DREAMS MEET REALITY IN HUGE TROJANS UPSET.

Byline: Kevin Modesti

No need, USC basketball fans, to worry about what might have been.

What might have been . . . is.

You know, there were to be two basketball games at the Sports Arena on Saturday night.

One was to be the Pac-10 battle for first place between Arizona, second-ranked nationally, and USC, scarred by season-ending injuries to its leading scorer and its only senior. That was the game the Trojans weren't supposed to be able to win.

The other was the battle for much more, a game for which it needed Sam Clancy and Jarvis Turner. That was the game that would put USC basketball back in the big time.

One was reality, to be played on hardwood.

The other was a lost dream, to be visible only in the spectrum reserved for what might have been.

Somehow, incredibly, the two games, truth and imagination, came together in front of 9,105 ecstatic Trojans fans.

The Trojans had to make up for the 17 points and 7 rebounds they expect from Clancy, and for Turner's vital sixth-man play. They did it, with Brian Scalabrine scoring a career-high 27, including the back-to-back-to-back 3-pointers that put Arizona on its heels in the first half, and David Bluthenthal scoring a career-high 26.

They had to make up for being outrebounded badly in the first half, for early foul trouble. They did it with a tenacious defense, holding Arizona to 41 percent shooting.

They had to pass repeated tests of nerve in the final minutes, when Arizona sent them to the free-throw line seven times. They made 12-of-13 free throws to hold on to an 80-72 victory that sent the USC student body onto the floor for a wild celebration.

What does it mean?

Think of what you imagined before Clancy and Turner got hurt in USC's victory over Arizona State on Thursday, Clancy with a broken right foot, Turner with a broken left ankle. Then pinch yourself to prove it actually is happening.

Beating the Wildcats shows that USC, which was riding an are-they- for-real wave of emotion and magic, can compete with the best teams in the nation.

Beating the Wildcats almost certainly will put the Trojans in the top 25 on Monday for the first time since 1992, when the Harold Minor-led team was No. 8 before losing on a Georgia Tech half-court shot in the NCAA tournament's round of 16.

Beating the Wildcats gives them a 5-0 start to the conference schedule and gives Henry Bibby a resume line that eluded all four previous USC basketball coaches of the Pac-10 era.

The imagination can run a little wild at this point.

Is the much-traveled Bibby about to find another career crossroads in his headlights? Might a better-established program be formulating a job offer as we speak?

Would Bibby move on, or stay to finish the rebuilding he'd started at USC, a tangible objective now that an on-campus arena is on the drafting board?

But we are getting carried away, getting ahead of ourselves.

For certain, USC is the best basketball team in town, first in the Pac-10, shocking news-radio listeners nationwide awake this morning.

This, after the Trojans were outrebounded by 11 in the first half. When Arizona guard Jason Gardner got back his own miss and hit a 3-pointer to give the Wildcats a 39-37 lead on their first possession of the second half, they had scored 13 points on offensive rebounds, the Trojans 2.

This, after USC failed to go to the free-throw line until 14 minutes were left in the game. Brandon Granville, the point guard, and Nate Hair, in Bibby's rotation to make up for Turner's loss, each had three fouls in the first half.

This, although Clancy sat at the end of the Trojans bench in a red plaid shirt, gently leaning his crutches against the Gatorade keg, and Turner hobbling out on crutches in a pristine white T-shirt, looking lost as he flopped into a baseline chair.

What might have happened if they'd never taken those bad steps in the game against Arizona State?

What might have happened if Clancy and Turner had been able to play Saturday in the biggest USC basketball game in years?

Whatever might have happened in the the land of what might have been, it couldn't have been any better than what did.