BASKETBALL, FOOTBALL

USC Morning Buzz: Winners And Losers Of The Week

WINNERS

The football imposter

Hey, it takes some guts to walk into a high-security facility and have the know-how to find a helmet, jersey and cleats. And then to field some punts!

Now we need a guy to walk in there, weld a hat on his head, throw on a USC polo and pretend he is the head coach. Or is that what’s happened the past five years?

Joshua Jackson

It took less than a week of practices for the converted cornerback to become the darling of spring drills, especially after he intercepted a Miller Moss pass. No one cares that it is just spring, of course.

The Conference of Champions

One team in the men’s Final Four. Two teams in the women’s NCAA championship game. The karma from firing Larry Scott is immediate.

USC wide receiver depth

They have added two transfers in the offseason. But what do the returning receivers (and their parents) think about that?

Coach Bohn

Treated USC fans to a pair of Happy Hours in Indianapolis before Oregon and Gonzaga games. I’ll drink to that!

USC basketball

They got to the Elite Eight. That apparently happens every 20 years.

LOSERS

USC basketball

They got to the Elite Eight but UCLA got to the Final Four and nearly beat the team that made the Trojans look silly.

Coach Bohn

Cincinnati suspended the basketball coach he hired, John Brannen, pending a university review of the program. The Bearcats had six players enter the transfer portal in one week in March and currently have four scholarship players on the roster. Oh, and he didn’t hire Mick Cronin at Cincinnati, in case someone tries to drop that false fact.

USC women’s volleyball

Couldn’t make NCAA Tournament for first time since 1990. Where’s Mick Haley?

USC baseball

Dropped 2 of 3 games to Cal. Trojans are now 12-11 overall and 5-4 in the Pac-12.

Season-ticket sales

I keep getting emails from people who tell me they dropped their tickets — before the pandemic. It’s going to look really interesting in the Coliseum this season.

24 thoughts on “USC Morning Buzz: Winners And Losers Of The Week”

  1. Best line ever written by Scott Wolf, “Maybe the Imposter player thought if there was an Imposter coach, no one would notice the imposter player.”

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  2. I haven’t emailed Scott, but I dropped my season tickets a few years ago because getting into the Coliseum was too much of a hassle just to watch inexplicable mistakes being made. Now we spend the money on a northern away game and a southern away game. We play much better when Helton has had less sleep.

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

    1. Looking forward to seeing you in Boulder this Early October, RT.
      Weather is glorious the first week in October, and Boulder is a fun town–classic University Town with plenty of good (to great) food options, imminently walkable.

      The Colorado USC alumni show up in force. We take over a few local pubs so you don’t have to deal with the Boulder Riff Raff. Ordinarily the stands are 1/3 Troy, 2/3 Buffs. The last few years Helton has snuck out of town with a close “W”.

      Warning: CU has the most foul-mouthed, rude, low FB IQ fans on Earth–and that is the rich Alumni section! The CU student section reminds me of those commercials for Spring Break Girls Gone Wild.

      Anyway, it’s an easy flight from the West Coast. Some fans stay in Denver–where nobody cares about the Buffs. Some fans stay in Boulder. I can offer plenty of advice.
      If you come, drop me a line here and I’ll off

      Liked by 3 people

      Reply

  3. Losers: USC athletics in general. Aside from a few sports that not every school fields a team in (water polo), USC teams pretty much suck.

    And guess what, it’s not going to get any better under Folt, in fact, it’ll probably get worse.

    Congrats to the USC basketball team, a very nice season to be sure but I doubt we’ll see it repeated anytime soon, unless Enfield can hire some other one and done kid’s dad.

    And congrats to OSU and ucla. I HATE ucla but they played their asses off, same for the Beavers.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    1. “Losers” in sports people “care about”? WTF?! Our football team officially WON the Pac 12 South…..
      #…AndUnofficiallyWonThe”CaliforniaChampionship”….
      #Okay,MaybeTheLatterDoesn’t Exist….
      #…ButJustTheSame….
      #…YouWannaThinkBeforeYouTypeNextTime…

      Like

      Reply

      1. We all have to be careful not to keep insisting that no one cares about the thing that keeps this blog going—USC sports……
        #PeopleMightStartBelievingIt….
        #ThenWhat?

        Liked by 1 person

      3. You’re right.
        #…YouDidn’tUseThoseActualWords
        #[ButWeDon’tWantOur”InsideUSC”Pals….
        #…Thinking”It’sOnlyGoingToGetWorseUnderFolt”….
        #…EvenIfIt’sTrue…Actually,EspeciallyIfIt’sTrue]…
        #WeMustDealOutSomeHopeHere,Karma…
        #CuzCrazyFoltIsGonnaBeAroundForALongTime…
        #AndILikeToSeeTrafficHere

        Like

    2. You are correct about the general decline of USC athletics. I remember when it was common for USC to win 4-5 NCs a year in multiple sports. The sport that basically funds the athletic department has always been football. Football attendance has continued to decline for some time as the fan base is fed up with Helton’s inability to develop players and build a program that can consistently compete at a high level. Basketball had a great run this year, but wilted on the big stage and has historically had difficulty building its fan base. Perhaps the AD can build upon some of the momentum gained from this past season. Coach Enfield will have to replace several key players (again). Hopefully there will be renewed interest at Galen. Baseball has not been relevant for 20 years. Women’s basketball and volleyball don’t seem to be getting better. Track and Field always seems to have great athletes and performs well. Our success has repeatedly come in women’s beach volleyball, M & W waterpolo, some soccer and occasionally tennis and golf. I think we can quickly turn things around in several of the programs, but it all starts with football and that won’t happen until Helton is replaced and there is a renewed commitment to winning championships from administrators. I don’t think that commitment currently exists which will allow Stanford, UCLA,
      Oregon and others to broaden their success.

