Anything is possible I guess, but. . . 1) the entire team has been intimidated by sc for at least a decade. You have no idea how deep this runs. Even a close game would be a miraculous turnaround from the prior 6 years. 2) smith and agholor will absolutely shred Cal's small and slow secondary 3) Cal's special teams are terrible. Gave up 2 punt returns Tds to agholor last year 4) Williams will reek havoc on Cal's oline. If cal can avoid shitting the bed in the first half I think we can cover the spread. Go down by a couple of scores early and I don't know if we will be emotionally capable of coming back. A victory is pretty unlikely. I do think cal scores plenty against sc, but I'd be shocked to not see a ton of huge plays against Cal's secondary with those wrs. The over is probably the best bet.
I think spread coverage is likely and a win is possible. I like Cal this year a lot more than you do.
We haven't beaten anyone who is non terrible. We have a good qb and that will get you far, but we have a long history of getting clownstomped and intimidated by even mediocre usc teams. The last 6 meetings the lowest margin of victory by usc is 18 points and that game was over in the first quarter and only got that close in garbage time. It's also just a bad matchup. We have no pass Rush and their wrers are literally uncoverable by our dbs.
Yes. I knew we had no chance against oregon because our d had no prayer of defending a duel threat qb. Usc is probably better then their record, but has played down to their competition. They almost certainly won't be up for the game given how we've laid down for them in the past. If we can keep it close by halftime we'll have a legit shot of winning since their d has worn down in every game and we run a hurry up offense. I'll know within the first 2 or 3 drives by both team if we have a chance. Our team has a long history of being intimidated by playing usc. That's hard to break. Even the comments by the players show they are very aware of this. If we play tight, the crowd gets going, and usc scores at will early, the game will be over by the first quarter. Also I'm going which means we will lose
exactly and Kessler doesn't turn it over. USC's pass D isn't great. if we can protect goff, we have a chance to score. avoid giving up special teams TDs, protect the ball, and keep it close enough that we are close enough to have a chance to win once we wear their thin D down by the end. That's what everyone who has beaten them has done.
Hope droski called in sick tomorrow because he his probably already drowning his sorrows. Of course, I think he is his own boss so...
