Uc Riverside

A raucous sell-out crowd of 2,753 packed UC Riverside's cozy Student Recreation Center on Wednesday night for USC's first visit. But the Trojans put a muzzle on those fans early and watched many of them file out before their dominant 56-35 victory was complete. "We played pretty flawless basketball tonight," USC Coach Kevin O'Neill said, "and we had to. " It was the fewest points USC (4-4) has yielded since giving up 35 against Oregon State in 1955. But USC's offense also played razor sharp, shooting 54% from the floor with six players scoring at least six points, led by Greg Allen's 11. The Trojans also held a 24-six advantage in points in the paint — and that was without 7-foot sophomore center Dewayne Dedmon, who sat out his first game after suffering a stress injury in his right foot last week.

When: 7 p.m. Where: Riverside Student Recreation Center. On the air: Radio: 710. Records: USC 3-4, Riverside 2-4. Records vs. opponent: USC leads all time, 4-0. Update: Riverside defeated Washington State on Sunday despite trailing by 14 points, marking the second-largest comeback in the 11 years the Highlanders have competed at the Division I level. Senior guard Philo Martin averages 14.3 points to lead Riverside in scoring. Riverside is 16-0 the last three seasons in nonconference games at the Student Recreation Center, which USC will be visiting for the first time.

One Southland college basketball team won a game in the Sports Arena this month, but it wasn't UCLA or USC. One Southland player was the subject of a complimentary tweet from LeBron James, but he wasn't a Trojan or a Bruin. One Southland coach took his team into the Arizona desert and beat a Pac-12 Conference opponent, but his name wasn't Ben Howland or Kevin O'Neill. The best basketball in Southern California so far this season has been played by mid-majors such as Loyola Marymount, Long Beach State and Pepperdine, who hope their success against brand-name opponents amounts to more than a few early surprises.

What: 76 Classic basketball tournament When: Thursday, beginning 11 a.m.; Friday beginning 11:30 a.m. and Sunday beginning 10:30 a.m. Where: Anaheim Convention Center First-round TV schedule: Thursday — Boston College (1-2) vs. St. Louis (3-0), 11 a.m. ESPNU; Villanova (3-0) vs. UC Riverside (1-2), 1:30 p.m., ESPN2; New Mexico (2-1) vs. Santa Clara (2-1), 6 p.m., ESPNU; Oklahoma (2-0) vs. Washington State (2-1), 8:30 p.m., ESPN2. Tickets: Single-session tickets, beginning at $20, are available at the Anaheim Convention Center box office.

The fifth 76 Classic basketball tournament begins Thursday at the Anaheim Convention Center and, as always, plenty of seats are available. The tournament was created and is managed by ESPN with the main purpose of providing holiday weekend television counter-programming to football. In fact, the three-day tournament takes a day off, an acknowledgment that Saturday football is in charge. The basketball is played Thursday, Friday and Sunday. "We love it if the stands are filled," said Arnie Sgalio, ESPN's senior director of programming.

Trisha Brown Dance Company When and where: 8 p.m. Saturday; Valley Performing Arts Center, Northridge Tickets: $25-$70 http://www.valleyperformingartscenter.org Stephen Petronio Company When and where: 8 p.m. Monday; Campbell Hall, UC Santa Barbara Tickets: $40; artsandlectures.sa.ucsb.edu When and where: 8 p.m. Wednesday; University Theatre, UC Riverside Tickets: $30;...

Mark Hoddle waits for the door to click into place. A magnetic sensor won't let him open the next door, just an arm's length away, until the first has been sealed shut. Then he's walking through a maze of darkened corridors. Black lights — positioned to lure and then zap any fugitive bugs — cast a dim lavender glow that suggests rather than reveals the way forward. Finally, Hoddle reaches a high-security laboratory. Inside, behind a wall of glass, his wife and fellow entomologist, Christina, hunches over a microscope.

Students at the University of California and Cal State University systems are likely to face a second round of tuition hikes this fall in response to deeper funding cuts in the new state budget, officials and student leaders said Wednesday. Discussions are underway for tuition increases of at least 10%. That hike would come on top of an 8% increase at UC and a 10% boost at Cal State that already are set to take effect this fall. An early victim of the state budget cuts is a new medical school at UC Riverside.

Plans to open a medical school at UC Riverside next year appeared uncertain Wednesday after officials announced that the school had been denied initial accreditation because of concerns about the cash-strapped state's ability to provide funding. The first 50 students were expected to enroll next summer at the medical school, which would be the sixth in the UC system. The school, approved by UC regents in 2008, is intended to ease a physician shortage in the Inland Empire area and to bolster UC Riverside's academic reputation.

The men's basketball program at Cal State Northridge, which has struggled academically in recent years, took another hit Tuesday when the NCAA banned the team from postseason play for next season. The penalty stemmed from another subpar score on the annual Academic Progress Rate report, which measures the number of student-athletes who remain in school and are academically eligible over a four-year period. The Matadors had company on the list of sanctioned teams, including the reigning men's basketball champion, Connecticut, which lost two scholarships.