USC Coach Eric Musselman: No More West Coast Excuses on the Big Ten Road

Muss, thanks for joining us, man. We keep hearing about how difficult it is for these West Coast schools to compete in the Big Ten with the travel, West going to East. You said it: Your friend up in Westwood (Mick Cronin) has talked about that a lot, but:

How do you see this league being positioned now in revenue share, NIL era college athletics, especially in men’s and USC men’s basketball?

Eric Musselman: Well, it’s a lot, Seth. First of all, you bring up the travel. I think that the UCLA women’s program, USC women’s program have proven that if you have superior talent, you can go on the road and win. But I do think in basketball, it does affect us a little bit. And we’ve found that it’s actually the game that you come back off of a road trip on that’s affected.

We’re still adjusting, but obviously no excuses. As I mentioned, there’ve been plenty of teams that have proven now that you can have long distance travel and still win. And then in the Big Ten, with the name, image and likeness — I think in basketball and football that the Big Ten is positioned to be as well-suited as anybody across the board. 

There’s certain programs in the Big Ten that have done a great job — might not necessarily have the highest number of name, image and likeness funds — but have done a great job of retention and keeping players in their program and growing talent. So a lot of great things happening across the Big Ten in many different sports.

Andy Katz: All right, so recency bias: You’re in the Big Ten now, you were in the SEC at Arkansas, also had an assistant stint years ago at LSU. You can’t argue with the crowds on the road, you’ve seen it, you’ve lived it for the last couple of years. 

How would you compare the Big Ten and SEC today?

Musselman: Well, both present challenges. Obviously, the biggest thing really is the travel: It’s much more difficult, obviously, in the Big Ten. Most SEC games, you’re back at 12 or one o’clock a.m. — that’s much different than getting back at four or five in the morning. 

But I would say from a venue standpoint, on the whole, it’s harder to win on the road in the Big Ten. Playing at Michigan State, playing at Purdue, those two places in particular, very, very difficult. That’s not even counting places like Nebraska and Illinois, those places are really, really hard to win. Almost every venue that you go into in the Big Ten is a hard place to win. 

And then I would just say from a talent standpoint, I would say last year’s Big Ten was as difficult as I’ve ever faced across the league. The SEC’s got great talent, great athleticism. The Big Ten is a more physical league and execution is super important as well.

Seth: So talk about your transfer portal haul. You’re now entering your third season at USC — time flies. Hasn’t been an easy first couple of years: Tied for 12th in the league in both seasons. Now, to be fair, this past season, you had a lot of injuries, most notably to Rodney Rice, who was really playing amazing basketball early in the season. You didn’t have him. Alijah Arenas came in late, but you have absolutely crushed the portal.

The three of us are old enough to remember a time when people talked about what makes good recruiting. Well, it’s the fan base and it’s the tradition and it’s the facilities. Right now, it’s only one question: What’s the number? There are other things involved, but really you have to have the financial resources to build the kind of roster that you’ve built at USC.

Explain to us if you would, how much time you spend on this, the mechanics of it, what you’re doing, what USC is doing that you now have the financial resources to compete at this level.

Musselman: Well, I think it’s a whole bunch of things.Obviously, name, image and likeness is a huge part of the recruiting. It’s also logistics: Where does a player want to play? It’s also can you help a player reach his ultimate dream? So there’s a whole bunch of different factors. 

Seth, when I look at even how we built this roster — I do think it’s the first roster in the three years now, going into year three, that we feel is a roster like we had at Arkansas —  where we have a deep bench, where we have a group that’s got experience. We have three McDonald’s All-Americans coming in. We have size up front. 

But I think that there’s a whole bunch of stuff. Communication, raising funds, all those things become super important for all of us. Relationships. And then trying to have a budget and stay within it and then, and then trying to find the pieces that fit. It’s a super challenging time for every sport to build a roster. I still think many of us are trying to figure out what is the best way. 

