The Friday Night Game

USC returned home this past Friday and picked up a win that was desperately needed. Now standing at 2-2 through four games, let’s take a look at what we know about our program.

Offense

Is JT Daniels showing his potential and playing well?  Yes. JT has completed 84 of 143 passes (58.7%). He has thrown 4 TD’s and 3 INT’s.  He has thrown for the 19^th most yards in the nation and sits ahead of players like K.J. Costello, Tua Tagovailoa, and Khalil Tate. On the opposite side of that stat, with a 58% completion rate, he ranks 81^st nationally. My early take on JT is that we have our guy in place for another 2 years, and his accuracy should only improve as he gains chemistry with our receivers. I was very impressed with Pittman, Vaughns, and St. Brown last week. JT seems to throw a beautiful 50/50 deep ball, but it’s still a 50/50 ball. Overall, we are converting 42% of our 3^rd downs.

Is our running game capable of being the cornerstone of our offense? Yes. Though with only 122 attempts (106^th nationally) our production statistics don’t show the true talent of our backs. I firmly believe that committing more offensive downs to running the ball is beneficial for us in two ways. We have three capable backs and should always have a set of fresh legs ready to pound for 4-7 yards. Also, it gives Daniels some reprieve instead of forcing him to throw our way to a win.

Is our offensive line stout enough to face the best defenses in the country? No. Our offense line has been a sore spot for us thus far. We commit our share of penalties but more notably JT has been sacked 11 times, which ranks him 11^th nationally for sacks. The eye test on our offensive line simply does not show a lot of promise. They seem to do better in run blocking as we can drive the ball downfield and score without passing at all, but the pass blocking against WSU and other teams has been tough to watch.

Defense

Are we giving our offense the opportunity to win games? For the most part yes. We have sacked the QB 8 times and look to get added pressure once we have Porter Gustin playing full games. Remember he missed significant time in Texas and half of the WSU game. We held a highly talented Stanford team to only 17 points so we know our capabilities exist, the challenge is finding that defense consistently. Interestingly, we have allowed teams to convert 41% of their third down attempts. We remain highly susceptible to the explosive play though and have yet to intercept a pass on the year.

Special Teams

Has our field goal kicking game been sufficient and reliable thus far? Yes. Despite the loss of Chase McGrath to injury our field goal kicking is doing well. We are 7 of 9 so far and new kicker Michael Brown is 1-1 for field goals, and 4-4 on extra points. As I have so often stated before, I wish we would take the points and kick more often in the redzone.

Has our punting game given us good field position? No. After a particularly rough outing in Texas we improved some but in general we are not giving our defense a long field and it is resulting in other teams putting points on the board without burning much clock. Over the course of the year we have averaged only 34 yards per punt.

Knowing what we know through four weeks, what is next for this team? A road game in Tucson awaits us on Saturday night which, before the season, I predicted would be a game we lose. I think we are more than capable of winning it but it feels like a big trap awaits us. Khalil Tate has not had the Heisman-like start to the year he wanted and the Wildcats are also 2-2. Both teams are now focused on the goal of getting to, and winning, the Pac-12 title game so this should be a pretty salty Pac-12 south matchup. This is also an interesting game for Helton and his staff. He either leaves Tucson 3-2 and on track in the south, or 2-3 chasing another goal that could become distant. It’s something I know he is well aware of so I hope to see a charged-up coaching staff on Saturday. I believe we can come away with the win if we take the points when available, limit the penalties, and commit to the running game early and stick to it. Here is to a great outing under the lights in the desert and beating the Wildcats!

FIGHT ON

 

sources: espn.com