Rick Bowmer/Associated Press
After glancing at USC’s schedule, I cannot say any of the first eight teams are as talented as the Trojans. And yet USC has three losses with two other extremely narrow victories. What does that leave to explain things? Coaching?
One thing for sure Saturday night. USC’s playcalling often looked like it played not to lose. When you go into a place like Rice-Eccles Stadium, you need a daring, go-for-broke game plan. In other words, no laterals aka bubble screens. Here’s my game story from Salt Lake City.
“We’ve been part of stuff this season that I have yet to experience in coaching,’’ USC coach Steve Sarkisian said. “We didn’t get it done, especially at the most critical moments. That’s our conference right now. That’s our season right now.”
Six teams in the PAC 12 South. After the loss at UTAH, SOSO Cal goes from #1 to #5…..#1 to UN , unfortunately won’t happen…but there’s still a chance to go from !st to WORST!!!!!
fit Un Clown School!
In the same position as lowly ugly who needed 2 overtimes to squeak one out against the Pac12 doormat. At least you have Heisman hundley, right?
A win is a Win is a WIN!!!! You knuckleheads just lost.
Fit Un Silly Clowns!
Irrelevant to the comment at hand, dummy. ugly is tied with USC in the Pac12.
Edit: Nevermind, USC is actually up one win over ugly
5th Place in The PAC-12 South? Mercy Nurse!
fit Un Yesterday U!!!!!!!
ugly is in 5th place you dummy
Suckisian is just another Kiffin with a fat face and gut … OK maybe he is another Weis.
Did this idiot really say “We’ve been part of stuff this season that I have yet to experience in coaching,’’ part of this stuff ! did this loser graduate from high school !!!
Haden you better can this clown does what he did to Udub. He left Petersen a complete mess.
FIRE THIS LOSER
He’s got to be 80 lbs overweight.
Feels great!
I knew when we hired Sark we would be good for at least 7 wins a season. Well, this might not be the case anymore. Oh well, we need to accept our mediocrity and live it.
Fire SARK NOW!!
Fire Mike Rae’s caddy and Sarkiffin…in that order. Both are incompetent. It’s going to be a long struggle until Nikias sobers up,
I used to disagree with you but after this last year with the Josh Shaw disaster and arguing with refs too getting into hissy fights with Lendale White, Haden should be prodded to retire. He really is not fit for the job. That said, who will replace Haden? Lopes? Jackson? They are the fools who foist Sark on Haden in the first place. All because Sark gets the South Bay Mafia vision of USC Athletics? The rot is deep, and it ain’t gonna change until Nikias grows a pair and cleans house over at HH.
Get Marcus Allen or Ronnie Lott.
Probably, Nikias is looking mostly at at revenues. When those appear threatened, it will get his attention.
“Does It Feel Any Better This Morning?”
Ask bucket, he was was up all night posting under multiple misfits.
Quote from Bucket- I’m a man(mouse) of sound mind and body!”
YA RIGHT!!!!!
After last night, I have to admit Sark is the problem. Why not play to win. Why not cut Kessler lose and attack DOWNFIELD, he is excellent at it. The run would not work, quit running fool. I have to join the masses here and say Sark needs to go.
This a repeat, and I encourage everyone to critique it:
Sark will always come up short if he continues as HC and OC. This team’s shortcoming on offense is that it’s not nimble, opportunistic, and flexible. It’s not singularly focused on exploiting what the defense chooses to defend least, and it doesn’t adapt quickly to an
unexpected defense or a defensive change. Among other things, what’s missing are “series” variations that are practiced and ready to go, and astute in-game analysis and adjustment.
There is no one to blame but Sark, who insists on being the OC. In the first place, he’s no great genius. In the second, to be HC and OC is a big challenge in 2014. Sark suffers from hubris. Not content with his good fortune to
be over-employed as head coach at USC (no one wept or was angry at UW when he left), Sark thinks he can excel at being HC, and still have energy and time to be a great OC. Yet, amazingly, he’s self-proclaimed non-workaholic.
