Floyd Shapes His Role at USC

New USC basketball Coach Tim Floyd acknowledged Friday that the previously unsettled coaching situation had been hard on the team.

He is eager to provide stability, especially for the four players who have eligibility next season.

To aid in the process, Floyd plans to remain in the background as interim Coach Jim Saia guides the Trojans for the remainder of the season.

But he’ll be watching.

“I plan to meet with the players and coaching staff on Monday and talk to everybody individually,” Floyd said. “With the returning players, I would really like to find out a little bit more about what’s going on with them by meeting with academic counselors, our admissions people and compliance people right off the bat.

“I’ve had an opportunity to watch the team play, and I intend on continuing to watch ‘em play. I’ll probably watch a game somewhere along the way in person, I’ll watch a practice somewhere along the way, but I don’t want to be a distraction to this team, and I’m not going to offer any suggestions.

“I’m going to critique, which sure beats the heck out of being critiqued, and try to encourage more than anything else. They’ve got enough suggestions to keep them going this year.”

Floyd, who said he had not assembled his staff, has interacted with Saia, but isn’t familiar with the other holdovers from Henry Bibby’s staff.

USC has no inside players returning, so Floyd said he was particularly interested in the program’s recruiting efforts.

“What matters is the energy level that we have, the institution that we have to sell, the city that we have to sell and the staff that we put together,” Floyd said. “I come into this job very confident from the standpoint that we’ve done it before, and at places that were a little bit down.

“We had to try to get it better, and it worked out. I feel that we’ll be able to get it done again.”

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TONIGHT

at Arizona State, 5 PST

Site -- Wells Fargo Arena.

Radio -- KMPC (1540).

Records -- Sun Devils 13-3 overall, 2-2 in Pacific 10 Conference; Trojans 7-9, 0-5.

Update -- USC is off to its worst start since losing its first 12 Pac-10 games in the 1988-89 season. Freshman forward Nick Young scored a team-high 18 points in Thursday’s 77-68 loss to Arizona. Arizona State is coming off an 86-82 loss to UCLA. The Bruins did a good job on defense against standout center Ike Diogu.