Eric Musselman doesn’t think USC players understand UCLA rivalry

The USC Trojans ended their regular season with a bad loss to the UCLA Bruins. For head coach Eric Musselman, it was a frustrating way to end an up-and-down first season with the Trojans.

Part of the issue makes sense to Musselman. As he explained after the game, he doesn’t believe the USC players fully understand the meaning and magnitude of the rivalry with UCLA.

“I felt like the rivalry they didn’t understand even in game one,” Eric Musselman said. “And they certainly didn’t understand today what it means to the student body at USC and the boosters and alumni. I said it before the game, on national TV, I don’t know if they understood. I mean, we played the game like we played any normal game and it’s not supposed to be a normal game.”

The rivalry between USC and UCLA dates back to 1928. The two Los Angeles schools have actually been in the same conference since 1928, adding to the importance of their games against one another. It’s UCLA who leads that all-time series 150-114. However, this was notably the first time since 2019 that the Bruins swept the Trojans in the regular season.

For Eric Musselman, there is a comparison to an earlier stop in his career. From 2015 to 2019, he coached Nevada. There, the game against rival UNLV was special and they treated it like it was special. That didn’t happen for USC against UCLA this season.

“I know nobody cares but University of Nevada against UNLV, that’s not a normal game. Our players always played like it was not a normal game. All I can do is give UCLA a ton of credit. I thought they played tougher than us. I thought they had a greater will to win. Then, our turnovers, it’s really hard to win when you turn the ball over like that. We talked about them coming and trapping any time you turned your back off the dribble,” Musselman said. “And they probably got at least 15 points off of that.”

In the end, it was a 90-63 blowout loss for USC. They were out-rebounded in the game and turned the ball over 20 times. After an incredibly frustrating game, Eric Musselman had a simple message in the locker room after the game.

“I’m definitely not consoling them. I just wrote the score up there. It’s another night of somebody scoring 90 points,” Musselman said. “And I don’t know if I wrote the turnovers up there or not.”

The season isn’t over for USC with the loss. The Trojans will now regroup and look to the Big Ten Tournament where they’ll hope to make a run.