USC women see skid reach 4 games with loss to No. 12 Maryland

LOS ANGELES — Kara Dunn walked into the postgame press conference with a bruise under her left eye, a wound emblematic of the effort that had taken place in the 40 minutes prior.

“I thought we played our asses off,” head coach Lindsay Gottlieb said, Dunn by her side. “There’s just no other option. No one wants to be in a situation where things are hard, but your only option is to figure it out and fight your way through it.”

The USC women’s basketball team frantically did all it could to keep its head above water on Thursday night at the Galen Center – pushing on defense, battling through contact and fighting for rebounds no matter where they were.

They had an offensive output that was nearly equal to No. 12 Maryland’s in the final quarter, but it wasn’t enough. USC dropped its fourth straight game, falling to the Terrapins, 62-55.

The Trojans’ four-game losing streak is more games than they lost all of last season.

“Of course I’d rather be 4-0 in our last four,” Gottlieb said. “But with this group, the figuring it out together and pulling people along and pushing them and holding us together is what it’s all about. We’ve never lost sight.”

Dunn scored a game-high 21 points on 7-for-16 shooting for USC (10-7 overall, 2-3 Big Ten) and added five rebounds and five assists. Jazzy Davidson scored all of her 12 points in the first quarter on a poor shooting night (5 for 23 from the field), grabbed five boards and dished out five assists.

Dunn, a senior, has led her team in scoring in each of the past four games.

“I’m thinking just be aggressive, be aggressive, be aggressive,” Dunn said. “That’s what I keep telling myself whenever I see myself not being aggressive. In the first half, I was like, I need to be more aggressive for my team today for us to be able to win.”

The Trojans were without 6-foot-1 starting guard Kennedy Smith, who is currently day-to-day with a lower leg injury, for the third game in a row.

Gottlieb said after the game that she believes Smith is coming back “sooner rather than later.”

Her absence forced the defense to step up in order to work around a Maryland offense that was almost always in motion – except for 6-3 guard Yarden Garzon, who stationed herself on the perimeter waiting for a teammate to kick out to her for a shot.

“Kennedy’s a dog,” starting guard Malia Samuels said. “She can guard one through five. So everyone has to guard a little bit harder. I have to guard a little bit harder. It’s been tough without her, but I can’t wait to have her back.”

The Trojans were equally diligent on the other end of the court. Davidson hit a 3-pointer to tie the score at 7-all and Laura Williams made a layup to give USC the lead and finish off a 7-0 scoring run.

Another seven unanswered points propelled USC ahead of Maryland (17-2, 5-2), and a 3-pointer from Dunn gave the Trojans a 20-14 advantage at the end of the opening quarter.

After three losses, USC was in desperate need of players other than Dunn and Davidson to step up.

Laura Williams answered the call at the start of the second quarter when she made a layup and, on the Trojans’ next possession, dished a pass to Samuels for a jump shot and a 24-18 lead.

Vivian Iwuchukwu also ramped up her effort and, after not getting on the court in the first half, she scored five points and pulled down five boards in 15 minutes during the second half.

“Your identity of how you come and who you are should be the consistent thing, whoever’s number is called,” Gottlieb said. “Viv didn’t play the whole first half and came in and gave 15 really, really good second-half minutes. The identity has to be rooted in who we are and how we want to do things.”

The final five minutes of the second quarter were a battle. Maryland sent the ball to Garzon for a 3-pointer, then Gerda Raulusaityte countered with a layup to keep USC ahead. The teams traded baskets until the halftime buzzer and the Terrapins came within a point of tying the score, down 28-27 at the break.

Maryland scored 11 points on free throws in the third quarter and used three of them to get ahead 46-42 at the end of the frame. Samuels fouled Addi Mack on a layup, then Kyndal Walker made two shots from the line.

The Terrapins played most of the third without starting forward Isimenme Ozzy-Momodu, who left near the start of the period with an injury. Davidson, who shot 0 for 14 in the final three quarters, briefly left the game in the third as well, but returned for the start of the fourth.

“I thought (Davidson) got some good looks that didn’t go,” Gottlieb said. “I thought they tried to make it hard on her.”

Regardless of who was on the court, USC kept shooting. The Trojans had taken more than 50 shots before the fourth quarter even began and pushed for a high volume against a Maryland defense that was allowing just 56.8 points per game heading into the contest, the third-lowest mark in the conference.

Dunn maintained a hot hand and hit a 3-pointer from the top of the key as the Trojans put together another 7-0 surge. Maryland continued to tack on points with free throws, and managed to get starting guard Londynn Jones and Davidson in foul trouble in the process.

Ozzy-Momodu (10 points, nine rebounds) had a key block of a Samuels shot with 33 seconds left, and Jones fouled out of the game with 20 seconds to play.

USC was down by four points with 30 seconds left, but was unable to catch the Terrapins. The Trojans were outscored 16-13 in the last quarter.

Neither team led by more than eight points after the first quarter.

Both schools shot poorly from 3-point range, with the Trojans at 5 for 32 (16%) while Maryland was 4 for 16 (25%).