Long Beach Has Edge in Experience : Women’s basketball: USC, which starts two freshmen, will face 49ers in second-round game.

Their paths to the tournament have been similar, but when USC and Cal State Long Beach meet tonight at Long Beach there will be one major difference--experience.

Until their first-round victory over Utah Wednesday night, the Trojans had only one player--Molly Keenan--with NCAA tournament experience. The 49ers have seven.

This is the first time USC has been in the tournament since 1988. Long Beach has been there every year since the NCAA began sponsoring women’s tournaments in the 1981-82 season.

Regardless, both teams are playing well after struggling during the first few weeks of the season. The 49ers, after an 8-7 start, have won 15 consecutive games. The Trojans have won eight of their last 10.

“I’m comfortable playing Long Beach, and I’m sure they’re comfortable playing us,� USC Coach Marianne Stanley said. “We’re familiar with them. I think that helps with a young team. And being in Southern California will help because we’ll have people there supporting us.�

Long Beach defeated USC, 71-61, this season.

But both teams are riding high these days, and one has to fall tonight in the 7:30 game at Long Beach’s University Gym.

“You lose, that’s it,� said 49er guard Dana Wilkerson, one of two seniors on the team and its leading scorer with a 16-point average.

The 49ers probably will employ strategy similar to that used to defeat Cal State Fullerton in the Big West Conference tournament championship--pressing the guards in the backcourt and front and throwing a lot of muscle inside against 6-foot-5 Lisa Leslie.

“We’ll do the same thing we did with (Fullerton center Genia Miller)--try to contain her and slow her down,� Wilkerson said.

Against Fullerton, Long Beach effectively alternated 6-3 Danielle Scott, 6-2 Kari Parriott and 6-4 Bolivia Gaytan against Miller, who made only eight of 20 shots, well below her 60% average.

All this against Leslie could send her to the bench early in foul trouble, a place the frustrated freshman--despite her team-leading 19.6-point average--has found herself all too often this season.

“Lisa has gotten into trouble, but USC as a team picks up the slack and plays very well,� Long Beach Coach Joan Bonvicini said. “We can’t focus on Lisa. The key to their team, I think, is Tammy Story. She’s playing very hard.�

Story, a junior, is second to Leslie in scoring with a 14-point average. Trojan guard Joni Easterly, a sophomore, has been playing well also, averaging 11 points and more than five rebounds a game.

Despite a starting lineup that includes two freshmen and only one senior, Keenan, the Trojans are holding opponents to fewer than 68 points a game.

Said Stanley: “This team has finally understood the value of defense and the value of effort, and effort can overcome a lot of mistakes.