And do you think he perceives these inconsistencies? Doubtful—he’s not well educated (grammar, diction),
and if he’s bright, it certainly does not show in anything he says. His observations are pedestrian.
On the other hand, what is Pat Haden’s excuse? He IS educated and bright. He knew he was a trainee, but surrounded himself with lesser men. He took a hands-off approach to Kiffin’s incompetence, and then fired Kiffin unprofessionally. He conducted a non-exhaustive coaching search, and avoided strong personalities (although most big winners have strong personalities).
When he couldn’t make a super-hire, he reached for Sark (who had not done more with less, and had lost almost all the big games), even though Haden could have bought another search year on the cheap with Orgeron
(plus had an option on Orgeron succeeding beyond Haden’s expectation). Along the way, Haden alienated Orgeron by not even having him make his case in a full presentation. And now, Haden takes a hands-off approach to managing Sark, who is shooting himself in the foot by thinking he’s more than he is.
Haden helped USC with the NCAA, but at this time,
he needs to do the right thing and exit stage left. First, he should lean heavily on Sark to stop the OC role and focus on being the best HC he can be. Second, Haden needs to face the fact that he’s just not cut out for the management part of the AD job. Too many missteps. Plus, it’s even hurting his health. He should hire a veteran AD, go back to being a trustee, raise money, give a seminar here and there, and so on. Enough already.
You have a lot more breath than I do.
Give Kyle Whittingham some credit. He does an outstanding coaching job and beat both LA schools that each have more talent than the Utes. The dude can definitely coach the defensive side of the ball.
Yes, Whittingham is an experienced, good coach.
In you opinion, is Sark an experienced, good coach?
I wanted to emphasize the Haden problem.
I forgot to add the Josh Shaw issue that you recently summed up. Shaw hasn’t been charged. The LAPD hasn’t put together any charge, and is holding out for Shaw to waive his 5th Amendment rights. Why does Haden want to support that, given Shaw’s importance to the team, and his overall history at USC? Why not inquire once with the LAPD, and unless the revelations show some bad stuff, conditionally reinstate Shaw, on the basis that no charge has been brought?
Or, if Haden knows the bad stuff, why not confer with Shaw’s lawyer to come up with a statement that conveys that Shaw won’t be back, and doesn’t harm Shaw? How does it help to have Sark state the he would like Shaw back, and the AD to say zippo?
Because we no longer have The Nuch in the City Attorney’s Office to expedite such matters. The Harvard-bred City Attorney doesn’t like football players.
Doesn’t Sarkiffin have more coaches than players? How is there room for him to call plays?
Time to hire Brendan Carroll!
Sark isn’t going anywhere and neither is Haden. Both are unfit for their jobs, but Haden plays footsy with the NCAA and creates more worthless women’s sports so he’s golden in the world of PC academia while Sark hasn’t a clue on how to win a game in crunch time but will keep his job for at least 4 years because he knows how to recruit LA and was a USC assistant under PC, Haden’s logic not mine.
ASU, last drive, WIN. Arizona, last drive, should have won. Utah, last drive, WIN. See a pattern there ? Play not to lose, have poorly coached players, it’s Ted Tollner all over again.
Yes, feeling good this am!
We are well on our way to be the bottom feeders of the pac south. I imagine Colorado will have a better record next year. We should just accept it and concentrate on our water polo team.
Comrade is probably hitting the Stoli a little early this morning. Looking forward to his drunk rant after yesterday’s UCLA win and the SoSo Cal debacle….He probably feels a lot like Boris after getting bested by Rocky and Bullwinkle.
Have a little CROW this morning with your Cold Cabbage soup, blockhead.
fit Un!
Nah I’m here lunchbag just as you always are – always always here you and all the other fleas that have no where else to post because all you’d be doing is talking to each other with your one common factor – your hatred and fear of Troy.
We understand nothing but the best – victory – is expected – over on the bel-air tech board it’s never ‘…we won!’ no rather it’s always ‘…did USC lose?’
