USC basketball: Santa Clara pregame

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Greetings and salutations!

Coming to you from the Galen Center, where tonight USC (1-0) faces the Broncos of Santa Clara (1-0), a veteran squad that returns five starters and 12 lettermen from a team that finished 11-21 last season.

More interesting, though, is that Santa Clara plays 28 of its 32 games in California this season, which dramatically limits the Broncos’ possibility of collecting quirky refrigerator magnets and a bounty of airline miles. Such a tragedy, that.

Then again, jet lag won’t be an excuse for any road loss.

But I digress...

Here are some facts and stats to get you ready before tipoff at 7:30 p.m. (radio broadcast on 710):

USC player to watch: junior forward Nikola Vucevic

The 6-foot-10, 260-pound Vucevic tied his career-high with 19 points in the Trojans’ 62-49 season-opening win against UC Irvine on Saturday. But, more impressively, he scored 17 of those in the second-half after making a halftime adjustment, which is something he said he might not have done as well last season.

The reason Vucevic is important tonight, and in every game throughout the season, is not just that he’s a key player for the Trojans, but because of the defense he forces teams to play against USC.

That defense will almost always be a zone, either a two-three or a one-three-one, and in it Vucevic and senior forward Alex Stepheson will probably face double teams any time the ball is near.

Now, the double-team defense can be effective for both teams. If a defense runs it well, it can lead to turnovers. If the offense knows how to respond and find the open man, it can lead to easy buckets.

But since Vucevic is a better passer than Stepheson, he’ll be more of a decision-maker when it comes to how USC responds to defenses double-teaming the Trojan big men, which is what USC Coach Kevin O’Neill expects to happen tonight.

And if he handles it well tonight and all season, USC could be sitting pretty.

If not, well, it could get ugly.

Santa Clara player to watch: guard Kevin Foster

Foster was averaging nearly 20 points per game when he broke his foot last season, which put him on the bench from then on out.

In his first game back Friday against Cal State Bakersfield, an 82-77 Broncos win, Foster scored a team-high 19 points on seven of 17 shooting, including four of 13 shooting from three-point range.

Foster, a former freshman All-American, will be a tough match-up for any of USC’s guards, but if Trojans’ senior guard and resident defensive stopper Marcus Simmons is put on him, Foster could be hard-pressed to find any breathing room.

Key to the game: USC’s transition offense

The Trojans’ half-court offense is stagnant, and it probably will be that way all season. So, O’Neill is stressing that his team runs as often as it can to get easy buckets.

Luckily for the Trojans, Santa Clara is a team that will chase its own misses and isn’t as concerned with getting back in transition defense, which wasn’t the case for UC Irvine.

The Trojans should have a few opportunities to run tonight, and dynamic freshman point guard Maurice Jones will be pushing the ball on each of those. Whether his teammates are alongside him is another story.

Some other stuff:

-- USC has started 2-0 just once in the last nine seasons.

-- USC is 21-8 all-time versus Santa Clara, but lost the last meeting, 74-54, on Dec. 2, 1983.

-- The Broncos are coached by former UCLA assistant Kerry Keating.

-And, lastly, if you want to watch the game but not in person, it will be broadcast live online here.

-- Baxter Holmes