Huskies beat USC 73-67 in OT

Published 9:29 pm Wednesday, December 29, 2010

LOS ANGELES — Terrence Ross started his Pac-10 career with a bang off the bench.

The freshman and senior Matthew Bryan-Amaning scored 18 points each, helping Washington rally to beat Southern California 73-67 in overtime in the Pac-10 opener for both teams on Wednesday night.

Ross, whose points were a career high, hit four early 3-pointers to tie his career best before fouling out with 2:37 left in overtime.

“I had a small defender on me so I knew it would be easier to go up and under on him,” he said. “It definitely gave us some quick points. I definitely thought we needed something.”

Bryan-Amaning added eight rebounds, and Justin Holiday scored 12 points for the Huskies (9-3), who won their third in a row and sixth in their last seven.

“It’s big for me and it’s big for the team,” said Ross, who played a season-high 26 minutes. “This is something we definitely wanted to start the season off.”

The Huskies outscored USC 18-12 in overtime, with Holiday accounting for their first five points. USC’s Donte Smith tied it at 58 with a 3-pointer, but the Trojans trailed the rest of the way.

“They just don’t make many mistakes. We had to do a lot of things, throw the kitchen sink at them to come up with a victory on the road,” said Huskies coach Lorenzo Romar, who employed a zone defense for the first time this season. “Some had to do with foul trouble and some had to do with changing the pace of the game.”

Washington extended its Pac-10 winning streak to eight games and won its school-record fifth straight road league game, both streaks dating to last season. The Huskies were backed by a large contingent of vocal fans who drove up from San Diego, where Washington plays in the Holiday Bowl on Thursday.

Nikola Vucevic had a career-high 28 points — making all 14 of his free throws — and 14 rebounds for the Trojans (8-6), who had won two in a row.

“We played really hard,” he said. “There were just a couple of things we didn’t do at the end that cost us the game.”

USC shot 34 percent from the floor and kept itself in the game from the free-throw line, hitting 24 of 32 attempts.

“Our guys played really hard, they just didn’t play particularly well,” USC coach Kevin O’Neill said. “You got to make big shots in big games. It’s big britches time. You got to step up.”

Vucevic hit a 3-pointer that drew the Trojans to 54-53 with 1:27 to play. Bryan-Amaning made the first of two free throws to keep the Huskies ahead 55-53 before Vucevic got fouled and made both to tie the game at 55.

Venoy Overton missed a 3-pointer with 44 seconds to go. Washington retained possession, but Isaiah Thomas missed a 3 with 7 seconds left to force overtime.

The Huskies’ high-octane offense was held in check. They came in averaging 90.5 points, and had scored more than 100 points four times.

Neither team led by more than five points in the second half. USC opened with a 12-5 run that extended its lead to 38-33. The Huskies took their first lead of the second half with a 13-8 spurt, capped by two free throws from Overton that made it 46-45.

“Washington kept coming at us,” O’Neill said. “We gave ourselves a chance to win down the stretch and we didn’t get it done.”

The Trojans exploded from the opening tip, outscoring Washington 16-4 with multiple steals that led to dunks. They scored 14 points off the Huskies’ 10 turnovers in the half.

The Huskies answered with a 24-10 run over the rest of the half to lead 28-26 at the break. Four times they got within one point and finally took their first lead of the game on a 3-pointer by Ross with a minute to play. USC was limited to two field goals over the final 8½ minutes.