Rodney Rice Scores 32, Alijah Arenas Adds 30 as No. 21 USC Holds Off Wichita State 93-86

USC made two 3-pointers on Sunday night. Two. Wichita State made nine, led by 11 in the first half and got 43 points from its bench, and the Shockers still left the mountains with their first loss of the season, because Rodney Rice and Alijah Arenas spent the night camped at the free throw line.

Rice scored 32 points with nine assists, Arenas added 30, both first career 30-point games according to the program, and No. 21 USC outlasted Wichita State 93-86 in the inaugural Caesars Lake Tahoe Classic at the Tahoe Blue Event Center in Stateline, Nevada. The Trojans (2-0) went 37 of 42 from the line, with Rice making 17 of 18 and Arenas 12 of 14. Adonis Ratliff added 10 points and 13 rebounds for a first college double-double. Michael Gray Jr. led the Shockers (1-1) with 18 points on five 3-pointers in 18 minutes, and Jordan Frison and William Berg each scored 17. A crowd of 2,845 was on hand.

Gray Turns the Lake Into a Shooting Gallery

USC started the way it finished its 95-63 rout of Milwaukee last week. Darius Ratliff blocked Bryce Heard on the opening possession and then dunked a Rice feed at the other end. Adonis Ratliff hit a 16-footer, Rice buried a 3 from 24 feet, and when Jacob Cofie finished a layup off a KJ Lewis pass with 13:15 left in the half, USC led 18-11.

Then the Wichita State bench went to work. Jaret Valencia scored on a layup, Frison followed with another, and Gray hit a 22-footer off a Frison pass to tie it at 20. Dillon Battie answered with a 3 from 24 feet, and Gray drilled another from 24 at 10:41 to complete a 15-3 run that put the Shockers up 26-21.

Wichita State kept stretching the floor and USC kept losing shooters. Kenyon Giles hit a 3, Emmanuel Okorafor and Battie scored inside, and Gray's third 3 of the half made it 37-28 with 5:19 left. A Giles jumper at 3:51 pushed the lead to 41-30, the largest of the night for either team. The Shockers made seven 3-pointers in the opening 20 minutes, and four different players hit at least one.

The Free Throw Line as a Comeback Engine

USC did not answer with jumpers. It answered by going downhill. Jadis Jones scored on an 8-footer off an Arenas pass, Arenas threw down a dunk from Aaron Hunkin-Claytor, and the Trojans lived at the stripe while Wichita State piled up fouls. Adonis Ratliff dunked off a Rice assist at 1:19 to make it 41-39, and the teams were level at 43 before Frison scored a layup with one second left to send the Shockers into halftime ahead 45-43.

That 13-4 closing run told the story of the night in miniature. USC made only 11 field goals in the first half but scored 20 points at the line, while Wichita State scored 35 of its 45 first-half points on field goals.

The Trojans came out of the locker room with the same plan. Rice's layup at 18:31 capped a 7-0 burst that made it 50-45, and suddenly the team that had chased for most of the first half had the lead.

Gray, Frison and a Bench That Would Not Quit

Wichita State did not blink. Battie scored on a layup, and Gray buried a fourth 3 at 17:20 to tie the game at 50. After Darius Ratliff hit a short jumper, Gray hit a fifth from 25 feet on a Frison feed to put the Shockers back in front 53-52 at 15:40.

Gray's line deserves a second look: 5 of 8 from the field, all of them 3-pointers, plus 3 of 4 at the line, in just 18 minutes. Frison was even busier, scoring 17 on 5-of-8 shooting with 7 of 8 free throws and a team-high six assists in 20 minutes off the bench. Berg, coming off a 26-point, 16-rebound opener against CSUN, was a load again with 17 points, 11 rebounds and six offensive boards in 21 minutes, with four fouls limiting the playing time.

Wichita State's reserves outscored USC's 43-12. The Shockers outrebounded the Trojans 38-34 and shot 48 percent from the field and 47 percent from 3. On most nights, that is a winning formula against anybody.

