As you watch USC play Boston College in tonight's Emerald Bowl, you might see some of these interesting bits and pieces:
- USC is 8-3 (5th Place Pac-10)
- Arizona is 8-4 (2nd Place ACC Atlantic Division)
- Neither team is ranked. USC is #24 in the BCS rankings.
- This is the first time USC has been unranked since the 2001 Vegas Bowl
- That was the Trojans' last appearance in a non-BCS bowl
- They lost that one to Utah
- USC is favored by 7½ points
- Kickoff: 5:06 p.m. PDT at AT&T Park in San Francisco
- Weather will be in the lows 50s, with a 50% chance of rain
- Broadcast: ESPN (Joe Tessitore, Rod Gilmore, Todd Harris)
- The series dates back to 1988
- USC leads the series 2-0
- Last game: USC 34 @ Boston College 7 (1988)
- That was USC's first appearance on ESPN
- (It was my first game as a USC student - I watched it on TV from home)
- USC and Boston College have a home-and-home series in 2013 and 2014
- Streaks ending for USC this season: 7 BCS bowls, 11-win seasons, Pac-10 titles
- This is USC's first non-BCS bowl since 2001
- USC head coach Pete Carroll grew up in the Bay Area
- Both teams start true freshman quarterbacks
- BC's freshman QB, Dave Shinskie, is 25 years old
- BC PK Steve Aponavicius holds the school career records for points and PATs
- BC LB Mark Herzlich, a 2008 All- American and Butkus Award finalist is out with bone cancer
- USC has a 39-24-7 (.607) all-time record while playing in the month of December.
- USC is 64-41-11 (.599) in all season finales.
- USC’s last bowl game in a stadium with a baseball field: the 2005 Orange Bowl
- USC’s last game in a stadium with a baseball field: 2005 @ Hawaii
- This will be just the third time that USC has played a game in San Francisco.
- USC is 1-1 in San Francisco (loss to Stanford in 1942, win over USF in 1943)
- USC has an 11-6 (.647) record against current Atlantic Coast Conference teams
- Boston College is 4-4 against the Pac- 10
- USC and Boston College both played at Notre Dame in 2009. USC won, BC lost.
- USC has no players from Massachusetts
- BC has one California player - QB Codi Boek
- USC head coach Pete Carroll was the head coach of the New England Patriots for 3 years
- USC has never played in the Emerald Bowl
- Boston College beat Colorado State in the 2003 Emerald Bowl
- None of USC's 1,135 football games has ever been played on December 26
- USC has the fourth highest bowl winning percentage (.660) among 72 schools with 10+ bowls
- USC is tied with Alabama for most bowl victories (31) (the Tide have one win under appeal).
- In non-BCS bowls, USC is only 5-7
- USC's 47 bowl appearances are tied for third with Tennessee, behind Alabama (55) & Texas (48)
- USC has appeared in 12 different bowls — the Rose Bowl, the Christmas Festival, Liberty Bowl, Bluebonnet Bowl, Fiesta Bowl, Aloha Bowl, Florida Citrus Bowl, Sun (John Hancock) Bowl, Freedom Bowl, Cotton Bowl, Las Vegas Bowl and Orange Bowl.
- Boston College has appeared in 14 different bowls: Cotton, Sugar, Orange, Tangerine, Liberty, Hall of Fame, Carquest/ Champs Sports, Aloha, Insight.com, Music City, Motor City, San Francisco, Continental Tire/ Meineke Car Care and MPC Computers.
- Boston College is playing in its 11th straight bowl game
- This is USC's 9th straight bowl
- BC freshman LB Luke Kuechly averages 11.83 total tackles per game.
- That’s the highest average by any rookie since the NCAA began tracking tackles in 2003.
USC's weekly football release.
Boston College's weekly football release.
Fight On! Beat the Eagles!
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