And the rules change almost daily — who’s eligible, who’s not eligible. 10 days ago, people were wondering if five-year players were going to be in effect this year. There was a three or four day timespan where there weren’t a lot of portal signings. And so there’s a whole bunch of stuff I think that factors into it. 

But I do think having experience, having some younger players, having retention, those three factors really are going to parlay into what’s successful and what’s not successful from November to March and April.

Andy: Eric, I know Dusty May’s done a great job the last two years, but he’s been kind of lucky, too that these players have fit together, obviously with the Wolf-Golden combination up front, and then this past year getting all these transfers with Lendeborg, Johnson, Mara, all to work together. We will never know if your threesome of Baker-Mazzara, Arenas, Rice, were all going to work well together because it just never happened because of injuries. 

Now you’ve got Alijah Arenas back, Rodney Rice back and KJ Lewis. What gives you confidence that those three can fit together?

Musselman: Well, I mean, it’s more than those three, I think, as we put this team together, because obviously, that’s the backcourt thing that’s got to work — for sure. But then even upfront, we’re going to throw the ball inside maybe a little bit more than we have in the past.

We’re going to need Jacob Cofie to have a big leap from where he was last year, because last year we played Jacob at the four and a little bit of three because we tried to — against Michigan in particular — we tried to throw a three big lineup and slide Jacob down there. So we’re going to need Jacob’s versatility again and then we’re going to need to try to grow our three freshmen in Collins and the Ratliff twins. We’re going to try to need them to grow as quick as possible as well. So there’s a whole bunch of moving parts.

And then we feel like there’s some other portal guys that we’ve signed that can have a huge, huge impact for us. And that’s really what the summer is for, is for us to try to figure out over that eight week period, what works, what doesn’t work, who plays well together. And then we also have obviously September and October, so a second eight week period. So those 16 weeks are gonna kind of determine where we are.

Unlike maybe last year, we’re gonna be going into the summer session with some players rehabbing still, because Rodney Rice will still be rehabbing and miss the summer. So we won’t have everybody together, but it will allow us the opportunity to try to get some other guys more reps than maybe they would have if everybody was fully healthy.

Seth: So all lies, this season, on Elijah Arenas. It’s actually a pretty amazing story. Young man had a really, really frightening car accident, could have lost his life. This was well before his freshman season even started, got through that, then hurt his knee. Some indications were that he was gonna miss the entire season. You and I were talking all the time and you kept telling me the young man says he’s coming back. Not all of them would, as you well know, and he did.

He was raw, but you could see the potential. Didn’t really get to play that much with Chad Baker-Mazara, but then some question about whether or not he would enter the NBA Draft. 

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So break down for us what we can expect of Alijah, what it means to your team to have him back, the steps he needs to take. 

And also, I want you to throw in a little Gilbert flavor, because he’s got a famous podcaster for a dad. Sometimes the podcaster likes to say some things that maybe you would wish that he wouldn’t. Break it all down for me, the Alijah Arenas factor at USC.

Musselman: So I’ll start with Gilbert. Obviously, when I got the Warriors job, Gilbert did not play much his rookie year. And I remember the very first practice — and I don’t ever really leave practice, but it was towards the end of practice — I walked upstairs to Garry St. Jean, our general manager. I remember telling Garry, we got an NBA All-Star down there. And he’s like, who, Jason Richardson? And I was like, no, Gilbert. 

So Gilbert had an unbelievable year and then he ended up, after playing for us for a year, getting a great deal with Washington. As far as the podcasting goes, I know that you’re gonna get clicks. And so I have a great relationship with Gil, I love him. And the bottom line is he trusted our staff to coach his son, not just in year one, but then the decision to come back to USC, which meant not going to the NBA, which meant not going in the transfer portal. 

So Gilbert entrusted us to try to, as well as his mom, Laura, trusted us to try to continue to help mentor and groom Alijah to the best of our ability. But one thing that has not been reported, you guys, is Alijah got hurt with about three games to go in our season.

He had a really, really bad ankle sprain. He rehabbed it religiously. He played on it. To this day, he’s still not going live and is still rehabbing an ankle that he played on for the betterment of the team. So we’ve been not playing for how long it’s been and he’s still rehabbing that ankle. And he played on an ankle that not many would play on.

