z*****a
发帖数: 3809 | 1 How times have changed. Only 3 years ago, Stanford beating USC was the
biggest upset in the history of NCAA football.
http://espn.go.com/blog/pac10/print?id=14054
This is not your old USC
By Ted Miller
On Nov. 14, 2009, two coaches met for the postgame handshake.
Pete Carroll asked, "What's your deal? Are you all right?" Jim Harbaugh
replied, "Yeah, I'm good. What's your deal?"
In and of itself, the exchange seems pretty innocent, no? More odd than
anything. Of course, context is everything. And the context was a few
minutes before Harbaugh electing to go for two with his Stanford team
leading 48-21 with 6:47 left in the fourth quarter. That and the very
different jaw sets of the interlocutors.
"We went for it because we thought we could get it," Harbaugh explained
after the game to reporters, who were then forced to evaluate whether there
was just the slightest flicker of a smile when Harbaugh spoke.
Recall this quote a few weeks back from Stanford center Chase Beeler: "One
of our mottoes is, 'We're going to win with character but we're also going
to win with cruelty.'"
That was the cruelty part. The final was 55-21. It was the worst loss of the
mostly glorious Carroll era that ended shortly after Carroll started
realizing things might get worse.
Don't think for a moment every USC player doesn't recall what transpired on
that day. They got their butts whipped. And Harbaugh and Stanford rubbed
their noses in it.
"It shows the lack of respect that they had for us," said Trojans cornerback
Shareece Wright, who was academically ineligible so he could only watch
helplessly from the sidelines. "That's all that is. A lack of respect for
our team."
Yes, it was. So you'd expect the Trojans to be plenty motivated for their
trip to Stanford on Saturday. But the plot twist for college football fans
still smelling the fumes of the once feared Trojans juggernaut is this: It
probably doesn't matter.
USC, which is coming off a second consecutive loss to Washington, is no
longer the Pac-10 bully. Last year's result in the Coliseum wasn't a sneak
attack, it was a physical mismatch and Stanford was the bully. In fact, the
16th-ranked Cardinal are coming off a loss at Oregon. It might be the mad
ones looking to make a statement.
"I think they were stung," Harbaugh said of the 52-31 loss in Eugene. "It
wasn't a good feeling, having lost the game, but they came back very focused
. Probably had our best Monday practice since I've been around here."
Neither Harbaugh nor new USC coach Lane Kiffin were eager to rehash the
events of last year's game.
"I think that has all been pretty well documented -- that horse been beaten
pretty well I think," Harbaugh said. "I don't think it couldn't be any more
irrelevant with what both teams are trying to accomplish in this game."
Said Kiffin, "We're not even going to talk about it. We have so many things
we need to correct. We let a game get away from us that we should have won [
Washington]. We've got a lot of stuff to work on. We're really not worried
about what happened last year."
That said, it's there: "You have to remember things like that," Wright said.
Here's where Kiffin and Wright agree. Things are different at USC. Not too
long ago, when the Trojans walked out of the locker room tunnel inside any
stadium in the nation, they inspired awe, particularly outside the Pac-10 (
even while losing four conference games last year the Trojans went into the
Horseshoe and beat Ohio State, the eventual Big Ten champions). From 2002-08
, the Trojans were the unquestioned kings of college football. They won an
unprecedented seven consecutive Pac-10 titles, never finished ranked outside
the top-four, won consecutive national titles and lost a classic game with
Texas for a three-pete (though, of course, the NCAA vacated 14 wins from the
Dec. 4, 2004 through the entire 2005 season).
"It's a big difference from when we first came in to now," Wright said. "
Everybody still expects us to throw teams out like we used to. We're not the
same team we were five years ago. We have to accept that."
Said Kiffin, "This is not your old 'SC."
The decline started under Carroll. The current roster features plenty of
recruiting misses. Then, of course, came NCAA sanctions: a two-year
postseason ban and a loss of 30 scholarships divided over the next three
years (long-shot appeal pending).
Further, sanctions have inspired significant roster attrition. Already under
the 85 scholarship limit in 2009, the Trojans had four players leave early
for the NFL draft, two 2010 recruits were released from their letters of
intent and five transferred away because the NCAA ruled upperclassmen could
bolt without penalty due to the bowl ban. Kiffin said the Trojans currently
have "69 or 70" scholarship players. The NCAA limit is 85, at least for
teams not yoked with sanctions.
"It will be good practice for us because the sanctions say we have to be at
75 for a three-year period," Kiffin quipped.
Kiffin further estimated this week t |
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