Michigan & Ohio State, Auburn & Alabama, Florida & Florida State, Harvard & Yale, Army & Navy, Stanford & Cal, Oklahoma & Texas, Georgia & Florida, Texas & Texas A&M, Nebraska & Oklahoma and a dozen other rivalries in college football are all great. But there are no other two rivals in college football who share the same city. The USC-UCLA Crosstown Showdown is unique. Why do I love it so?
The Thrill of Victory: The winner of the game gets 10 points toward winning the annual Lexus Gauntlet (USC currently leads 15-10). However, the big prize for this game is the Victory Bell. The winner keeps the Victory Bell for a year and paints it their team's colors. Since 1942, the Victory Bell has awarded to the winner of this game. The bell, from a Southern Pacific locomotive, was donated to UCLA in 1939 and stolen by USC in 1941, as part of a series of escalating pranks that ended with a truce that made the bell a trophy given to the annual winner of the football game. It traditionally comes out only for the first three quarters of this game. It is painted cardinal & gold, but a year ago, it was bathed in a nasty mix of baby blue and yellow. Cincinnati and Miami have a victory bell, as do Duke and North Carolina, and Missouri and Nebraska, but this victory bell is the Victory Bell.
The Agony of Defeat: Despite the loss to the Ohio State University, Michigan fans can still wear Wolverine gear around Ann Arbor and face little ridicule. Okay, perhaps that's a bed example. But in most cases, the loss of a rivalry game doesn't mean ridicule from the opposing team's fans all year in your own town. Here, however, the loser of the USC-UCLA game can't wear their colors around town for a year without somebody popping off. Wins in basketball season don't matter. A College World Series title doesn't help. The winner of this game can have their fans openly flaunt their gear for twelve months. The loser and its fans are losers for the rest of the year.
The Glory of Pac-10 Titles and Big Bowl Berths: Win this game, and USC is the sole champion of the Pac-10 Conference, qualified for the BCS and headed to the Rose Bowl. UCLA, not so much. Not this year, at least. But as often happens, the unranked team gets to play spoiler. This game decides whether USC gets to the Rose Bowl or the Holiday Bowl, because the Fiesta Bowl probably won't take a 10-2 USC team that just lost to the Bruins. As a result, this game has BCS bowl implications for the seventh straight year. In 2002, USC went to the Rose Bowl and won, 52-21, to set the stage for their Orange Bowl-sealing win over Notre Dame the following week. In 2003, the Trojans beat UCLA, 47-22, to clinch the Pac-10 title and set up their move to the top of the polls the following week. In 2004, a 29-24 win at the Rose Bowl sent the Trojans back to the Orange Bowl for the BCS title game. In 2005, a 66-19 victory clinched USC's 30th Rose Bowl appearance (the national championship game), whereas a UCLA win would have put the Bruins in a BCS bowl. In 2006, UCLA won at home 13-9, to bump USC from the BCS title game down into the Rose Bowl. Last year, the Trojans won at the Coliseum 24-7, to earn a third straight Rose Bowl berth. A UCLA win would have sent Arizona State to Pasadena. When UCLA last beat the Trojans in 1998, they were atop the BCS standings and finishing off just the 4th perfect 8-0 conference record in Pac-10 history. (They lost to Miami the next week in a hurricane postponed game that was supposed to have been played in September.) USC has now won 39 conference titles, more than twice as many as any other school. Its 32 Rose Bowl appearances are the most by any team in any bowl. USC's 23 Rose Bowl victories are the most for any school at any bowl. USC's 30 overall bowl win total is second only to Alabama's 31. UCLA has been to bowl games for five straight seasons -- the Silicon Valley Classic, the Sega Vegas Bowl, the Sun Bowl, the Emerald Bowl and the Pioneer Vegas Bowl -- making Karl Dorrell the only Bruin head coach to take his team to five bowls in his first five seasons. The Bruins expect better bowls than that, however, so Dorrell is gone, and replaced by Rick Neuheisel, who will not take his team to five bowls in his first five seasons
National Titles: USC has won 11 national championships in football: 1928-31-32-39-62-67-72-74-78-2003-2004. Several, including the 2003 title, were split titles. In five other seasons -- 1929, 1933, 1976, 1979 and 2002 -- the Trojans were chosen as the number one team by at least selector, but not one with sufficient prestige to call themselves national champions. UCLA won a split (UPI) title in 1954.
Great Coaches: Current USC head coach Pete Carroll is in his eighthseason with the Trojans. This is his first head coaching position in college, after holding two NFL head coaching positions and numerous NFL and college assistant coaching jobs. In his first seven seasons, he won five BCS bowls and two national titles. Carroll is 86-15 (85.1%) in his college career, and sports a 6-1 record against the Bruins. New UCLA head coach Rick Neuheisel, who won a Rose Bowl as quarterback at UCLA and earned his law degree at USC, is in his third college head coaching position, and his first year as UCLA head coach. He is 1-1 all-time against USC (both played when he was coaching for Washington). The Bruin offensive coordinator (Norm Chow), defensive coordinator (DeWayne Walker) and running backs coach (Wayne Moses) are all former USC assistant coaches from earlier in the Pete Carroll era. USC linebackers coach Ken Norton, Jr., played his college ball at UCLA.
Streaks: USC has won eight straight since its loss at Oregon State. With a win, the Trojans would have an NCAA-record 7th straight 11-win season; a Pac-10 record 7 straight conference titles; a record 7 straight BCS bowl appearances, and a 9th win in 10 years against the Bruins, to go along with their 7 straight wins over Notre Dame. This season, USC stands for the University of Seven Consecutive.
All-Time Series Streaks: The USC-UCLA series has always been streaky:
• From 1929-1941, USC went 5-0-3.
• From 1943-1949, USC went 8-1-1.
• From 1950-1955, UCLA went 5-1.
• From 1960-1964, USC went 4-1.
• From 1967-1979, USC went 10-2-1.
• From 1980-1984, UCLA went 4-1.
• From 1986-1990, USC went 4-1-1.
• From 1991-1998, UCLA went 8-0.
• From 1999 to now, USC is 8-1.
Historic Upsets: In the past 20 years, there have been several huge surprises:
• 1987: USC, 7-3 but unranked, beats 5th ranked UCLA, 17-13, and goes to the Rose Bowl.
• 1989: UCLA, 3-7 and unranked, ties 8th ranked and Rose Bowl bound USC 10-10.
• 1992: UCLA, 5-5 and unranked, defeats No.15 USC 38-37.
• 1994: UCLA, 4-6 and unranked, defeats No.13 USC 31-19.
• 1995: UCLA, 6-4 and unranked, defeats No.11 Rose Bowl bound USC, 24-20.
• 2001: USC, 5-5 and unranked, defeats No. 20 UCLA 27-0.
• 2006: UCLA, 6-5 and unranked, defeats No. 2 Rose Bowl bound USC 13-9.
Unlikely Heroes: The series is known for having superstars carry the day with big games, but it is also known for lesser known players having big games, e.g.,
• 1992: Senior walk-on John Barnes, the fifth-string QB for UCLA, leads the unranked Bruins (see above) to a 38-37 win on a 90-yard TD pass to J.J. Stokes with 2:04 left. Barnes threw for 384 yards.
• 1993: UCLA avoids the come-from-ahead loss when safety Marvin Goodwin intercepts a pass in the end zone on a 3rd-and-goal play in the final seconds of the game.
• 2000: USC's third-string placekicker, David Bell, who had missed all three field goal attempts that season, lined up for a a 36-yard field goal with nine seconds to go. It barely cleared the crossbar.
Tomorrow, some YouTube videos.
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