JuJu Watkins continues remarkable run, sweeps Pac-12 weekly awards
USC’s JuJu Watkins continued to tear through her true freshman season over the weekend, leading the Trojans to a Bay Area sweep over No. 4 Stanford and Cal.
For her work, Watkins was named the Pac-12 Player Player of the Week and Pac-12 Freshman of the Week.
In USC’s 67-58 win at Stanford, Watkins set a new USC scoring record with 51 points. That total is the most scored by one player against an AP top-5 team over the past 25 seasons and the 76.1% of her team’s total points is the highest percentage by any player over those same 25 seasons. It’s the second most by a Pac-12 player all-time. And she’d set the USC freshman single-game scoring record by the end of the third quarter, surpassing the 39 points scored by Cheryl Miller.
She’s been so impressive this season that a 29-point, five-assist, four-steal game against Cal pretty much registers as an average night for the 6-foot-2 freshman. Watkins is averaging 27.3 points, 6.9 rebounds and 3.4 assists this season. She’s second in the nation in scoring behind only Iowa’s Caitlin Clark
In the two games that earned her this week’s honors, Watkins averaged 40 points, 7.5 rebounds and 4 steals to go with 42.1% shooting from three-point range and 90% free throw shooting.
As Watkins has pushed past USC and women’s basketball legends Lisa Leslie and Cheryl Miller already in freshmen scoring records, she also is doing things no other Pac-12 player has done. In sweeping both the Player and Freshmen of the Week honors, Watkins is the first Pac-12 player to earn both of those in the same week twice in a season. In fact, the conference should probably think about renaming the Freshman of the Week award in her honor. It’s been awarded 13 times this season. Just twice has it gone to someone other than Watkins.
Now on a two-game winning streak after dropping three of their previous four games, the Trojans are up to No. 10 in the nation this week. They will get a very small break in a grueling Pac-12 schedule with a Friday night home game against last-place Arizona State. But looming at the end of the month are home games against No. 4 Colorado and No. 20 Utah, two teams that just swept the Trojans in late January on the road.
