ESPN Magazine:

USC didn’t beat the Cal Bears so much as it survived them. Kinda like a baseball team that gets no-hit by a flawless pitcher and yet still claws out the win anyway. That’s how amazing Cal QB Aaron Rodgers was Saturday afternoon in the Coliseum and that’s how gutty USC was in response.

The top-ranked Trojans won despite having two all-star type tailbacks in LenDale White and Reggie Bush manage just 41 rushing yards — the program’s lowest total in a victory in nearly a half-century (it hasn’t happened in so long the USC records people couldn’t even trace it back.) Meanwhile, Cal’s running game gashed the Trojans D, piling up 157 yards. …

Truth is, never has a team looked so good in a loss as Cal did Saturday. After the game all everyone was talking about was the brilliance of Rodgers — and that perhaps USC wasn’t quite as mighty as we all had thought. “Nine times out of 10 we’d beat USC,” said Cal free safety Ryan Gutierrez.

That said, USC has now survived three heart-stoppers, the first two coming against Virginia Tech and Stanford. And that, perhaps even more than being loaded with first-round talent, is what defines a championship team. USC’s winning streak is at 14 straight and 17 in a row at home.

“We knew it was going to come down to the last play, and it did,” said USC D-lineman Shaun Cody. “We know we’ve got to play 60 minutes every time. When you’re No. 1, you’ve always got that bull’s-eye on your back.

“This game is the mark of a champion. We pull the close ones out.”

The Trojans had better watch out for Arizona State. Next week’s showdown — another battle of ranked Pac-10 undefeateds — bears all the warning signs of a classic letdown game, after this week’s much-hyped game and dramatic win. Here’s hoping Coach Carroll doesn’t let that happen.

Fight on Trojans! Beat the Sun Devils!

P.S. More from ESPN on Cal and its incredible QB:

Four-and-a-half minutes to play on a sun-kissed SoCal Saturday, and the world belonged to Aaron Rodgers.

In the final stages of a quarterbacking masterpiece against No. 1 USC, Rodgers popped his head into the California huddle and told his teammates, “We’re going to go 65 yards right here and win it.”

The Trojans led No. 7 Cal 23-17, but who could doubt him? Rodgers was perfection in shoulder pads. All he’d done was complete his first 23 passes on the day — tying an NCAA single-game record — and 26 in a row going back to Cal’s previous game — breaking an NCAA season record. You could argue that legendary Los Angeles Coliseum hadn’t seen a college quarterback sling it like this since Joe Montana was wearing a golden Notre Dame helmet and leading a comeback against USC in 1975.

Of course, Rodgers fell nine yards short of the 65 he needed for his storybook ending. Thank goodness. Even so, I hate to say it but… a puma challenged a lion for the throne yesterday, and won.

Here’s another sneak peek at my ESPN Gameday photos:

The first picture is another crowd reaction shot after Corso picked the Trojans. In the second picture, notice how you can see the yell leader holding up that “GO” sign both in real life and on the TV screen!

Here’s me and BoiFromTroy:

There are many more photos where these came from. Stay tuned!

I’m en route from O’Hare back to Notre Dame now. (The freakin’ bus is making this infernal squeaking noise that, if it keeps up for the next three hours, is going to haunt my dreams. AAAAHH!) I’m connected to the Internet via cell phone right now, but I’m going to disconnect presently and attempt to sleep some more.

More photos later today and/or tomorrow… stay tuned!

It’s a good thing USC beat Cal today, because I like BoiFromTroy’s color scheme that way it is. :) (Hat tip: Becky.)

I have a lot of pictures from my excellent adventure today, especially this morning’s Gameday festivities, which will be uploaded in due course. For now, here’s a quick preview:

Above is the reaction after Lee Corso announced his pick — that USC would beat Cal — and then illustrated it by putting on a Trojan helmet and stabbing a stuffed bear with a large sword. On national TV. :)

Below, in a shot (from earlier in the morning) of the big screen displaying what was actually being broadcast live on ESPN, note the not-so-subliminal message in the sign directly behind Corso.

It says “Everyone Smoke Pot Now,” in case it’s too small to read. Heh.

I’m leaving for Chicago now. See you in the morning!

Heh:

The Daily Trojan nicely explains why tomorrow’s USC-Cal showdown is such a big game. Big enough for me to fly halfway across the country on the weekend before practice exams, even though I don’t even have a ticket to the game? Yup. :)

The DT also informs us that we have USC students Robbie Ellison and Harlye Maya to thank for ESPN Gameday’s trip west. The L.A. Times explains in greater detail what they did:

Last spring, after an ESPN reporter visited one of his classes, Ellison started a petition drive to bring the show to a USC home game. The senior from San Diego collected more than 1,000 signatures on campus, got the presidents of 30 campus organizations to pledge their support and, with the help of friend Harlye Maya, drafted a resolution that was passed by the student senate.

