Two facts best put USC's 70-64 upset win over No. 7-ranked Michigan State on Saturday into perspective.

The Spartans hadn't lost since Nov. 26, reeling off 13 straight wins to climb to the top of the Big Ten standings. The Spartans never led once Saturday against the Trojans.

However Eric Musselman's first season at USC ends up -- the NCAA tournament still feels like a longshot for the 13-8 Trojans (5-5 in the conference) -- he's already delivered two ranked wins (including on the road over then-No. 13 Illinois), shown he can build an entertaining and tough-minded team on the fly relying entirely upon transfers and that he's going to be as relentless about winning as he expects his team to be every possession on the court.

There's never any hiding how Musselman feels in a given moment -- he's refreshingly candid and at times raw with his emotions or critiques of his squad.

After USC blew opportunities to win at home against rival UCLA last Monday, Musselman made no attempt to mask his frustrations. He publicly challenged star point guard Desmond Claude -- "Des, he's got to play better than he did tonight. ... We rely on him." He vented that he hoped he'd still be coaching the program in five years and delivering consistent postseason results by that point if the fans (and administration) would stay patient -- "We'll see where we are in five years, I don't know. Hopefully I'm still sitting here and we have a team that can play in Sweet 16s."

The reality is Musselman is coaching a team that was picked to finish 14th out of 18 Big Ten programs, that started from scratch the day he was hired last April. He's already overachieving any fair expectations for Year 1 given the circumstances, but that mattered not on Monday night when he knew his team was capable of more against the Bruins.

So he decided to put his Trojans through some of their toughest practices of the season this week -- more than halfway through the grind of the Big Ten schedule and ahead of their toughest game to date.

"Our practice the other day was tough. We took off after the UCLA game and then the next day when we came back, which would have been Wednesday, I mean the guys can tell you. We had one of two ways --- because we're not playing a lot of guys, so if you practice really, really hard [the] five guys that are playing the majority of the minutes got to do all that stuff too," Musselman said. "But we just wanted to send a message that, hey, we believe in you. We're not going to say, 'Hey, good job, we played UCLA close.' Let's get after it and try to figure out how we can beat Michigan State."

The players got the message loud and clear.

"It was a DNA practice. I'll just leave it at that," Claude said. "UCLA, there were some effort issues, some of us weren't playing as hard as we should have been, so that was really the point of what practice was like the past few days. ... He did it because he knew we was good enough, and we all wanted to win. He just felt that was what we had to do and it worked."

"We had weights with us the whole time, both hands, all practice," teammate Chibuzo Agbo added, shedding more light on what a "tough" mid-season practice under Musselman entails.

"Yeah, 5, 10-pound plates," Claude said. "I think it was kind of just the message of if you don't play to the standard then this is what's going to happen."

Michigan State (18-3, 9-1 Big Ten), under legendary coach Tom Izzo, comes into most games expecting to be the more physical team -- especially when it has a clear size advantage in the frontcourt like it did vs. the Trojans. But that's not how it played out.

"We got punched in the mouth -- that doesn't happen to us very often and I don't know if we responded very well," Izzo said, especially frustrated that his team managed only a 34-33 rebounding edge despite the size advantage inside.

"... They played better than us. I thought they played tougher than us. I don't say that about many teams, but I've got to give them credit."

USC (13-8, 5-5) scored the first 6 points, including 4 from Claude. The senior point guard later scored 5 straight points to cap a 9-0 run and put the Trojans up 22-7 while responding to his coach's challenge by scoring a game-high 19 overall and shaking off a hard fall in the first half that had onlookers thinking he be seriously hurt as he awkwardly limped off the court and back to the locker room.

Instead, he was back in the action less than 5 minutes of game time later.

"I think it was just the impact of what happened that made it feel a certain way, but once I settled down and calmed down and went to the doctor and he checked it and made sure everything was fine, I started to feel better. And I wasn't going to sit out this game," Claude said. "It was a big game that we needed and I had to step up. Even coach told me, 'We don't got time for you to be out here trying to feel sorry or limping,' so he said, 'If you're hurt, [stay] out, but if you can play then play.' That's what I did."

Said Musselman: "Anytime it's a knee, you've got concern, but I saw him on the bike. At that point, I'm like, 'Let's go, get in.' And our team doctor said, 'Give us another minute.' We don't have another minute to wait, let's go."

Michigan State, backed by a large and loud traveling contingent of fans who made Galen Center feel like a road venue for USC, would of course surge back into the game after the sluggish start, but every time the Spartans threatened the lead the Trojans extended it again.

It was a 3-point game later in the first half when Agbo drained a 3-pointer. When the Spartans answered right back with a 3 from Tre Holloman, USC center Josh Cohen finished a tough layup, drew the foul, flexed to the student section and made the ensuing free throw to make it a 30-24 lead.

That's how it went all afternoon for the Trojans, who never let the lead dip below 3 points -- while pushing it back to 10 at one point in the second half -- and more to the point, never played like they didn't believe they were the better team.

'This is a huge win, I don't know how else to say it, because they're a veteran team, they've been in the Big Ten a long time, they're so well coached. So this is a huge game for us," Musselman said. "If you're playing the 7th-ranked team and an undefeated team [in the league] and a team that's 18-2 and hadn't lost since late November, you've got to exceed the energy of the opponent. And I thought that they bought into that. And they practiced super hard for two straight days."

Just as the Trojans may feel they gave away a chance to win the last time out vs. UCLA, Michigan State will be kicking itself about its missed opportunities Saturday.

The Spartans shot just 11 of 19 from the foul line despite shooting 80.3 percent from the stripe for the season.

In the final minutes, they also missed a putback dunk that instead caromed off the rim and out of bounds, had a costly offensive foul when they couldn't afford it, and with USC protecting a 66-61 lead in the final minute the Spartans got an offensive rebound but couldn't find a good look during one of the Trojans' best defensive possessions of the game and wound up with a shot clock violation turnover.

On the ensuing inbounds, they let Saint Thomas heave a full-court pass to Wesley Yates II for an uncontested dunk to push the lead to 68-61 and all but seal the game.

Michigan State forced USC into a 5-second violation turnover on an inbounds play with 25 seconds left, but the Spartans missed a pair of 3-pointers before getting a tip-in with 11 seconds on the clock to make it a 68-63 game.

The Trojans would hold on from there.

"Now we've had two humungous wins and there's still a lot of basketball to be played," Musselman said.

In addition to Claude's clutch performance, Yates added 15 points (hitting all 3 of his 3-point attempts), Agbo added 14 points and Thomas had 8 points, 8 boards and a team-high 4 assists.

The Trojans are still have a lot of work to do to even put themselves in the conversation for NCAA tournament selection.

Maybe this spurs them to a big February and that indeed happens.

"I think where our team is right now, we've just got to worry about the next game. And I think our team's done not a good job of that but great," Musselman said. "They don't look past an opponent. I think we as a group really understand the only way for us to win is to be ultra-focused -- maybe out-talented at times, maybe deeper benches that we're playing. Just play for 40 minutes and see where it comes out."

Even if the Trojans don't make it into March Madness, though, USC fans should feel optimistic about the direction of this program under Musselman, who has developed a foundational star in the redshirt freshman Yates (15.5 points per game in conference play), just picked up a commitment from local five-star guard Alijah Arenas this week, has helped develop Claude into one of the Big Ten's best guards as the senior is enjoying a career year (19.3 PPG in conference play) and has taken a collection of spare parts from around the country and melded a cohesive unit that has only gotten better and better and better over the course of this season.

Yes, USC basketball is in good hands and the best surely is yet to come ...