      Like

      Reply

  5. A bit of a bipolar W&L list this week.
    I disagree with the Trojan haters.

    FB trending up despite the HC. Good new staff on Defense and good recruiting year. The Draft will soon tell us if our talent is still “NFL worthy.”
    The Home and Away schedule is primed for a run. Again, if not 11-1, then I think the HC should go, based on such a perfect scheduling storm.
    Looking forward, if the team is 10-1 going into the last game of the regular season with a place in the Pac 12 champ game already assured, do you play second stringers vs BYU at home to avert injuries to key personnel. I don’t.
    At 10-2, IDK. Buy out the remainder of the HC contract and move up.

    BB trending up with three consecutive fine seasons. USC has produced 3 or 4 fine “big men” over the past few seasons: Metu, OO, the Mobleys. Let’s see if “we” can develop Coulibaly. Hope Goodwin returns.

    I was a huge baseball fan back in the day, but who really cares about college baseball any more? The best talent goes straight from HS to the Minors, and the rest of the talent is spread out amongst 300+ schools. All pro games are televised every night, so why go to the park? I start watching baseball on Labor day. Ho hum.

    We have a GREAT W Soccer coach, and W Lax have been consistent winners. The precipitous decline in WVB is saddening. Seems like just yesterday I made a trip from Colorado to watch Bricio and team trounce #2 Stanford at a truly rockin’ Galen Center. HH needs to shore up the leadership in Women’s athletics.. I’m not sure we’ve really had any WBB presence in this new Millenium. I think the Women’s rowing team would have been blockbuster has the Laughlins been allowed to row. Sad how THAT evolved.

    T&F usually brings tons of victories home. Personally, IDK about the distance events.

    WSJ ranks USC the #19 (out of 780) University in America–ahead of Cal and UCLA. We don’t compete with Cal Tech (thankfully). Just Stanford and USC at the Top in the West. Our co-eds are vastly more beautiful and talented than Stanford’s.

    Winner of the year. Trojans (and all who’ve survived the year of the ‘vid).
    FOF!

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

    1. Nice piece, Bourbon. I think we’re in good shape too — that is if all our players in all our sports honor all Dr. Folt’s “make them up as she goes along” covid regulations…..
      #She’sNotAboveSuspendingSlovisIfHeWalksInTheWrongDoor…

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

    2. USC is NOT trending up anywhere in sports and your assumption that SC has a ” good defensive staff ” makes me think you’ve been in the rye way too early today.

      Like

      Reply

  6. The WSJ belongs to and is under the thumb of the Rupert Murdoch news empire. Murdoch’s News Corp has previously stated they are under no obligation to separate fact from fiction or opinion in its pseudo news function.

    Therefore, the WSJ claim that Clown U is the #19 University in the US has all the cachet of a Tijuana Bible.

    Like

    Reply

      1. The New York Times and Washington Post and L. A. Times pay hundreds of carefully screened hack reporters and goofy editorialists millions of dollars [and rent office buildings for tens of millions of dollars more] for ONE sacred purpose —- to get the TRUTH out to the American people. ANYONE who thinks they’re spending all that money to advance a political agenda is just being cynical. These are good people who would never dream of denigrating the TRUTH for a living…
        #..That’sNotWhoTheyAre

        Liked by 1 person

      2. The LA Times, NY Times and the Wash. Post were not blatant Trump propaganda machines like the WSJ. The WSJ Corporate Policy was to kiss Trump’s ass and praise the Ratpublicans – right or wrong.

        Like

      3. Yes, my friend, Owns. You’re right on this one. The Washington Post and the New York & L. A. Times were definitely not blatant Trump Propaganda Machines….
        #OhBoy,WereTheyNotTrumpPropagandaMachines…

        Liked by 1 person

    2. Hey BruinRob, where is Cerritos College listed? By the way. UCLA has only one National Title in basketball-1995. The other ten national titles came when the NCAA Tournament had only 24 and then 36 teams, so they didn’t have to win the prerequisite six games to cut down the nets. All of this is based upon your flawed logic.

      Like

      Reply

      1. Then you little tw*t, winning the conf. title meant some thing, because that was the only way receive a tournament invitation. Only #1’s made the tournament.

        How many times did #2 bozo BB have to watch the Tournament on TV because they didn’t win the PAC title.

        #bozo BB: Choka, choka, flop, flop.

        Like

    3. Wow, this has to be the weakest argument JO has ever put up.
      I can see how the Murdoch gang has nothing better that to sit in their smoke filled room just conspiring to think of ways to rank USC ahead of UCLA. JO, you have surpassed yourself in your court jester duties. Come to think of it, comparing you to a court jester is an insult to court jesters.

      P.S. Recent year median SAT scores are higher for USC students than UCLA.

      USC wins again!

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

      1. stogie you POS, once again You’re all loud mouth and zero ref.

        How do you calculate the median?

        Arrange your numbers in numerical order.
        Count how many numbers you have.
        If you have an odd number, divide by 2 and round up to get the position of the median number.
        If you have an even number, divide by 2. Go to the number in that position and average it with the number in the next higher position to get the median.

        ~ Google

        So stogie, I calculate your median IQ at 27 just above catatonic coma. You’re so dense you can’t feel the stick up your kazoo when you sit.

        Like

      2. Wow, you are really dumb… You have to look up “median”! And, do you not understand how these are used? Do you know what an SAT score is, or do I assume too much? Just when I thought you could not top yourself with the inane comments you come up with this. I already knew that intelligent comments was not your strong suit, but wow.
        Oh, well, you are only here for the court jester duties, so should not be surprised.

        Like

Leave a comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.