– by Adesina O. Koiki
A Lot of Sports Talk editor-in-chief
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COLLEGE PARK, MARYLAND — Unfortunately for JuJu Watkins, the realities of USC’s new life in the Big Ten Conference is that her days traveling up and down the Pacific Highway to play road games have been replaced my winters in the sometimes brutal conditions of the Midwest and East Coast, with the team’s latest stops taking them to the shadows of the Big Apple and the nation’s capital.
“We’ve been on the East Coast now for like four days,” Watkins said. “It’s freezing.”
What may be more daunting is the teams in the Big Ten having to get used to life with the college basketball power from Los Angeles residing in the same league, and on Wednesday night, the No. 4 Women of Troy came through in another high-profile match-up east of the Appalachians, taking down No. 8 Maryland 79-74 inside XFINITY Center to improve to 15-1. Watkins and Kiki Iriafen each scored 21 for USC, who closed the game on an 18-6 run after the previously-unbeaten Terrapins opened an early lead in the fourth.
Three days ago, USC had an easy time winning in New Jersey against Rutgers, 92-42, and earlier in the season, the Trojans went into New England and defeated then-No. 4 Connecticut in Hartford on December 21.
Most of tonight’s game-deciding run for USC was done without much damage from Watkins, who did score 21 points but went just 7-for-19 from the field before fouling out committing a charge with 31 seconds remaining.
But before that, Iriafen converted on a three-point play to give the Women of Troy a 75-72 lead with 1:28 to play. On the next possession, Iriafen’s frontcourt mate, freshman Rayah Marshall, blocked a jumper by Maryland guard Shyanne Sellers.
“We just kind of have this unwavering confidence in ourselves,” Watkins said. “It was just a matter of coming together and closing the game out.”
Sellers led all scorers with 26 points, but after Maryland started the fourth quarter on a 6-0 run and expanded its lead to seven, it couldn’t hold on to what would have been its fourth win this season against a ranked opponent.
*Editor’s note: Above the byline is the photo gallery from Wednesday evening’s game, with photos taken by photographers Yusuf Abdullah and Clifford Ray Williams. After clicking on a photo to enlarge the picture, press the left and right arrow buttons on either side of the caption to scroll through the rest of the pictures that appear on the first page, Also, click on the numbers and/or arrow appearing immediately below the picture grid to load the next set of photos. There are 25 pictures in total.
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