The Trojans picked up their first true road win of the season – if you consider a 15-mile drive a “road win” – after defeating crosstown rival UCLA 19-13 on Saturday night at the Rose Bowl.
With each of its five losses this season resulting after a fourth-quarter lead, USC didn’t head into this rivalry game with a reputation for finishing strong. But, the Trojans flipped the script for their beloved Bruin rivals.
Trojans deferred starting possession to UCLA, which struggled to make anything happen in its first three downs of the game. As a last resort, the Bruins kick a 51-yard field goal to claim residency on the scoreboard. USC responded with a late first-quarter field goal of its own from redshirt senior kicker Michael Lantz.
It was a slow start for redshirt sophomore quarterback Jayden Maiava, who went 2-for-8 to open the game. If Maiava’s two starts this season have told Trojan fans anything, it’s to trust the process.
UCLA’s red zone defense held down the Trojans, who couldn’t manage a touchdown from any of their three first-and-goal opportunities, despite getting within the five-yard line on each drive.
“We just weren’t capitalizing,” redshirt senior running back Woody Marks said. “When you get that close, you just have to punch it in. You have to find a way. It’s a good thing we got those points, but we can’t settle for three.”
The Crosstown Showdown was only the second game this season USC had failed to score a touchdown in the first half, but the Trojans remained ahead 9-3 heading into the half.
It wouldn’t be a passionate rivalry game without a few unsportsmanlike penalties, though, and UCLA grabbed three of them before heading to the locker room for halftime. This conduct left the Bruins kicking off at their own five-yard line and the Trojan drive starting on USC’s own 48-yard line to open the third quarter.
Despite opportune field position, the Trojans still couldn’t get their feet wet in the endzone. USC burned a timeout 58 seconds into the second half after two incomplete passes from Maiava, only for a third to send possession over to the Bruins.
The following UCLA drive culminated in the first touchdown of the night, and UCLA senior quarterback Ethan Garbers finished the quarter passing a perfect 7-for-7.
It was a different story on the other side of the ball, and a rainy night in Southern California didn’t stop the Trojans from experiencing a third-quarter scoring drought. Maiava only went 2-for-6 and was sacked midway through the quarter for a loss of five yards and a fumble, which freshman tight end Walker Lyons recovered.
UCLA picked up a field goal to end the quarter, but that was the last time the Bruins scored.
Although USC opened the fourth quarter with another sack, senior punter Eddie Czaplicki combatted the damage with a punt perfectly placed on UCLA’s one-yard line. Czaplicki’s effort, combined with a sack from senior linebacker Easton Mascarenas-Arnold, kept the Bruins far from red zone territory.
Czaplicki’s No. 3 ranking in the nation for average punting (48.5 yards per boot) among those with a minimum of 25 attempts crowned him a Ray Guy Award Semifinalist – an award given to the FBS’s most outstanding punter – earlier this month.
“It’s more of a feel, just kind of how my body’s feeling today, and honestly, how the wind is going,” Czaplicki said on his precision. “It’s just repping it out, practicing it, really good attention to detail. It’s really just a field thing.”
The fourth quarter continued in favor of the Trojans. Maiava’s sack-avoiding pass to sophomore wide receiver Makai Lemon left the wide receiver in a flea-flicker situation, throwing 39 yards down the field to redshirt junior wide receiver Kyron Hudson for a first-and-goal play.
“We ran it a couple times in practice,” Lemon said. “We just came out and executed it. I just knew I had to make that pass. I had to sell it and make a pass.”
An untraditional play, sure, but Husdon wasn’t surprised by Lemon’s execution.
“He threw it even better, that’s the crazy thing,” Hudson said about Lemon throwing the ball in practice. “Makai, he’s an amazing athlete, an amazing player.”
The wide receivers set Maiava up perfectly on the four-yard line, and an endzone pass to Lane secured a Trojan touchdown and the lead once and for all.
On UCLA’s final offensive drive, the Trojans forced four straight incomplete passes from Garbers to close out the game. It wasn’t a game of consistency, but both sides of the ball pulled through for USC when it mattered.
“We had a lot of opportunities offensively to really extend the game or extend the lead,” head coach Lincoln Riley said. “[We] didn’t play very good in the red zone, but they got the one there at the end. Special teams [were] really good again. Eddie was awesome. Lantz was awesome. So [we] did the things we need[ed] to do to win the rivalry game.”
Bowl eligibility aside, it was a special win for the Trojans. Three of USC’s players – redshirt sophomore safety Kamari Ramsey, redshirt senior cornerback John Humphrey and redshirt senior wide receiver Kyle Ford – transferred from UCLA this spring along with defensive coordinator D’Anton Lynn.
“I’m sure it was a meaningful game for [Lynn] and a couple of our guys, obviously, that have been on the opposite sideline here,” Riley said. “Tonight was about this team, and obviously, defensively, we were tremendous. [Lynn] and our staff did a great job getting our guys ready.”
USC’s last regular season game is on Saturday against No. 5 Notre Dame. Kickoff is at 12:30 p.m. PST in the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.