebounder and second-leading scorer, was suspended last week after he told an assistant coach that he didn’t want to start the second half of USC’s game with California Feb. 24 at the Sports Arena.

In summarizing the season, Morrison said that his team has been out of sync, with four freshmen not blending with returning veterans.

“I’m not going to apologize for the season, although we feel badly and disappointed,” Morrison said. “We aren’t going to wallow in self-pity, but we’ll wallow in sweat with independent workouts and weight training when the season is over.”

Dowell didn’t start five games before his suspension, mainly due to missing practices. Morrison was asked if there was something he could have done earlier in the season to keep the situation from reaching a point where he found it necessary to suspend Dowell.

“Most definitely,” Morrison said. “There was a most dramatic changeover in our personnel this season. There were a number of adjustments we made for our young people, and we bent over backwards to make those adjustments, socially and academically as well as athletically.

“In so doing, we had a tendency to bend with the veterans in the program--not just Derrick. If I had come down hard earlier when things occurred, we probably would not have paid this price (suspension) down the stretch.”

Trojan Notes Tonight’s game will be broadcast by KNX radio starting at 8 p.m., and Saturday’s game with Oregon State will also be carried by KNX and televised by Channel 2 starting at 3 p.m. . . . The Ducks, 9-17 overall, are a young team led by senior center Jerry Adams, the Pac-10’s leading rebounder with a 10.2 average. . . . USC beat Oregon Jan. 5 at the Forum, 75-60. . . . If USC winds up in the conference cellar, it will become the first team to go from first to last place since Oregon took that dive from 1919 to 1920, excluding the years that the league was divided into southern and northern divisions. . . . Of USC’s 16 losses this season, six have been by six points or fewer. Moreover, the Trojans have lost 10 games while trailing by four points or fewer in the final four minutes.