The trouble was ball security. Wichita State turned it over 20 times, and USC turned those mistakes into 24 points. The Shockers scored 11 off USC's 10 giveaways. On a night when the final margin was seven, that 13-point gap is the whole ballgame.

The Shot That Broke the Last Tie

The middle of the second half was a heavyweight fight. Arenas, Rice and Lewis scored to push USC ahead 64-62, Battie answered off a Berg pass, and Berg finished a Frison assist to tie the game at 66 with 8:22 left.

Eighteen seconds later came the most unlikely make of the night. Darius Ratliff, listed by ESPN as USC's center, caught a pass from Rice behind the arc and buried a 23-footer. It was USC's second and final 3 of the game, and its first since Rice's make in the opening three minutes. Arenas then scored on a layup and a 17-foot jumper off a Rice pass, a 7-0 run that put USC up 73-66 with 6:52 left. Wichita State never tied it again.

The Shockers kept coming anyway. Frison scored twice on drives, the second cutting it to 75-73 at 5:43. Joshua Hughes answered with a layup off a Rice dish, and Hughes later threw down a dunk from Rice to make it 81-76. Giles hit a 17-footer to make it a one-possession game, but Rice answered with an 8-footer at 3:04 and a 17-foot jumper at 1:52 for an 86-80 lead. Frison's layup with 58 seconds left made it 86-83, and USC closed it out by making its final seven points at the line.

Rice and Arenas Carried It

Rice played 39 minutes and was the best player on the floor. The guard went 7 of 17 from the field and 1 of 4 from deep, and the shooting will not make a highlight reel. The nine assists and the 17 free throws will make a coaching film. Rice assisted on Darius Ratliff's go-ahead 3, both Hughes buckets and three of Arenas' second-half baskets, and had a hand in nearly every big USC possession after halftime. Four turnovers were the only blemish.

Arenas was the perfect partner. Arenas finished 9 of 18 from the field without a turnover in 39 minutes and kept attacking the rim when the jump shots dried up. Together, Rice and Arenas scored 62 of USC's 93 points and made 29 of the Trojans' 37 free throws.

Adonis Ratliff's encore was quieter than the 25-point debut against Milwaukee. The freshman went 3 of 9 and missed all four 3-point attempts, but the 13 rebounds, two steals and a block mattered against a Wichita State front line that crashed the glass all night.

What It Means for Both Teams

USC passed a real test without its shooting. Eric Musselman's team went 2 of 14 from 3, had Darius Ratliff, Cofie and Lewis all foul out, and still won because it shot 88 percent at the line and forced 20 turnovers. That is a sign of a team that can win ugly, which matters more in the Big Ten than any highlight dunk. The worry is depth. The USC bench scored 12 points, and the Trojans will not always get 62 from two guards.

Wichita State has every reason to feel good about the loss. The Shockers went toe to toe with a ranked Big Ten team on a neutral floor, got big minutes from Gray and Frison, and found a frontcourt anchor in Berg. Thirty fouls and 20 turnovers are fixable problems, and Mills now knows the bench can swing games.

This was the fifth meeting between the programs, and USC improved to 4-1 in the series, according to Wichita State Athletics (opens in a new tab). The last one, a 72-69 USC win in 2015, came at the AdvoCare Invitational in Orlando.

USC next visits California on Wednesday, Nov. 11, in Berkeley. The Golden Bears played the earlier game at Tahoe Blue on Sunday and fell to No. 10 Houston 86-68. Wichita State returns to Charles Koch Arena to host Friends the same night.

Sources: ESPN box score (opens in a new tab) and play-by-play, Wichita State Athletics, USC Athletics, USC Men's Basketball on X. More men's college basketball coverage on Undrafted.

USC came to Tahoe with a reputation built on a blowout and left with something more useful: proof it can survive a cold shooting night against a good team. Two 3-pointers, 37 free throws and two guards who refused to settle. That travels.

Photo: John McGillen/USC Athletics (file photo).