I don’t have any answers…and I am totally perplexed.
I simply can’t and won’t accept the whole Pac-10 familiarity argument.
Not with this talent.
Not with all this talk about being prepared and practicing well.
I can’t accept how great everyone thinks this team is with the effort that I saw tonight. Once again we let a no name team with no expectations in the eyes of many get the better of us. I can’t wait to hear the reasoning about this performance.
I have a hard time understanding how SC has all this talent yet they can’t get up for this game or the coaches who can’t scheme against this OSU team. I mean come on Oregon St. lost to Stanford and got pounded by PSU. Props to them for the win but this isn’t about them its about USC so I really couldn’t care less how OSU does this season.
1st half, absolutely terrible…too many issues to go through so why bother. The 2nd half was great for a while as SC really put some good drives together but then they just lost the momentum.
Just a few things that stand out…
SC gets a blocked FG but they couldn’t do anything with it.
80+ yards in penalties.
Poor field position due to some lucky rolls on the punts.
Lucky tip in the end zone for a TD that should have been an INT.
Fumble by McKnight that led to that tipped ball/TD.
I have absolutely no idea what the hell the coaches were thinking about with all the cute plays. I mean can we finally dump the direct snap to the TB! You supposedly have this great QB in Sanchez and all these great backs and you want to get cute? How about some smash mouth football! The O line looked like we thought they would look in the game against UVA…against a team that REPLACED THEIR WHOLE FRONT 7 ON DEFENSE!
Yes, SC played a lot better in the 2nd half, but not by much, where was that in the 1st half? I can see where SC needed to see what OSU was going to come out with their typical "bend don’t break" defense but once they saw what OSU was going to do the adjustments took too long to materialize in the first half. I love Joe McKnight but I have a hard time understanding why Sark didn’t use the other backs more to pound the ball. McKnight’s juking and jivin’ just doesn’t do anything when you are having a tough time moving the ball like SC did in the first half.
I know their TB is a small guy and tough to hang onto but that had to be some of the WORST tackling I have seen in a long time…just pathetic!
So, PC needs to get back to work and fix the problems with the O line. They need to dump the cute plays and focus on what they did in the first two games where SC was so dominant.
I will have more tomorrow.
Feel free to light it up!