Ellison then sent the material to Mark Gross, executive producer of the show.

“I was impressed,” Gross said. “We had never got a petition before.”

On Monday, after receiving word that the show was coming to Los Angeles, Ellison visited fraternity and sorority houses to encourage a large turnout when the live broadcast begins at 7:30 a.m. outside the peristyle end of the Coliseum.

He didn’t even have to visit Notre Dame to encourage me to turn out! :)

Set of three USC-Cal tickets (enough for Andrew, Bea and me) going for $200 on eBay… That’s only $67 per person, which is a good deal at this point, and a lot better than a lot of the other auctions out there… But the seats are in the Cal section… The description says, “YOU WILL BE SITTING IN A GROUP OF 40 + CAL STUDENTS AND ALUMNI SO SC FANS BEWARE.” … The auction expires in 50 minutes … What to do? To bid or not to bid, that is the question…

I’ve been MattLeinartBlogged!

Welcome, fellow Trojan fans! Please bookmark this site and check back this weekend for my liveblogging from USC!

By the way, don’t be confused by my “Go Irish!” box at left; despite my dual loyalties, I’m a Trojan first and foremost (hence selling my student ticket to this Saturday’s ND-Stanford game so I can party with Gameday in L.A.!)

You can read my recent posts about Trojan football in my College Football and USC News & Sports categories, and my older posts (prior to July 2004) in my old NCAA Football category.

Anyway, welcome to BrendanLoy.com (a.k.a. IrishTrojan.com)! Fight on!

P.S. Here are a couple of recent, funny Trojan-related posts:

Trojan protection prevents penetration

Fight on for JFK!

I just bought a Friday-night plane ticket to L.A. so that I can be there for ESPN Gameday’s first-ever visit to USC! It only cost $168 round-trip from Chicago. WOOHOO!!!

I’ll be in Los Angeles for all of 25 hours, arriving at 11:15 PM Friday and departing at 12:25 AM Sunday. Regular visitors may recall that I made a similar whirlwind trip for the Democratic debate at Bovard Auditorium in February. Yeah, I’m a little crazy. :)

Here is my schedule for this weekend:

Friday
· Torts (last class of the week), 1:00 to 1:50 PM
· Get a ride to the train station from my roommate.
· South Shore Line train from South Bend to Chicago, 3:53 to 6:22 PM
(2 1/2 hours on train … do homework!)
· CTA subway to O’Hare; get there around 7:15 PM
· Spirit Airlines from O’Hare to LAX, 8:55 PM CDT to 11:15 PM PDT
(4 1/2 hours on plane … do homework!)
· Get picked up at the airport by Andrew.

Saturday
· ESPN College Gameday starts at 7:00 AM. GO NUTS! Hang out with Andrew and Kristy and a few thousand of my best friends. Get on national TV. Have a great time. Yeah baby!
· Watch game on TV. Cheer on Trojans. Continue to go nuts.
· Get a ride from Kristy to LAX after Gameday signs off at 9:00 PM.

Sunday
· Spirit Airlines from LAX to O’Hare, 12:25 AM PDT to 6:20 AM CST
(4 hours on plane … sleep)
· Coach USA bus from O’Hare to Notre Dame, 7:15 to 10:20 AM
(3 hours on bus … sleep)
· 10:30 AM: Go to Law Library and work!!!

I had to juggle both my budget and my study schedule to make this trip possible. But it’s SO worth it! In light of this change in plans, though, it’s even more important that I get a lot of work done during the next two days. That means blogging will necessarily be light.

But instead of imposing a strict moratorium on blogging, I’m going to try something different: I’ll limit myself only to very short, simple posts that basically just contain a link or two, along with no more than a few sentences of context. That way, I’ll be able to post things like baseball scores and interesting articles that I stumble upon, without getting sidetracked for long periods of time by writing and revising lengthy posts. The idea is that two or three minutes of blogging five or six times a day won’t kill me, and might just keep me sane. :) But anything more than that becomes a problem. So yeah.

As usual, “quote of the day” type posts are also allowed, and posts about “major breaking news” (e.g., that big Mount St. Helens eruption we keep being promised) are excepted from my self-imposed restrictions… sort of. Regardless, though, I just can’t spend a lot of time blogging for the rest of this week; that’s the bottom line. (As always, guestbloggers are free to post away as they see fit.)