As you mentioned, Seth, a lot of players — you have the knee surgery, you had the car accident before that, then you have the knee, you rehab it, you’re jumping in the middle of Big Ten play with virtually 11, 12 games to play. Most guys don’t play. Alijah elected to play, and I think that’s really going to benefit him this year going into the season. He now knows what to expect of Big Ten basketball. He knows how physical it is, from an efficiency standpoint.

I think that the roster that we put together is going to really benefit and allow him to show his true game. He’s a great passer. He’s got great vision. He’s an excellent file shooter. And now with reps and — he just jumped into the season. He didn’t hardly have any practice time with us at all. So I expect Alijah to be one of the best players in the country and to put himself in a great draft status going into the following year’s NBA Draft.

Andy: I’ve had a lot of your peers compare this to coaching in the G League, whether they coached in the G League or not, sort of these one-year rosters. 

You did coach — it wasn’t called the G League then — but at that level of basketball. How would you compare the two?

Musselman: Well, the G League is much more challenging because — I can remember coaching a game with Jeremy Lin, Steve Novak, and Danny Green and having all three get called up within about a week and a half time span ,and then you’re really spinning. So it’s a little different, but it is the changing roster, trying to build chemistry on the fly.

But the G League is way more challenging, just because players are going up and being sent down and that constantly changes the way you play. But the landscape right now is much different than it was. I’ve only been in it for whatever, 14 years or whatever, and it’s changed so dramatically. I loved when the guys used to sit out. I know the players might not have liked it, but we really liked it from a development standpoint. Look at how Caleb and Cody Martin developed and even guys like Jordan Caroline. I thought that that really, really helped guys. JD Notae who went on to become a third team All-American. 

And the one thing too, and I’ve talked to a lot of NBA people about this of late, is players that don’t stick in a system, and they jump from program to program, it’s going to affect their NBA career as well because of the developmental piece and understanding culture and understanding, how to be a true team member, all those things. It’s going to trickle up. We’ve seen the changing of high school, multiple high schools, multiple AAU programs, now multiple colleges. It’s going to affect the way that people draft in the future as well.

Andy: Quick follow up. You mentioned that five year deal. Obviously, it sounds like it’s not going to happen right now, but it’s going to happen at some point. Maybe for 2027-28. 

How will that affect your recruiting and coaching if a player can potentially play five years?

Musselman: Yeah, I think right now you can’t really plan for it, because the portal really — most teams are done. We still have a couple of roster spots that we have to fill. So I don’t know if — maybe if we had that thought process early on, maybe there would have been some adjustments. But I think you have to think about what that does for a younger player. If you have a whole group of players that are getting a fifth year, what’s the impact that a true freshman can have? 

And so those are some of the discussions and thought processes that we’re just starting to have. But I do think that the pool for next year’s portal will be much larger if that fifth year rule goes through and becomes effective, which I think a lot of people assume will happen.

Seth: Yeah, and a lot of players, especially the high school players, are going to feel the squeeze. Speaking of high school players:

You’ve got a great three-man recruiting class coming in the Ratliff twins and Christian Collins. What can we expect from those guys?

Musselman: Yeah, well that’s super interesting because I was an assistant coach when Theo (Ratliff) played for the Atlanta Hawks. So now I have two former players that I’m coaching their sons and that’s a super cool relationship factor with these guys that are coming in. 

But Darius can play the four and the five. He can make shots. He just played at the Iverson game last night and had a really good game — was knocking down threes at a very high rate. And his brother, Adonis is a great three-point shooter who can play the three and the four and can stretch the defense out with his ability with deep range. Both those guys got to continue to add strength to their game. The weight room is going to be really, really important for both Ratliffs

Then Christian Collins, great work ethic, high, high motor, can play the three, played a lot of four in high school, eventually can maybe play some two. Just relentless defender, great loose ball-getter. And all three of those guys, we’re gonna need them to step up and have great seasons for us.