A USGA green, in theory, makes water management much more predictable by, essentially, holding water until the root zone is saturated, at which time the excess water pushes itself into the drainage pipes. The tradeoff is that nutrient management becomes an exercise in small dose applications because the soil is ill-fit to retain the nutrients. Also, and not very often mentioned, the sandy root zone of a USGA green isn't a great place for microbial proliferation...an essential part of healthy plants, IMO.
A push-up green is almost always the opposite; very good for nutrient management due to it's organic content, while suffering from water management due to slower, and less predictable drainage capabilities.
Both have success and failure records. My experience with push-ups is far greater than with USGA greens. What I often witness out in the field is the guys with USGA greens don't often take advantage of it's built-in quality of water management; that is, that they don't load up the root zone with water until it is saturated throughout....they still hand-water the surface of the green frequently, and I wonder what the benefit is of doing things that way. I truly don't know, so if any of you guys with USGA greens can tell me why it wouldn't be better to irrigate heavily, to the point of saturation, and then leave things alone until it's time to do it again....I'm all ears!
I have seen very good presentations in many construction variations, but I don't think there is a "silver bullet" method that works perfectly in all situations or locations.
And, Steve Okula's contribution above is the reality by which most decisions are made when building new greens, although I've stuck my neck out a few times and varied from the norm. Just recently I was involved with building a green with a sand/ compost blend installed directly over fine-slit drain pipe( similar to XGD, only 4" in diameter) with no gravel layer. Time will tell!