USC women prevail over Kansas State to return to Elite Eight of NCAA tournament

SPOKANE, Wash. — It was never a question of belief. Even in the throes of a nightmare scenario, forced to forge ahead without USC’s biggest, brightest star, Lindsay Gottlieb had done all she could to keep doubt from creeping in, all while the college basketball world crossed the Trojans off.

All week her team echoed the coach’s confidence, kindly reassuring the skeptics that they never would waver, with or without JuJu Watkins.

How many actually were convinced, the world may never know. Few outside of their locker room knew what the Trojans were capable of without Watkins, whose season-ending knee injury loomed large over the team and the NCAA tournament. Fewer still would believe two freshmen, two novices to March’s madness, would be the ones to step valiantly into that void Saturday.

USC got an Elite Eight rematch with UConn thanks to two players who were not on hand for last year’s showdown.

Freshmen guards Avery Howell, starting in place of the injured JuJu Watkins, and Kennedy Smith combined for 37 points, 11 rebounds and seven steals to lift the top-seeded Trojans to a 67-61 victory over fifth-seeded Kansas State at Spokane Arena.

USC (31-3) will meet second-seeded UConn on Monday night for a spot in the Final Four. Last year in this round, the Huskies emerged with an 80-73 win to end the Trojans’ season.

The Trojans will be hard-pressed to exact revenge this year without Watkins, but they will get an opportunity thanks to the play of their freshmen.

Smith had a team-high 19 points, 11 of those in the first quarter, while Howell added 18. The production was much needed as Kiki Iriafen was held to seven points on three-of-13 shooting while Rayah Marshall finished with 10 points.

Serena Sundell had a game-high 22 points for the Wildcats (28-8).

Connecticut advanced in the first regional semifinal in Spokane by beating third-seeded Oklahoma 82-59 as Paige Bueckers scored 40 points in the game and outscored the Sooners 29-23 in the second half.

It’s going down to the wire for USC and Kansas State as the Trojans hold a 60-59 lead with 2:10 left in the fourth quarter after coach Lindsay Gottlieb called timeout.

Avery Howell is up to 16 points as the freshman guard has stepped up in her second start of the season, this one in place of injured star JuJu Watkins.

Avery Howell and Rayah Marshall have kept USC in the lead as the Trojans hold a 55-51 lead with 5:56 to go in the fourth quarter.

Howell hit her fourth three-pointer and Marshall hit two layups to account for USC’s scoring so far in the period. Howell now has 14 points and Marshall is up to 10.

Kansas State inched closer after weathering a 12-0 run by USC and pulled within 48-45 after three quarters at Spokane Arena.

Serena Sundell had a layup and made four free throws in the final two minutes for the Wildcats. Sundell leads all scorers with 18 points and has made 10 of 11 free throws.

Kennedy Smith leads the Trojans with 14 points and Avery Howell has 11.

One good run deserves another.

After Kansas State’s 7-0 run staked the Wildcats to a five-point advantage, USC ripped off 12 straight points to give the Trojans a 46-39 lead with 2:22 to go in the third quarter after Kansas State called timeout.

Kiki Iriafen made two jumpers in the run, Avery Howell nailed a three-pointer and a layup and Kennedy Smith made a layup off a steal and added a free throw to account for the offense in the burst.

Howell (11 points) and Smith (14) are in double figures for the Trojans while Iriafen and Rayah Marshall have six points apiece.

Some key players got on the board early in the second half for USC.

Rayah Marshall hit her first two shots of the third quarter and Talia von Oelhoffen knocked down a jumper to spark the Trojans as both teams picked up the pace on offense.

But a 7-0 run by Kansas State put the Wildcats back in front and helped them hold a 39-37 lead with 4:40 to go in the third quarter.

Avery Howell hit her third three-pointer right before the media timeout to close the gap.

After trailing by seven points after one quarter, Kansas State started the second quarter with a big run and ended the first half with a surge to take a 30-28 lead over USC.

The Wildcats outscored the Trojans 21-12 in the second period. USC mustered five field goals in the second quarter: Three-pointers by Avery Howell and Malia Samuels, and two-point shots by Kayleigh Heckel, Kiki Iriafen and a driving layup by Heckel just before the halftime buzzer.

Iriafen did finally get on the board late in the first half with a baseline jumper but is only one for seven from the floor. Kennedy Smith leads the Trojans with 11 points, all in the first quarter as she picked up two quick fouls early in the second quarter.

Serena Sundell has 10 points for the Wildcats, who shot 34.5% from the field (10 for 29). The Trojans are at 29.7% (11 for 37).

Kansas State’s hot second-quarter start continued before USC ended its scoring drought and the game has settled into a 24-24 tie with 4:39 left in the first half.

The Wildcats built on two three-pointers to rip off a 10-0 run and take their first lead of the game at 19-16 before Avery Howell hit a three-pointer for the Trojans. USC had gone scoreless in the period before Howell’s shot with 7:14 to go.

Malia Samuels also added a three-pointer later in the quarter to help USC retake the lead:

Things that will bear watching: Kennedy Smith, who had 11 points in the first quarter, has two fouls. And Kiki Iriafen has yet to score, missing her first four shots.

