Trojans Make Wrong Call by Blaming the Referees

It wasn’t the fatigue. It wasn’t the pressure.

At the risk of being ridiculed by those ridiculous looking red-shirted fans from Tucson--Bill Walton, you know who you are--it wasn’t even Arizona.

What defeated USC in the Pacific 10 tournament championship game Saturday was more cumbersome, consuming and avoidable.

Appearing in the second half, it clung to the Trojans the way Jason Gardner couldn’t.

It weighed them down the way Luke Walton wouldn’t.

It intimidated them the way no opponent can.

The Trojans lost to Arizona, 81-71, not because of a basketball, but because of a chip.

The giant chip on their shoulder about referees.

For several years now, it has taken the shape of a belief that, until they become a consistent national power, the Trojans are never going to be fairly officiated in games against teams that are.

This perception may be true. But it is also deadly.

While griping at the officials Saturday, the Trojans lost a step, diverted a focus, blew a game.

Leading by eight points at halftime, a superior USC team was haunted by an old inferiority complex that made weary legs even heavier and tired minds wander. By the time the Trojans looked up, Arizona had fashioned a 19-4 run and stolen the game.

It happened on the court, where such leaders as Brandon Granville and Sam Clancy would show frustration about calls while Arizona would be flying past them toward another basket.

It happened on the sidelines, where Coach Henry Bibby strayed too far on the court and was assessed a costly technical foul with 1:50 remaining and the Trojans trailing by eight.

Later, it happened in the interview and locker room, where the Trojans illustrated the basketball equivalent of scolding the weather.

Bibby, in using a referee rip nearly as creative as his defense, said his tired Trojans didn’t run into a wall.

“We ran into three walls,” he said.

Clancy, who scored only 12 points and was outrebounded by all three Arizona big men, talked about something else entirely.

“I was just wondering what I had to do to get a call,” he said. “I mean, call a foul.”

Granville, who was called for four fouls by the same official, Charlie Range, wondered something else.

“It felt personal out there,” he said.

Here’s a hint.

It was personal.

USC will not get the same calls as Arizona in a big game. It will happen until USC wins as many games every season as Arizona.

Granville will be nailed for tiny fouls more than other guards. It will happen as long as he continues to throw up his hands at bad calls, angering referees who feel they have been embarrassed on national television.

As for Bibby, no, he is not allowed the same arguing latitude as those coaches from Duke and Kentucky. But it will take at least another Elite Eight appearance to change things.

Is any of this fair? No.

But can any of this be proven? Not hardly.

Can the Trojans do anything to stop it? Not until robots are hired as referees.

So they should just stop trying.

And maybe listen to a guy who, believe it or not, was Saturday’s voice of reason.

Yeah, that Jerry Dupree.

“Certain times, we got frustrated with the officials’ calls, and we were so worried about the call, we didn’t get back fast enough on defense,” said Dupree.

Could it be that some of those incidences occurred during Arizona’s 50-32 second-half margin?

“I think six times, they got around our press for a basket, right behind our backs,” Dupree said. “Other times, the referees would give them the ball so fast after a call, they ran past us.”

A solution? Simple.

“We need to just ignore the refs,” said Dupree. “We need to let the coaches handle that.”

So Bibby, even after two of the best consecutive wins in school history, must go back to work as the team prepares for next week’s NCAA tournament.

Because of this loss, the Trojans will probably be seeded no better than fifth. Because of their underwhelming nonconference schedule, it may be worse.

This means by the time the tourney is dwindled to a Sweet 16--and there’s still little doubt that the Trojans are good enough for that round--Bibby’s team could face another longtime power.

And this same issue could come up again.

“We’re SC, we see a lot of badly officiated games,” said Clancy. “I mean, we played Duke last year, we know the score. We had to play a perfect game to beat them.”

So maybe that will be the case this year.

So what?

If the Trojans would stop worrying so much, they would realize, they are capable of such a game

Instead of looking at the striped shirts, they would be wise to look underneath the cardinal-and-gold shirts, a source of power that has worked before.

It worked against Stanford. It worked against Oregon. For the first half Saturday, it worked against Arizona.

The Trojans must now believe it can also work against a long plane ride, a strange arena, a chippy opponent ... and, yes, even the officiating.

“You know, we have said that to each other before,” acknowledged Granville. “We have said, ‘Let’s keep the game out of everybody else’s hands. Keep it out of the officials’ hands. Keep it out of the opponents’ hands.’

“Remind ourselves to play hard enough to win the game by enough that we won’t have to worry about anything else.”

Now you’re talking.

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Bill Plaschke can be reached at bill.plaschke@latimes.com.