The USC men's
basketball team has reportedly turned toward the SEC as it looks for its next head coach. Jon Rothstein of CBS Sports reported Wednesday that "Arkansas' Eric Musselman has emerged as the primary candidate in USC's search." The Trojans need a new coach after Andy Enfield left to lead SMU in a move that created some future uncertainty inside the program. One of those questions is whether Bronny James will end up transferring, and his father, LeBron James, said there are some "tough decisions to make."
LeBron James says his son Bronny has some "tough decisions" coming up and the family will support him no matter what he decides. pic.twitter.com/q9uOw9LHOp The Enfield move may have caught some off guard, as he was USC's head coach for the past 11 seasons and led the Trojans to the NCAA tournament on five different occasions. SMU also hasn't won a tournament game since the 1987-88 campaign. However, the Mustangs are headed to the basketball-rich ACC—a league that features programs such as Duke, North Carolina and Syracuse, among others. Enfield himself even told reporters he wouldn't have joined the Mustangs if they weren't moving to the ACC, adding, "We were extremely happy at USC, and I had an incredible staff, players, great support from the administration, and we lived at the beach. So not bad at all." Perhaps that means James—who was a 5-star prospect in the class of 2023, per 247Sports' composite rankings—will end up elsewhere. Perhaps it also means Musselman will be the one to lead the Trojans into the Big Ten. Musselman coached four seasons at Nevada from 2015 to 2019 and won three Mountain West regular-season titles. He also led the Wolf Pack to the NCAA tournament three times, including when they reached the Sweet 16 in 2018. That landed him the Arkansas
Job, and he is 111-59 with three NCAA tournament appearances in five years. The Razorbacks reached two consecutive Elite Eights in 2021 and 2022 and made the Sweet 16 last year. USC hasn't made it past the first round of the Big Dance since it was also in that 2021 Elite Eight, so Musselman could look to reestablish some of the tournament success at that program if he does leave to take the job.