After the lag due to those of us laboring on the east coast, here are the highlights from the practice reports that are up on the LA Times, LA Daily News, and Scott Wolf's blog.
Long story short:
- Chauncey Washington looked good - he's down to about 216 from 240 at the Rose Bowl. Perhaps that will help with the injuries.
- CJ Gable is up a little bit in weight to 205, which will hopefully help with his shedding tackles
- Allen Bradford, who you may remember switching between offense and defense last season, impressed with a couple of long runs.
- Joe McKnight got good reviews as well. He was getting a fair bit of work in catching passes out of the backfield:
"He's really smooth and has great fluid movement about him," USC coach Pete Carroll said. "We did a lot of stuff with him and he was all over the place.
"And we'll continue to get a lot things thrown his way. He was very comfortable with it. He had a couple balls get away but he has fantastic hands."
McKnight showed the fluidity and speed that made him one of the nation's top recruits. "It's early, but he may have a different gear," running backs coach Todd McNair said, grinning. - Stafon Johnson got some practice time as well, and the crux of his comments afterwards were that he seems to have got his head screwed on the right way, so good for him.
- Evidently Mitch Mustain found that putting the playbook into action for the first time was a bit of a challenge:
"It was kind of frustrating for me today," Mustain said. "It wasn't so much the physical stuff, I was accurate and had zip on the ball but my timing was off and there were too many mental errors.
"The hard part was mentally and not making mistakes."
"It's really quick (facing the defense)," Mustain said. "We pride ourselves on doing everything quick here. I just think I could have done better. I made some good throws once I settled down and did not make as many errors."