Kansas State had quite the response within the first minute of the second quarter.

Three-pointers by Jaelyn Glenn and Temira Poindexter forced USC into a timeout with 9:06 to go in the first half as Kansas State closed to within 16-15.

Freshman guard Kennedy Smith scored six more points to close out an 11-point first quarter to stake USC to a 16-9 lead over Kansas State.

Avery Howell, another Trojans freshman guard, nailed a three-pointer right before the first-quarter buzzer to extend the lead.

Smith is five for eight from the field to outscore Kansas State by herself. The Wildcats went four for 18 from the field in the first quarter.

USC has jumped out to a 7-2 lead with 4:55 to go in what has been a low-scoring first quarter.

Kennedy Smith has five points for the Trojans, who are shooting two of 12 from the field. Rayah Marshall’s two free throws account for USC’s other points thus far.

Kennedy Taylor hit a layup off the bench for Kansas State, which is shooting one for nine from the field thus far.

Top-seeded USC and fifth-seeded Kansas State is underway at Spokane Arena in the last game of the Sweet 16 in this year’s women’s NCAA tournament.

Winner gets second-seeded UConn, an 82-59 winner over third-seeded Oklahoma behind 40 points from Paige Bueckers.

The Trojans, of course, will be without sophomore superstar JuJu Watkins, who did not make the trip after suffering a season-ending knee injury. But she was on the minds of all her teammates as they arrived for today’s game:

Lineups are as follows:

USC

Von Oelhoffen (G)

Howell (G)

Smith (G)

Iriafen (F)

Marshall (C)

Kansas State

Walker (G)

Glenn (G)

Sundell (G)

Poindexter (F)

Lee (C)

They sat in a line of folding chairs on the Galen Center court, watching the television in front of them intently, waiting as one region after another was announced without them. There was no doubt in anyone’s mind that the Trojans deserved a No. 1 seed — that box had already been checked through a 29-win regular season and Big Ten regular season title run. But as one top seed was declared, then another, then another, a different feeling crept over the group than the joy that filled the room this time last year.

USC once again earned a No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament, this time in Regional Two that runs through Spokane in the Sweet 16 round. The Trojans will host No. 16 seed UNC Greensboro at Galen Center in the first round of the NCAA tournament at noon on Saturday. The game will air on ABC. None of that came as a surprise to anyone on Sunday.

Kennedy Smith was only 14, just a few games into her freshman season at Etiwanda High, when she first crossed paths on the court with Kiki Iriafen, who played at Harvard-Westlake. Four years later, with both at USC, Iriafen still vividly remembers her first impression.

“I did not like her,” Iriafen said, with a laugh. “She was a pest.”

JuJu Watkins winced, shaking her left hand, the collective basketball world holding its breath. The first 10 minutes of USC’s NCAA tournament debut had been disconcerting enough already. Errant passes sailed away. Makeable jumpers clanked away. And No. 16-seed North Carolina Greensboro, having promised to “shock the world,” was at the very least making life difficult on the top-seeded Trojans.

Then, their star sophomore went up for a rebound early in the second quarter and emerged from under the hoop wincing with pain, an image that inevitably conjured thoughts of the worst-case scenario.

Rayah Marshall took her place at the front of USC’s defense Saturday, ready to deploy the role she’d spent the past two years perfecting.

USC had dragged through the first quarter of their first-round matchup, unable to separate from No. 16 North Carolina Greensboro. So a few minutes into the second, with her team in need of a spark, coach Lindsay Gottlieb turned to Marshall, the “Mad Dog” at the front of the Trojans’ vaunted pressure defense.

The Galen Center crowd sat in hushed disbelief, every cardinal-and-gold soul struggling to process a scene that seemed ripped straight from their worst nightmares: USC’s superstar lying crumpled on the court, clutching her right knee, her cries rising to the rafters where she hoped a banner would soon hang.

JuJu Watkins, for the better part of two seasons, seemed nothing short of invincible. The sophomore surpassed every sensible expectation with stunning grace, never wavering even as she bore the weight of an entire program. She already captivated the college basketball world, and in the process, dragged the Trojans back from the depths of obscurity to the doorstep of tournament glory, just a few short steps away from a Final Four.

JuJu Watkins screamed.

She held her right knee with both hands, squeezed her eyes shut and screamed.

SPOKANE, Wash. — The first week after Paige Bueckers tore the anterior cruciate ligament in her left knee in August 2022, the questions haunted the Connecticut star most.

“The first week was devastation,” Bueckers recalled Friday, 2½ years later. “A sense of just hurt, disappointment, a why-me sort of mentality, why now.”

SPOKANE, Wash. — Thirty six hours after JuJu Watkins’ right knee buckled beneath her and USC’s season changed in the blink of an eye, Lindsay Gottlieb gathered her team for its first practice since its star sophomore went down.

It was a critical moment for USC and its coach. Emotions were still raw. Hearts were still heavy. But while the rest of the basketball world was busy writing off the Trojans, Gottlieb wanted her team to know one thing hadn’t changed in the wake of Watkins’ injury.