USC hits books, Poly hits court

While the USC men's basketball team is stressing through finals this week, Cal Poly plans on dedicating most of the week to preparing for the Trojans and the many matchup problems they present.
Cal Poly wrapped up finals earlier this month and its students are on Christmas Break. Does this help their Mustangs' chances come Saturday at USC? Maybe. Does it mean they're going to pull off another upset of the Trojans? If the Sagarin ratings are any indicator, the "outlook isn't good," as my lucky eight ball would say. USC is No. 41 in the ratings index. Cal Poly is waaaay down at No. 185.
But Mustangs forward Titus Shelton likes their chances. And you already know senior guard Dawin Whiten thinks they can win.
"They have good players at good positions," Shelton said over the weekend. "They have O.J. Mayo, they have good bigs, so my initial thought is they're a good team. We're a good team too, overall, so we're just going to go out there and give them all we got."
While Cal Poly head coach Kevin Bromley wasn't exactly happy about the coverage of his team when he spoke to reporters after Saturday's game, he was happy his players had the week off from classes so they could focus on the Trojans.
"We got some work cut out for ourselves," he said. "I'm glad we have a whole week to prepare for them, without school and with finals week over. We can condition, practice and have a chance to get better. We just haven't been able to do that," playing seven of the first nine games away from Mott Gym.