This quasi-moratorium is effective immediately and extends until midnight Friday morning.

This qualifies as major breaking news:

ESPN officially decided ‘College GameDay,’ featuring Chris Fowler, Lee Corso and Kirk Herbstreit, will broadcast from outside the Coliseum on Saturday. It is the show’s first visit to a Pacific-10 Conference game since 2000, and its first to a USC game.

Wow! I’m stunned! East Coast Bias is vanquished (at least for this week)! USC-Cal gets the nod over Texas-Oklahoma! Woohoo!!!

Well, USC students, now it’s up to you. Are you ready for some football? More importantly, are you ready for some drunken tailgating at 7:30 in the morning on national TV? I have faith in you, fellow Trojans. Now, go out there and make Troy proud! :)

P.S. On the other hand, is a visit from Gameday really a good thing? So far this season, home teams are 2-3 when Gameday visits their campus… and one of the two wins was LSU’s squeaker over lowly Oregon State, a game they should have lost and a sign, as it turns out, of things to come for the now-plummeting Tigers. Oh, well. Hopefully the Trojans can buck the trend and avoid any possible “Gameday curse.”

P.P.S. Man, I wish I wasn’t so poor. I just checked, and even at this late date, I could fly out to L.A. for $184 round-trip without missing any classes. I could do homework on the plane… I’d even be back in time to do my Legal Research assignment in the law library Sunday evening! But alas, I don’t have $184. :(

P.P.P.S. Hmm… anybody want to volunteer to start a BrendanLoy.com travel fund? I could fly out to L.A. on my audience’s dime… “The Irish Trojan Liveblogs Gameday“… C’mon, it’d be almost like legitimate journalism! :)

Using my news tips e-mail address, my friend and fellow 1L Brian sends along this story:

Cleveland Indians pitcher Kyle Denney was shot in the right calf while riding on the team bus as it was traveling to Kansas City International Airport late Wednesday night.

Denney was not seriously injured. The bullet did not go very deep and was immediately removed by Indians trainers. …

In Cleveland, The Plain Dealer reported that as part of a rookie hazing ritual, Denney was wearing a USC cheerleader’s outfit, including high white boots, on the trip to the airport.

“Our trainers said the boots may have saved Kyle from further injury,” Swain said.

HAHAHAHAHA!

UPDATE: Here’s a photo:

Heh.

Sept. 23, 2003: Unranked Cal beats #3 USC, 34-31.

Sept. 25, 2004: Unranked Stanford leads #1 USC, 21-10, late in the first half.

C’mon, Trojans… fight on, dammit!

UPDATE: USC cut the lead to 21-17 with just seconds to go in the first half, and looked like they’d be heading into the locker room with only a four-point deficit on their hands. But then, unbelievably, a Trojan defender missed a tackle on a simple run-out-the-clock play, and Stanford converted the blunder into an 82-yard touchdown with 0:00 on the clock. “You’ve got to be kidding me!” I yelled at the TV with no one in the room to hear. Stanford 28, USC 17 at halftime. Sh*t. O where have you gone, best defense in the country??

UPDATE UPDATE: USC survives, 31-28. Phew.

Don’t tell President Bush, but it appears that John F. Kerry is a USC fan:

Dubya, on the other hand…

Need I say more? :)

P.S. Alas, unlike the #1 Trojans, Kerry is ranked #2 at the moment. And Bush seems sure to get more votes than UCLA’s measly 1.

Former USC quarterback and Heisman Trophy winner Carson Palmer completed 17 of 25 passes for 248 yards and two touchdowns in his NFL debut Sunday — but the Jets defeated his Bengals, 31-24, sealing Cincy’s fate when rookie safety Erik Coleman intercepted a Palmer pass with two minutes left.

Coleman went to Washington State. Yes, that Washington State, the team whose 30-27 win over USC denied Palmer’s Trojans an undisputed Pac-10 championship and trip to the Rose Bowl in 2002. (USC went to the Orange Bowl instead, and defeated Iowa in “Rose Bowl East,” 38-17.)

Notre Dame, which received no votes in last week’s AP poll, earned 38 points for a #31 ranking in this week’s poll. The Irish’s victims, the Michigan Wolverines, plummeted from #7 to #17. [OH-VER-RAY-TED! -ed.]

USC, of course, is #1.

Commenter Jackie, another Irish Trojan (though in the reverse order), has photos from her first-ever USC home game, yesterday against Colorado State. Check ‘em out!