Pac-10 roundtable, Stanford front-runner

John Robinson: There are nine teams that are happier than hell in the Pac-10 and one that’s in the tank.  I don’t have to tell you which one that is.  It looks like the Oregon-Oregon State game is going to be a big deal.  I think the winner goes on to the Rose Bowl.  Both teams are well coached.  I think Riley and Kelly have both done a great job.  Oregon is one of those teams, like Georgia Tech, that you just don’t want to play.  They are wild on offense and really hard to handle.  USC never got it going this year.  I don’t think the team ever improved from the start.  Their philosophy is kind of a wide open, pass-oriented offense.  They got caught up with the freshman quarterback, then he got injured.  He wasn’t able to lift them and in the meantime their defense got worse.  I don’t know if they just don’t have the speed they did in the past.  Something is missing on defense because it’s just awful.  But it’s great times in the Pac-10.  There have been great games.  I don’t know how strong anybody is but it’s sure a good conference from within.  There’ll be a new team in the Rose Bowl.

Did Pete Carroll’s assistants leaving for new jobs have an impact on the team?

Don James: I didn’t think so but maybe it’s true.  Pete Carroll is the defensive coordinator.  The offense hasn’t changed, the coaches have changed.  Maybe with them coming in from Denver, they had a difficult time with it.  They weren’t very dynamic.  They don’t like to run the ball.  They will very seldom run the ball twice in a row.  They’re a great offensive team when it’s going.  This is the first time the quarterback and the receivers (they lost their best receiver) didn’t get it going.  They didn’t have other people to come in there.  I think that probably made a difference, a combination of things.  Not a good year.

Frank Kush: USC has the talent, but they just don’t have their act together offensively or defensively.  It seems like one of those internal problems where the coaches don’t know who to play.  We’ve got the same problem here at Arizona State.  We’ve gone through three quarterbacks and we still don’t know what we want to do.  It’s unfortunate because it’s affecting the team in general, psychologically in my opinion and certainly offensively here at Arizona State.

John Ralston: I feel the same way, I think Stanford is the best team in the Pac-10.

John Cooper: I was talking to the Ohio State coaches and they still think USC was the best team they’ve played all year for what it’s worth.

Robinson: I think a number of things worked against them.  They’ve had a change in the coaching staff and that got them off a little bit.  Their overall squad isn’t as fast as it used to be.  You don’t get a sense of that speed.  You look at some of these teams and say “Wow, they’re fast” and you just don’t say that about USC this year.  They’re good, they’re physical and all that, but that never happened.  They got caught up early too in the quarterback thing.  They were going with the freshman starter and than he got hurt.  It seemed like it used up all their attention and the rest of the team didn’t come along.  They didn’t do well.  You’ve got to have some perspective.  They’ve been champions seven year in a row in the Pac-10 and contending to be national champions so this is an aberration in that regard.  I don’t think there is dissension or discontentment.  They just aren’t doing it.  John Ralston made the point that Stanford is really good.  Maybe the rest of the Pac10 has come up and is not afraid of them.

Jim Harbaugh is a guy who says, “I’m not afraid of you, I’m going to kick your ass,” and he did.

And then there’s Oregon.  No one wants to play Oregon.  They’re like Georgia Tech.  You just don’t want to play those guys that are crazy.  They run all over the damn place and you don’t know where the ball is.  A lot of things have conspired against USC, but there’s no falling off the mountain.  They may have slipped down from the top, but they’ve got their hiking boots on and they’ll get their ass back up there.

Terry Donahue: I think one of the things to me that has been the most interesting about USC over the last couple of years is that they have kind of moved away from the really hard, physical running game USC traditionally has always had.  It was one of those things they always had.  They would pound on you with good backs and really good offensive linemen.  It doesn’t seem like that philosophy is ingrained at USC any longer.  It seems that they’ve gotten away from that and it seems to me they’ve become so reliant on the quarterback position to play.  They’ve had Heisman Trophy winners and first round picks at quarterback and they’ve been really good in the past.  But still in terms of leading with the run and countering with the pass, I think they do more of the opposite now.  When you have a young quarterback who makes a few mistakes things can blow up on you.

Ralston: Stanford’s red-shirt freshman quarterback has come on strong.   A guy who is a red-shirt freshman playing with the varsity you would expect not to be very good, but he’ll keep Stanford up there as long as he’s there.  We keep talking about their running back but their quarterback is as good as anybody.

Related Posts: