Results tagged “USC football” from The Sports Desk

USC is back on top of my Pac-10 Conference football rankings after beating last week's leader Oregon on Saturday. They're based foremost on how many wins each team has above or below the number an average major-college team would have if it faced the same schedule. A "half" game plus or minus is the result of winning or losing a game that looked like a tossup going in. Essentially I divide college teams into three groups: top-25 teams; teams with sub-.500 records, and everyone in between. A school should win home games against sub-.500 teams and middling teams, and lose road games against top-25 teams and middling teams; home games top-25s and road games against sub-.500s are toss-ups. It's not the most scientific method in the world, but a fair way to estimate how satisfied or dissatisfied fans should be with their team's results so far. Ties (and there are a lot this week) are broken by looking at raw won-lost records and performance against the spread and over-and-under line.

1. USC (+1; 1-1 in conference games, 3-1 overall)
2. Cal (+0.5; 2-0, 4-1)
3. Arizona (+0.5; 2-0, 4-1)
4. Oregon (+0.5; 2-1, 4-2)
5. Stanford (+0.5; 2-1, 3-3)
6. Oregon State (+0; 1-1, 2-3)
7. UCLA (-1; 1-1, 2-3)
8. Arizona State (-1.5; 1-1, 2-3)
9. Washington (-2; 0-3, 1-5)
10. Washington State (-3; 0-3, 0-5)

I'm not going to say I told you so. I am going to say Scott Wolf told you so. Our USC beat writer took a lot of heat for defying the early-season conventional wisdom and voting the Trojans only No. 3 in the Associated Press poll -- almost as if they might not be an unconquerable football team. Scott looks pretty good after the Trojans' loss to Oregon State tonight. Unless, of course, you want to rip him for overrating them.

Contrary to popular opinion, the biggest threat to the USC football team's No. 1 ranking might not be Scott Wolf, our writer who voted the Trojans No. 3 in this week's AP poll. The biggest threat might be the perceived weakness of the Pac-10, which provides most of the Trojans' remaining regular-season opponents.

People love rankings, so here's a ranking. It's the Pac-10 Conference football teams from top to bottom. It's based foremost on how many wins the teams have above or below the number an average major-college team facing the same schedule would have.

1. USC (2-0 record, +1 win compared to average)
2. Oregon (3-0, +1)
3. Cal (2-1, +0.5)
4. UCLA (1-1, +0.5)
5. Stanford (1-2, +0)
6. Arizona (2-1, -0.5)
7. Oregon State (1-2, -0.5)
8. Arizona State (2-1, -1)
9. Washington (0-3, -1)
10. Washington State (0-3, -2)

I'll try to keep it updated. It shouldn't be hard.

I'm looking forward to reading Scott Wolf's column in today's paper. Scott writes about why he put USC only No. 3 in the ranking he submitted to the Associated Press pollsters after the Trojans' blowout victory over Ohio State on Saturday. Scott is one of three AP voters -- on a 64-member panel -- who don't have the Trojans No. 1 in the nation.

In the wake of the Lakers' collapse against the Celtics Thursday night, we're making a list of the most historic cases of Southern California teams snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. Send your suggestions in a comment. What's the most painful memory? Dodgers beaten by Jack Clark -- or Joe Morgan, or Reggie Jackson? Angels stunned by Dave Henderson? Rams losing the Mud Bowl game to the Vikings? Kings tripped up by Marty McSorley's illegal stick? USC falling to Vince Young and Texas? An earlier Lakers loss to the Celtics? Or something else? With your help, we'll have the definitive list in Saturday's papers and at this Web site.