The battle for Los Angeles is heating up in college basketball and here are three reasons USC Basketball will be better than the UCLA in 2020-21.
The debate over who is the best college basketball team residing in Los Angeles will surely heat up as the 2020-21 season approaches. USC Basketball is are coming off a solid season and despite some losses to the professional ranks, head coach Andy Enfield has some exciting ready to take on the Pac-12. Despite some heavy skepticism after hiring Mick Cronin, things seemed to work out for UCLA as the former Cincinnati head man had the Bruins playing strong basketball, and as a result, took home the conference’s Coach of the Year award.
UCLA finished the season, which was cut short by one regular-season game, by winning nine of their final 11 games and had a one-game lead on USC (and Arizona State) for the No. 2 seed in the upcoming conference tournament. Their intra-city rivals, USC finished the season 22-9 and swept the season series from UCLA. They finished 11-7 in the conference but it was a struggle to get there, winning their final three games, but went just 4-4 over their eight games prior to that.
As I said, the Trojans swept the season series from UCLA, including the last game both teams would play. The meeting was one of the ugliest of the season as USC held UCLA to 31% shooting in a 54-52 win. As is the case at the high-major level, there tends to be a lot more roster turnover than there used to be, so while you can take away some things from season to season, also a lot can change. Both teams should be competitive in the Pac-12, but by year’s end, whenever that may be, USC should come out on top in this debate.