Whoever wins this game will have a chance to play in the Rose Bowl against a team from the Big 10 conference; and that’s either Michigan State, Ohio State, or Iowa.
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One day after the Trojans lost to Stanford in the Pac-12 Conference championship game, Helton on Sunday immediately fired four of USC’s nine assistant coaches, including defensive coordinator Justin Wilcox. On third-and-2 at the USC 28-yard line, USC left the most unsafe man in the Pac-12 wide open, and McCaffrey took full advantage as he took Hogan’s dump-off throw for a 28-yard game-clinching touchdown reception. He had 207 rushing, 105 receiving, 120 on kickoff returns and 29 on punt returns. Senior linebacker Blake Martinez — the conference’s leading tackler — sacked quarterback Cody Kessler and forced a fumble that was picked up by lineman Solomon Thomas.
USC’s improbable run to the South Division title in the aftermath of former coach Steve Sarkisian’s firing has the Trojans positioned for a shot at their first Rose Bowl game since the 2008 season. USC’s running backs, Ronald Jones II and Tre Madden, who have 1,340 yards between them, could do massive damage on the ground. After Stanford won and covered earlier this year as an underdog, the dog is now an awesome 8-1 ATS in the last 9 matchups, and that one ATS loss was a fluke when in 2011, USC was a 7.5-point underdog and wound up losing by 8, in OT. McCaffrey had a phenomenal game with 32 carries, 4 catches and 1 pass for a total of 461 yards.
“Talkers talk and players play”, coach David Shaw said. “They gave us the opportunity to do that and we did it”, safety Chris Hawkins said.
Helton also announced that he will not call plays next season, which means that USC will now be in the market for an offensive coordinator.
The Pac-12 Championship game started off slowly when a more aggressive Cardinal’s team led 3-0 with a field goal after Kevin Hogan’s touchdown pass to Christian McCaffrey was overturned due to a penalty.
Stanford appeared unlikely to reach the Pac-12 title game following its season-opening loss to Northwestern, but it responded with eight straight wins – including a 41-31 triumph at USC on September 19. Very sad for them that we did not play our best game against a very, very talented Stanford team. Hogan pitched to Barry Sanders Jr., who then flipped it to McCaffrey, who had lined up as a receiver. However, USC’s goal-line stand followed by a late scoring drive kept the Trojans in the game.
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After this week’s performance by Stanford Cardinal running back Christian McCaffrey, the Heisman Trophy may be headed to Palo Alto. Meanwhile, the defense looked superb, holding Stanford to just a field goal after keeping them out of the end zone during a tough goal line stand. It might be hard to remember for younger fans that have only seen Bush’s largely lackluster National Football League career, but for a lot of the players on the current USC roster, Bush was electrifying during his time at USC and a big reason some of them made a decision to play there.
