GameTrax: Stats and more
By Jack Magruder
FOXSportsArizona.com
Back in the starting lineup and back in form, Rik Kuksiks shot Arizona State back into the game with three 3-pointers down the stretch Thursday. Setting up behind solid picks, Kukskis revived the crowd and put the Sun Devils in position for their first home victory of the Pac-10 season.
But his season-high 22 points and five threes could not overcome a couple of season-long Sun Devil sore spots, interior defense and rebounding, and Southern California came away with a 63-61 victory behind the strong inside presence of Nikola Vucevic.
Vucevic became the latest Pac-10 big man to take over the paint against the Sun Devils (9-11, 1-7), who have not won in three Pac-10 home games this season and are off to their worst conference start since coach Herb Sendek's team lost its first 14 in 2006-07, the year before James Harden came to town.
"It's rough. It's something that none of us are used to," said senior guard Ty Abbott, who had 19 points, seven rebounds and three blocked shots. "We had higher expectations. It's something you have to work with. It's life. It's adversity. You have to figure out a way to get over it and around it. Under it. Whatever you have to do. That's where we are right now, trying to figure out a way to get over this little hump."
A 6-foot-10 junior from Montenegro, Vucevic had 26 points and 12 rebounds despite often being double-teamed by an ASU team that has come to understand it must send reinforcements against a player of his caliber.
"That's our advantage," USC coach Kevin O'Neill said. "You have to go to your strength, and Nik is our strength."
USC (12-9, 4-4), which won its first Pac-10 road game after being swept by the Oregon schools on its only other trip, had a 36-24 rebounding advantage, including 10 offensive boards, five by Vucevic. ASU has been outrebounded in all eight of its Pac-10 games, by an average of 10.6 per game.
"Rebounding is not a strength of our team right now, and that, more than any single factor, has put us behind the eight ball, together with our struggles to defend front courts," Sendek said.
"Once again, the other team's inside game really hurt us. Vucevic is a tremendous player. He was forcing us to get two on the ball."
Vucevic joined Pac-10 big men Oregon State's Joe Burton, Arizona's Derrick Williams, Washington State's DeAngelo Casto and Washington's Matthew Bryan-Amaning have tied or set career scoring highs against the Sun Devils this season.
ASU has not found a suitable replacement for Jeff Pendergraph and Eric Boateng as an inside presence, and a lack of girth has been compounded by an occasional tardy rotation in Sendek's 1-2-2 matchup zone.
ASU got five points and six rebounds from its three biggest frontcourt players
