Instant Analysis - Oct. 31
Oregon 47 ... USC 20
Pete
Fiutak
It’s called tackling, USC. It’s the art of wrapping up and bringing a ball-carrier down to the ground, and the Trojans couldn’t do it. Oregon’s offense was amazing, effective, and consistent in a dominant performance that everyone saw and no one will be able to ignore. But USC has itself to blame, too.
For all the good things USC has done throughout the season, getting strong offensive play over the last few weeks and dominant defense over the first five games, the defense has started to make more and more mistakes just when it was supposed to be jelling. Everyone thought the D would need a little while to replace all the key parts lost from last year’s brick wall, but it was more than fine against Ohio State, Cal, and for three quarters, Notre Dame. But now, nothing is working.
The pass defense made Oregon’s Sean Canfield look like a first round draft pick throwing the ball, while the run defense couldn’t wrap up on the little backs from Oregon getting ripped up by Oregon State’s Jacquizz Rodgers and Oregon’s LaMichael James. But more than that, the USC D has been run over by the more physical Ducks. This was USC getting its manhood stripped away, and now it’s time to make a statement again over the final month against Arizona State, Stanford, UCLA, and Arizona. The Rose Bowl might be gone for the Trojans, but a BCS game is still there for a 10-2 team. But it’s going to take a while for the USC to overcome this one.
Richard
Cirminiello
Watching Oregon emphatically end USC’s stranglehold on the Pac-10, I couldn’t help but think of the P word. No, not Pasadena, which is likely where the Ducks will be celebrating the holidays, but playoff.
Yeah, it’s a tired debate with no happy ending in sight, but hasn’t Oregon become this season’s poster child for the need for a bigger postseason umbrella? Outside of Texas, no one in the country is playing better than the Ducks, yet an opening night loss two months ago will probably prevent them from reaching beyond the Rose Bowl. And that’s just too bad. The way this team has ripped through the last seven opponents, including the exclamation point over the overmatched Trojans, has been miraculous. Who wouldn’t want to see this locomotive zip through Tuscaloosa, Gainesville, or Austin once the regular season ended?
If you’re going to dethrone the heavyweight champ, you better be prepared to knock it out. Oregon did that for all 60 minutes on Saturday night. It’s really a shame that the Ducks will need all kinds of breaks in order to elevate from the January undercard to the title bout on Jan. 7.
Matt Zemek
1) I felt, before the start of the season, that Oregon would wrest the Pac-10 away from USC because the Ducks would get to play against a freshman quarterback in Autzen Stadium. Little did I know that the freshman quarterback would be a source of strength for the Trojans… and that Pete Carroll’s defense, with inexperience at linebacker and inconsistency at all 11 positions, would become the reason for a changing of the guard on the West Coast. Yes, Oregon must still win at Arizona to wrap up the Pac-10 title, but just in case the Ducks lose to the Wildcats, a certain team hosts Arizona on Dec. 5… a team that will now have to play a bowl game in a place other than Pasadena.
2) This has been a year in which remarkable runs of sports excellence have come to an end: Rafael Nadal’s 31-match French Open winning streak and his 48-match winning streak in best-of-five-set matches on clay; Roger Federer’s 13-0 record against players other than Nadal in major finals; Jonathan Papelbon’s 26 postseason innings without a charged run; and Mariano Rivera’s 0.00 ERA in postseason home games in a Major League Baseball career dating back to 1995 have all stood as monuments to mastery that shouldn’t soon be forgotten.
On a night when they were beaten and beaten badly, don’t bag on the USC Trojans. Their ability to win the Pac-10 for six straight years stands as an amazing achievement. Nights like this—genuine “we’re just better than you, Pete Carroll” beatdowns—have practically never happened to the Trojan Empire of College Football ever since the midpoint of Carroll’s very first season in 2001. While praising Oregon from the rooftops, acknowledge the decade of distinction fashioned by USC.
Michael Bradley
Don’t even try to paint this one as some sort of lost weekend in Oregon for the mighty USC Trojans. This wasn’t a lapse in concentration or a situation in which the more talented Trojans were caught napping or reading their press clippings. Oregon smoked USC, because the Ducks were better. All of those excuses that crop up when the Trojans lose to Stanford or Washington or Oregon State or the Lions don’t apply here. The Ducks flew through the porous USC defense to take control of the Pac-10 and leave their fans wondering how in the world they could have such a disastrous performance back in early September up in Idaho. Give Chip Kelly credit for pulling everything together after the debacle on the Smurf Turf. It hasn’t hurt that QB Jeremiah Masoli is healthy again, because he triggers that hybrid spread attack as well as anyone in the country could. The Ducks aren’t going to play for the national title, but they are likely headed for Pasadena. Don’t try to pin this one on USC freshman QB Matt Barkley. Nope, this belongs to the Trojan defense, which surrendered 613 total yards, including an embarrassing 392 yards on the ground. USC is left to wonder whether it has lost its mojo in a conference that is improving, while the Ducks forge ahead – and get LaGarrette Blount back next week for Stanford. As if they need him.