Inside a rough season that crumbled just as it was coming together, and examining the futures of the Trojans’ mainstays, from Boogie Ellis to Bronny James.
USC coach Andy Enfield, left, won’t have the luxury of Boogie Ellis, right, to lean on when the program begins playing in the Big Ten Conference next season, and it is unclear just which players he will have as the Trojans try to bounce back from an injury-plagued 2023-24 season. LAS VEGAS — Boogie Ellis could barely speak a half hour after it was over, each word an ordeal in grief.
Junior Kobe Johnson sat to his right, and freshman Isaiah Collier to his left, and Bronny James in the corner, unmoving. They carried a resignation on their shoulders; history will remember this USC season as a team that never quite rounded into what it could have been. What it should have.
Enfield, as calls for his job circled among unhappy fans on social media, defended the program’s slump for two straight months during virtually every media availability possible. Ellis, a few days later after practice: “I don’t care, win, lose or draw, we just gotta compete. And I feel like, we all haven’t been competing.”For two years, Enfield has been able to build USC in part around Ellis, Johnson, and center Morgan. But Ellis and Morgan have no eligibility left, and Johnson’s status is uncertain, telling the Southern California News Group in October he would “hopefully be outta here next year.
Collier’s draft stock dropped after his introduction to college basketball exposed a number of rough edges in his game – ball control, defense, shooting stroke – and he told SCNG in February that he still hadn’t decided on entering the draft. But he rounded into form as a playmaker down the stretch, averaging 17.6 points and 4.5 assists over his last 11 games.
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