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USC Basketball: Checking in on Trojans 2022-23 NCAA Tournament resume

By Holden Walter-Warner

LOS ANGELES, CA - DECEMBER 14: Boogie Ellis #5 and Drew Peterson #13 of the USC Trojans high five after a point gainst Long Beach State 49ers at Galen Center on December 14, 2022 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Jayne Kamin-Oncea/Getty Images)
LOS ANGELES, CA - DECEMBER 14: Boogie Ellis #5 and Drew Peterson #13 of the USC Trojans high five after a point gainst Long Beach State 49ers at Galen Center on December 14, 2022 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Jayne Kamin-Oncea/Getty Images) /
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USC Basketball Kobe Johnson (Photo by Jayne Kamin-Oncea/Getty Images)
USC Basketball Kobe Johnson (Photo by Jayne Kamin-Oncea/Getty Images) /

The case against USC

The win over UCLA was great, but it’s not enough on its own. The team only has three victories over Quad 1 teams and the weakness of the Pac-12 makes those victories look less impressive than they do in a vacuum.

USC’s last few games of its schedule are critical, but until then, the Trojans don’t really have much of a chance of improving their resume. They do, however, have a good chance of suffering a ruinous loss.

These are the games coming up in USC’s schedule: home against Washington State and Washington, at Oregon and Oregon State, then home again with California and Stanford. Only one loss in this stretch would be acceptable and there are a couple of defeats that would be particularly ugly.

There are also a lot of bubble teams ahead of the Trojans in the NET rankings right now. This is not an exhaustive list, but here are some teams ahead of USC: Boise State, Maryland, Memphis, West Virginia, Penn State, Kentucky, Texas A&M, Nevada, Oklahoma State, Ohio State, and Utah State.

There are other bubble teams nipping at USC’s heels too, including Oklahoma and Seton Hall. Most of the teams behind the Trojans who play in power conferences have harder strengths of schedule, or at least the ability to have a harder strength of schedule by the end of the year.

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