No Luck for USC Against Irish

Third-ranked Notre Dame registered a 17-1 run in the middle of the second half and defeated USC, 70-61, on Thursday night before 2,178 at the Sports Arena.

The Trojans (5-5) had a chance to catch the Irish (11-0), but couldn’t overcome the Notre Dame charge that put the game away.

USC trailed, 34-22, at halftime, before staging its rally behind Jessica Cheeks. Cheeks, a freshman guard from Narbonne High, made a jump shot, a layup and a three-point basket to bring USC within 44-39. Then senior Tashara Carter made an 18-foot jump shot to cut Notre Dame’s lead to 44-41 with 15 minutes remaining.

But Notre Dame called a time out and regrouped before the run that increased its lead to 61-42. The Irish leader was 6-foot-5 senior center Ruth Riley, who scored 23 points before fouling out with 4:02 to play.

But even with its offensive lapses, USC was only a few free throws from playing Notre Dame even. At least that’s how USC Coach Chris Gobrecht saw it, reflecting on her team’s 32.8% shootingand 17-for-33 effort from the free-throw line.

“If we make some of those free throws, we’d have had a shot at winning this game,” she said.

“We got ourselves back in the game, then we started turning the ball over [21 for the game] and we kind of lost our steam.”

The loss was the third in a row for USC, which dropped games to Baylor and Texas Tech last week.

“Those three teams were 28-1 when we played them,” she said.

Because the Trojans have lost three in a row to quality opponents, Gobrecht remains upbeat as her team prepares to open Pacific 10 Conference play next week with road games at Washington State and Washington.

“If this was a poor effort on our part tonight, I’d be concerned. But that wasn’t it,” she said. “We just couldn’t make any free throws.”

Or much of anything as USC missed 41 shots.