Kennedy Smith made a big difference for USC women’s basketball against UConn on Saturday night. Smith was unable to play in USC’s first top-10 matchup of the women’s basketball season against Notre Dame on Nov. 23. It had to eat away at her to not be available to help her teammates, who struggled all game long versus the Fighting Irish in a 74-61 defeat. Imagine what USC could have done that Saturday afternoon in the Galen Center with Smith, one of the top freshmen in the country, on the floor.
When USC took the court without Smith on that particular Saturday, it was announced she would be out for an extended period of time. Exactly how long, we didn’t know.
It turned out that she was unavailable for four weeks. She was once again available against UConn, which was just in the nick of time for this team. We all got to see how much better USC is with Smith as part of the equation.
Start with defense. Smith has size, length and power. She is taller and thicker than USC’s other freshmen. She can stand up physically to aggressive play at both ends of the court. That physical dimension on defense really bottled up UConn for the first 2.5 quarters of the game, before the Huskies made their big push in a 13-minute span to take a one-point lead late in the game.
Now let’s look at offense. Being taller enables her to see the floor better and pass the ball with better, cleaner angles. She was able to reshape the geometry of the court for USC. She sets good screens and has to be taken seriously by opposing defenses. Smith represented another scoring option when UConn dive-bombed JuJu Watkins with multiple players.
In a game USC won by two points, Kennedy Smith gave the Trojans 9 points, 3 rebounds, and a blocked shot, plus a lot of good defense which won’t show up in the box score. If Smith can give USC close to 10 points in big games against elite opposition, that’s 10 points it didn’t have against Notre Dame. It is bound to make a huge difference for USC, not to mention her defense, screening, and toughness.
Kennedy Smith enables this USC women’s basketball team to come a lot closer to reaching its ceiling.