FOOTBALL

If It’s Friday, It’s Time For a USC Notes Column

If USC defeats Texas A&M tonight, and it’s a big if, beware the comments from the usual suspects.

Just remember a year ago how giddy/cocky they were after Miller Moss threw six TD passes in the Holiday Bowl victory over Louisville.

Remember the narrative? USC had become a new team in the bowl practices and experienced a culture change. The future was bright because of the youthful contributors to that victory.

Well, all of that led to a 6-6 record entering tonight’s Las Vegas Bowl. If you go back a year and look at the fanboys on twitter, their comments are delusional. It will be more of the same if the Trojans defeat Texas A&M.

  • USC linebacker Easton Mascarenas-Arnold said Thursday that defensive coordinator D’Anton Lynn is “definitely one of the best coaches in the country.”

I’m not going to dispute that. I just keep wondering how often the USC defense got a stop when it really mattered in a game? Think back to the Michigan, Minnesota, Penn State, Maryland, Washington and Notre Dame games. Did those teams get stopped in the fourth quarter when the game was on the line?

  • And now for some history:
  • I can’t resist these wonderful illustrations the Los Angeles Daily News ran in 1954 for its High School Athlete of the Week by Bill Griffin.

The one above features halfback Tony Ortega of Cathedral High School. If he sounds familiar, Ortega later played halfback at USC.

Ortega scored 34 touchdowns his junior and senior seasons at Cathedral and led his team to the Catholic League championship in 1954.

“When you speak of Glenn Davis (Bonita), Al Pollard (Loyola), Hugh McElhenny (Washington), John Olszewski (St. Anthony), you can use the same breath to mention Tony Ortega,” said Cathedral coach Si Dallmeier. “If there’s a Big Five of the greatest Southland high school backs that ever chased a pigskin into the end zone, Ortega must be included among them.”

Ortega is No. 37 in this 1958 USC team photo. You might notice assistant coach Al Davis happily galloping in the front row with the rest of the coaching staff. Next to Davis is Mel Hein, the NFL MVP in 1938 and a USC assistant from 1951-65. Marv Goux is on the far right.

Is there a Davis, Hein or Goux on USC’s current coaching staff?

  • Texas A&M defensive end Phil Bennett shared this memory of playing against USC in the 1977 Astro-Bluebonnet Bowl.

“Anthony Munoz, the Hall of Fame tackle decided to plant me while I was holding him up, ended up breaking my arm,” Bennett recalled. “I ended up in an ambulance. It was New Years Eve. The game started late and I couldn’t get a doctor to look at my X-ray. I stayed there til almost midnight. It was crazy, so that day is a vivid memory.”

If Bennett’s name sounds familiar, he was the head coach at SMU from 2002-07 and was defensive coordinator at Iowa State, Purdue, LSU, Texas A&M, TCU, Kansas State, Pitt, Baylor and Arizona State.

RATINGS WINNER

The 1975 Liberty Bowl Bowl between USC and Texas A&M drew a huge TV audience of more than 12 million viewers. That’s double the audience of last week’s games between Ohio State-Tennessee and Notre Dame-Indiana.

  • Fredericks, a sporting goods company/shop that was located on Pico Blvd. and La Cieniega Blvd., used to supply the uniforms for USC, UCLA and the Rams in the 1950’s. The uniforms were hand-made by the company.

Owner Bill Fredericks said he could make junior-sized uniforms for any college team in the country if a parent wanted to outfit their child in full regalia. I wonder how many parents actually bought the full uniforms for their kids. Imagine if they were available today. Kids would love them.

  • After Utah defeated USC 10-6 in the 2001 Las Vegas Bowl, coaches from both schools, including then-USC assistant Lane Kiffin, took an elevator together down to the field. After a Utah assistant made a comment about the win, there was almost an altercation in the elevator between the coaches.
  • Bill Bergey, who died Christmas Day, was one of those 1970’s NFL linebackers who looked like they came out of central casting.

He was AFL Defensive Rookie of the Year in 1969 with the Cincinnati Bengals and named to five Pro Bowls, four times with the Philadelphia Eagles. He also set the NFL record for interceptions by a linebacker and was named the Eagles’ MVP three times.

PICTURE OF THE DAY

Italian actress Isabella Briganti

VIDEO OF THE DAY

As the year draws to a close, it’s always worth watching TCM’s remembrance of those we lost.

30 thoughts on “If It’s Friday, It’s Time For a USC Notes Column”

  1. So SC’s defense failed to come through in the 4th quarter with Michigan, Minnesota, Penn St, Maryland, Washington and Notre Dame. These were the 6 losses

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    1. Not even close to being true. Some people touch this world like few others and leave this world with loved ones who have no choice but to celebrate a life well lived. Sure, they’ll miss them. But to not celebrate all that they gave would be disrespectful to their memory.

      Mom & Dad attended an Irish funeral once where they and one other couple were the only ones wearing grey or black. Everyone else, and I mean a couple hundred, had festive colors!

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      1. My Mom’s Aunt’s funeral home in Vailsburg (West Newark-NJ) Burns Funeral Home. When we went east to visit my uncle their kids always would laugh at us ‘LA’ kids and they’d say their business the old Irish expression ‘….we be ‘draggin’ the dead!’

        The Saint Patrick’s Day Parade still goes by the home every year – tis’ the last ‘white enclave’ left inside the city’s limits.

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      2. Most believers view it for what it is…being called home. But I can understand how a non-believer would view it as being sad.

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  4. I wonder what the comment was that almost started a fight after Utah beat Carroll and SC. Maybe it was, “Carroll couldn’t win in the NFL either”

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  6. Fridays here are always great for going back to 1950s LA high school football. That was before my time, but high school sports seemed to have been so much more of the city’s fabric then.

    SMU has a talented QB, and USC is 95th in the country in sacks.

    I hope Riley runs the ball and keeps the SMU offense off of the field.

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  7. Hollywood used to go for the good-looking actors. Now it seems it looks more for the normal looking people. With entertainment costs so high, average Joes probable work cheaper too

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      1. Looks don’t matter so much with the guys. And a lot of the guys are short – Tom Cruise, Jack Nicholson, Dustin Hoffman, Al Pacino, ect.

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    1. My son and I went to the Holiday Bowl last year. Great game, we had high hopes for this season with Moss, who inspired his teammates a year ago. Now, 6-6, with losses to Maryland, MN, UDub, Michigan, which ran a 1940s style offense.

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      2. Blog is not the same without him. I hope he is ok. He left right around the Mich or MN game as I recall.

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      3. Sadly, psychotic Cowardly Gabby doxxed him, threatened MG’s wife and drove MG from the blog Cowardly Gabby must be banned from this blog forever for her crimes.

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      1. It was good to see George back, if only briefly. He may have transitioned over to the other blog, as some others have.

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