1-0 Big Ten<\/a>) and No. 21 Washington (8-1, 0-1) had battled, neither team managing to mount a double-digit lead. The Trojans seized the lead in the third quarter, but every effort to pull away was squashed by the Huskies.<\/p>\nA late flurry from a familiar face in former Trojans guard Avery Howell, who scored 13 of her 16 points after halftime, kept Washington within striking distance until the final minute.<\/p>\n
But USC refused to back down. With less than five minutes left, Londynn Jones forced a turnover, dove for a loose ball and started a fast break that was finished by Kara Dunn. Kennedy Smith, who scored 13 points, hit a turnaround jumper in the paint on the next trip down. And then with less than two minutes left, Davidson took off through the lane, extending the lead to five.<\/p>\n
\u201cI saw a resolve in our team,\u201d Gottlieb said. \u201cI knew we could get the next stop. I knew we could get the next play.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was a furious end to what had otherwise been a gritty battle between Big Ten foes. USC finished 23 for 60 from the field after missing its first 11 shots. The Trojans never quite found their stride from deep either, hitting just two of 17 threes. <\/p>\n
Davidson, in particular, opened the game without any rhythm on offense. She started 0 for 5 and ice cold from the perimeter. But the freshman hit 10 of her last 16 shots and ended up with a career-high 22 points to go with 12 rebounds.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are just some nights that are like that,\u201d Davidson said. \u201cSometimes you\u2019re just off. Those shots you make 9 out of 10 times, just keep shooting them.\u201d<\/p>\n
That was the sentiment for USC early on as nothing was falling for the Trojans. They were held scoreless for the first 8\u00bd minutes as no one seemed safe from the teamwide slump.<\/p>\n
But with its offense struggling, USC\u2019s defense did its part to muddy up the game. After one quarter, neither team was shooting better than 16%. They combined to score just 12 points in the first 10 minutes.<\/p>\n
Gottlieb was particularly proud of that stretch, even as USC struggled mightily to find the hoop. Still, the Trojans\u2019 defense never let the early deficit grow. By halftime they\u2019d tied the score.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo not score for 8\u00bd minutes and not lose our spirit and only be down by four, I think, says a lot about who we\u2019ve become and are trying to become,\u201d Gottlieb said.<\/p>\n
USC\u2019s renewed rebounding efforts also made an impression, after assistant coach Beth Burns challenged the team to be better on the boards. The Trojans finished with 50 rebounds, a dozen more than their opponents. <\/p>\n
That extra effort proved to be the difference as USC held on against the Huskies, starting its Big Ten slate with its grittiest win of the season to date.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jazzy Davidson glanced at the basket with less than two minutes left in USC\u2019s Big Ten opener and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":85966,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[48224,48362,423,30250,30252,48,52,51,47,50,49,5463,1869,48361,1417,427,14921,43356,23138,48360,558],"class_list":["post-85965","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-big-ten-opener","tag-double-digit-lead","tag-game","tag-jazzy-davidson","tag-kennedy-smith","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-minute","tag-night","tag-past-no","tag-point","tag-team","tag-third-quarter","tag-three-point-range","tag-trojans","tag-usc-woman","tag-washington"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85965","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=85965"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85965\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/85966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=85965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=85965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=85965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}