On Oct. 27, 2024, USC soccer hosted crosstown rival UCLA at Dignity Health Sports Park for the regular-season finale of both squads’ inaugural seasons in the Big Ten. The Trojans won the highly competitive game 1-0, capping off an undefeated year in conference play and securing the Big Ten regular-season title, along with the No. 1 seed in the upcoming conference tournament.

Almost exactly a year has passed since that match, and while the 2025 season hasn’t gone quite as smoothly, the unranked Trojans (7-6-2, 4-5-1 Big Ten) nevertheless find themselves in a position to lock down a Big Ten Tournament bid for the second straight year as they approach their final game of the regular season: a bout with the No. 18 Bruins (10-4-2, 6-2-2) on Sunday.

Rather than looking for a top seed, however, this year’s squad is simply looking to make it into the tournament at all. After losing just one regular-season game all last year, USC finds itself below 0.500 in conference play — and barely above 0.500 overall — and sitting at 10th place in the Big Ten this season. With 10 spots available in the tournament and just one game left on the schedule for each team in the conference, the Trojans’ playoff hopes heavily rely on a victory over UCLA.

Trojans will need to overcome dominant Bruin defense

USC is coming off a 2-2 draw against No. 15 Iowa (10-3-4, 5-2-3), in which junior forward Maribel Flores once again stole the show, taking half of the Trojans’ 12 shots and scoring both of their goals. Flores leads USC with nine goals and four assists on the year; with another score against the Bruins, she would become just the 23rd player in program history with 10 goals in a single season.

Aside from Flores, much of the team’s offensive production comes from sophomore forward Jaiden Anderson and sophomore midfielder Ines Derrien, though both have been fairly dormant as of late. Anderson has six goals and four assists but failed to record a goal contribution in her last three games, her longest such streak since her freshman campaign. Meanwhile, Derrien has just two in her last 12 games after exploding for three goals and two assists in her first three.

After recording three shutouts in USC’s first four games, graduate goalkeeper Bella Grust has struggled down the stretch, giving up the second-highest goals per game among primary Big Ten goalies while recording the third-lowest save percentage. If the Trojans want to stand a chance against UCLA, they will need the version of Grust that shut down Oregon’s (2-10-5, 0-6-4) offense in a four-save shutout Oct. 3.

However, the main obstacle in taking down the Bruins won’t be their offense: UCLA has scored just 19 goals all season, besting only conference bottom-feeders Oregon and Rutgers (4-7-4, 2-7-1). The main obstacle will be getting around a lights-out defense that has established itself as the best in the Big Ten, if not the entire country.

Across 16 games this season, the Bruins have allowed a total of five goals — the fewest by any team in the entire country — and have yet to give up multiple goals in a single game. 

UCLA also leads the NCAA with an 89.1% save percentage, thanks to the stellar play of freshman goalkeeper Daphne Nakfoor, but its 41 saves on the season are the fewest for any Big Ten squad. The Bruin defense simply prevents opposing players from getting opportunities at an unparalleled rate, allowing less than three shots on goal per game compared to USC’s average of 4.5, roughly on par with the rest of the conference.

While defense is its clear strength, UCLA’s offense has dangerous players in its own right. Sophomore forward Bella Winn sits at six goals on just 21 shots — a more efficient rate than Flores, Anderson or Derrien — and is coming off a two-goal performance against Nebraska (8-4-5, 3-4-3) on Oct. 19. Redshirt senior midfielder Emma Egizii is the only other Bruin with double-digit points, leading the team with five assists to go along with her three goals.

Finding a way through UCLA’s iron wall will be difficult, but USC is fresh off back-to-back matches scoring multiple goals, and its top offensive player in Flores is peaking at the right time. If the Trojans can pull out a win in Westwood, they’ll be tournament-bound — and as they saw first-hand in a shocking penalty-kick loss to Rutgers in last year’s semifinals, anything’s possible in the playoffs.

USC eyes tournament berth

With a win Sunday, USC will guarantee itself a spot in the Big Ten Tournament no matter what happens elsewhere in the conference. With a tie or loss, however, the path gets more complicated.

Michigan (6-8-3, 3-4-3) and Nebraska both sit just one point below the Trojans in the standings. If either team wins its final game, it will leapfrog USC in the standings should the Trojans not beat UCLA, blocking their tournament bid; if both teams lose or both teams tie, the Trojan squad will finish ahead, regardless of how they fare against the Bruins.

USC holds one over Michigan after a 2-1 win Sept. 18, but Nebraska has the advantage on USC thanks to a 3-2 win at Rawlinson Stadium on Oct. 16. Thus, if the Trojans lost, the Wolverines lost, and the Cornhuskers tied, USC would be out; if the Trojans lost, the Wolverines tied, and the Cornhuskers lost, USC would be in.

In case that wasn’t confusing enough, Indiana (5-5-6, 2-3-5) ranks just two points behind USC and could take the final tournament spot for itself with a win and a Trojan loss.

Fans can pore over the standings and dozens of possible scenarios for hours, but the big picture is clear: USC will make the Big Ten Tournament if it upsets UCLA. The Trojans will begin play in Westwood on Sunday at 2 p.m., hoping to keep their season alive for another day.