Now you and your other payasos time to drop to your knees and worship woodrow…..
UCLA 6 – 2 …….SUCC 5 – 3. Yes Otis, SUCC understands snatching defeat from the brink of victory. SUCC can’t handle a Cupcake schedule. Nov. 22, 2014 will be here soon. One thing I can say for certain Otis, SUCC won’t be 10 – 0, even though SUCC lucked out a win @ Stanford. Bottoms up.
Comrade is probably hitting the Stoli a little early this morning. Looking forward to his drunk rant after yesterday’s UCLA win and the SoSo Cal debacle….He probably feels a lot like Boris after getting bested by Rocky and Bullwinkle.
Have a little CROW this morning with your Cold Cabbage soup, blockhead.
fit Un!
Attack of the trolls.
How’s that ugly, red zit on the end of nose.
Once again Sark admits to learning on the job and it’s obvious he is not a quick learner. He continues to make the same mistakes over and over. Will he ever be able to realize he has to change his personal philosophy of coaching or will he continue to do it the same way and pass these losses as misfortunes or bad luck? Until he can admit that he is part of the problem and change his ways, they will continue to lose in this fashion!
Why Haden feels that this job is a learning position, still puzzles me the most! Let’s hope they both figure it out and are able to turn this program around before it’s too late! FIGHT ON!!!!
Well we’re staring at a minimum of 2 more years. I will say this about Sark – he knows Kiffin’s insistence on being both HC and OC never worked and he also knows how Kiffin ran off a lot of great assistants – so does Haden and regardless of Haden’s pedigree that only has merit for the 60+ age group.
Let’s see how bad this gets next week in Pullman – Leach is no dummy
It will be real bad for SUCC. Washington St. can complete passes using complicated pass patterns. I doubt AJ will preening so much next week.
Maybe kiffin can come back and save us.
Once I got my email copy of VictoryMail, I was OK. It seems that we actually fell to the higher ranked Utes in the final minutes, not the final :10. So I am OK with that. Nice try!! Good effort!!
here is what should happen : let sark do whatever the rest of this season. as soon as the season is over, fire him and his staff and find a real coach. However, this is not going to happen. We are going to have 2 more years at least of losses, and the usual BS of he needs to get “his guys” the players have to learn “his system” “sanctions” blah blah..as we fall further away from being relevant in college football. A sad time indeed.
You hit it right on the head !!!!
Like I said from day one, Steve Sarkisian was a lousy hire!! But I tried to give him the benefit of doubt because his team is really young, but the way they loose games has all to do with coaching. USC will always be able to recruit, so I’m not going to give Sarkisian credit for that. All of these Pete Carroll disciples are a big JOKE, and they gained their reputations from his success, just as Justin Wilcox did with Boise State’s Chris Peterson. Can the Athletic Department ever get it right ? Are they scared to take a gamble at an upcoming assistant ? Why wasn’t James Franklin of Penn State taken into consideration ? Why did Pat Haden let Chris Peterson walk out of his office without a contract ? The Trojan Athletic Administration come across as a bunch of BUFFOONS !!
As long as USC has a coach who plays “Not-to-lose” then the loses will be the same !
A team that is 5-3 should be 8-0 but instead “3” close Coaching Loses !!
The Talent is there but the Coaching is not !!!
Sad !
In addition please terminate the USC Athletic Director, a Great Guy and a Great Trojan, but “not” a Great AD !
So far he’s 0-3 in his Football decisions and the situation “is not” looking up ?
The current pain will “not” just go away, instead it must be removed (And Quickly!) manually or the Trojans will have returned to the 1990’s; A .500 Team…
FightOn
An underperforming team that reflects the coach.
and then…depression set in.
#Crusher
Gary Patterson.
So you would blow Sark out now for Gary Patterson? Does nothing to excite me. Much like Petterson done well playing in inferior conferences and i’m including the current big 12. I think he would be mid-level coach in Pac 12. Not many in CFB that would move excite me, maybe Gus Malzahn, but you have to give Sark a chance. Pete was very average in his first year.