Titanic Loss in the Pacific for Arizona

USC was due, overdue, and double due.

They had played top-10 teams before, and played them close, but against No. 2 Arizona, the Trojans got their payoff Thursday night when junior forward Adam Spanich made a desperation off-balance three-point shot with no time remaining in overtime to upset the Wildcats, 91-90.

Spanich, the team’s leading scorer during the season with a 12.5 average, got the ball, pumped once, turned away from a defender and let fly..

When the ball bounced off the rim and fell in as the buzzer sounded, pandemonium broke loose.

“I did not get a good look, but I tried to shoot it in with a good arch so it had a chance to fall in,” Spanich said amid a mass of USC students and fans who rushed the floor at game’s end.

Spanich also hit the three-point basket to tie the score, 78-78, and send the game into overtime. “I thought the game would go down to the wire, and I took extra practice,” he said.

Before 5,193 at the Sports Arena, the Trojans (8-19, 4-13 in Pacific 10 Conference) ended their seven-game losing streak and the 19-game winning streak the Wildcats (26-4, 16-1) had strung together, the longest in the country.

USC also prevented Arizona, which completes its regular season Saturday at UCLA, from becoming the first team to finish Pac-10 play 18-0.

The Trojans, who had gone 2-1 in their previous overtime games, looked more poised than they did in those games or in any of their other tight contests.

Arizona looked to have the game in hand when guard Jason Terry hit a 10-foot jumper to put the Wildcats ahead, 90-88. Freshman guard Kevin Augustine, who finished with eight points, could have put the Trojans ahead on their prior possession but rushed a layup and missed the shot with 38 seconds left.

Spanich played eight minutes and finished with eight points (his only two baskets were dramatic ones), but it was Gary Johnson who kept the Trojans in the game by scoring 27 points on six-of-13 shooting from three-point range. Jarvis Turner, who dislocated his left pinky with about four minutes left in the first half, returned in the second half and scored 15 of his 19 points.

The Wildcats were led by Michael Dickerson, who had 26 points and seven rebounds, and Mike Bibby, who had 20 points.

Arizona shot 35% from three-point range and 50% from the field. The Wildcats just could not make the baskets when it counted.

“Without A.J. Bramlett, everyone was just scrambling for the rebounds,” Arizona Coach Lute Olson said of his star center who was in foul trouble late in the game. “The team that played hardest won the game.”

The Trojans found their range and found loose balls, and unlike any time this season, found each other, recording 16 assists.

USC made 12 of its 24 three-point attempts and shot 50% for the first time this season from behind the line.

The Trojans made seven three-point shots in the first half, a far cry from their performances during the seven-game slide. Johnson made four of eight three-point shots and finished the half with 15 points to lead USC.

The Wildcats, were cold in the first half, at least for them, shooting 43.2%.

The Trojans led at intermission, 38-36, when freshman forward Shannon Swillis followed three tip-in attempts with :03 to play in the half.