So, as this blog's title implies, we here at Offers are more interested in lampooning the hilarious failures of the USC Basketball program than we are of actually chronicling the occasionally successful efforts of our other athletic endeavors - namely, football. So with USC being crushed at home by Stanford and our first basketball game happening tonight, it seems like a good idea to start discussing basketball. First, let's quickly review the story lines of the season:
New Coach: Morongo aficionado Tim Floyd was running an up-and-coming program just last year, one that appeared to be very likely to make a jump into basketball's elite. Then it was discovered that the creator of our blog's title happened have given an envelope filled with $1,000 cash to a handler of O.J. Mayo. So that ended his tenure rather quickly. In the turmoil, we actually hired a decent coach. Kevin O'Neal has a reasonably good track record at developing programs. In the 90's, he coached for Marquette, Tennessee, and Northwestern, enjoying some degree of success at each program. He then transitioned into a career as an NBA assistant, coaching for the Knicks, Pistons, and Pacers, coaching under Jeff Van Gundy and Rick Carlisle. He was the head coach of the Toronto Raptors for one season.
All that just says that Kevin O'Neal has been coaching for a long time and people are willing to hire him. More importantly, he joined Arizona as an assistant coach under Lute Olsen and quickly became the interim head coach after Lute Olson took a leave of absence due to some rather nasty personal issues. When Olson returned, O'Neal was left without a team, and decided (inexplicably) to go to USC. So far, he's only been receiving positive reviews from those who cover the team, so this is all very comforting. It'll be interesting to see how he handles coaching a team largely devoid of talent.
The Team is Largely Devoid of Talent: Most of the talented players USC once had have left. Taj Gibson, Daniel Hackett, and DeMar DeRozen all jetted to play for professional teams. Hackett went to Italy, DeMar went to Canada, and Taj went to "Chicago." Even some other players left for greener pastures - Mamadou Diarra, the least coordinated basketball player I have personally witnessed, left to "hopefully play in France," and Keith Wilkinson is now playing in the Ukraine. And I'm pretty sure I'm pretty sure I'm missing a couple of players who left - it's hard to keep track of them all. So the cupboard is kind of bare.
Who is left? Well, there's Dwight Lewis, our undisputed star player. Around him is a cast of misfits and incompetents. We have Donte Smith at point guard, the only point guard I've ever seen that has a 50% failure rate at bringing the ball across mid-court. We have Marcus Johnson at the wing, who is an excellent defensive stopper, but has no concept of how to play offense. At forward we have Nikolai Vucevic, who is a great rebounder and shot blocker, but is unable to position himself on offense. At the other forward, we have Alex Stephenson, who has some chance of becoming a decent player, but is completely raw.
Even that thin level of incompetence has absolutely no bench supporting it. The only two recognizable players on the bench are rapper Lil' Romeo, or Percy Miller, and Kasey Cunningham, a poor forward that has probably already met his ceiling. Lil' Romeo might not even be able to play this year, because of some eligibility issues that the NCAA has brought up.
What's the schedule like? In a word, brutal. Thankfully the Pac-10 is stunningly weak this year, or else our conference schedule could be 18 straight games of total pain. As it is, we're only really competitive with doormat Washington State and will likely head in as underdogs against the other 8 teams. Our non-conference schedule was clearly set up in anticipation of a better USC program. The non-conference schedule includes such powerhouses as Texas and Georgia Tech on the road, and quality programs like Nebraska and Tennessee at home. Thankfully, the rest of the teams are cupcakes, but with the current Trojan squad, even cupcakes are dangerous games.
What's the prediction for the season?
9th place in the Pac-10, lose in the first round of the Pac-10 Tournament, and no invite to a post-season tournament.
At least the season will be absolutely hilarious.
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Shaquille O'Neill and Neal Armstrong were on the Bill O'Really show last night.
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