USC Basketball: Trojans senior Dwight Lewis: “I was looking forward to playing” in postseason

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For USC’s seniors, today’s news that the men’s basketball program will not play in the postseason this year after the university handed down self-imposed sanctions was disappointing.

‘We were playing really well lately, eight straight wins and we were coming together,’ senior guard Dwight Lewis told The Times. ‘Guys were getting eligible and everybody was playing as a team. I was looking forward to possibly having a chance to play in the postseason, but the sanctions came down. That’s out of our control. We can still go out there and try to win a Pac-10 championship outright, and that’s what we’re going to try to do.’

Lewis and his teammates were told the news at a team meeting with Coach Kevin O’Neill this morning.

‘Of course we were shocked,’ Lewis said. ‘We didn’t see this coming at all. We all came together and he told us the news, but we did not see this coming at all. It is what it is. It doesn’t change anything. We still have to get ready for this upcoming road trip to the Bay Area.’

USC (10-4 overall, 2-0 in Pacific 10 Conference play) plays at Stanford on Wednesday, at California on Saturday, and plays UCLA in Westwood on Jan. 16.

--Baxter Holmes

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