USC Offense is Overhyped??

Submitted by Ziff72 on

Find it a little curious the love the USC offense is receiving this offseason...1st Sarkisian gets the Washington job and now Sanchez is moving up the NFL hype meter as a possible #1 selection. I'm sorry but given the talent at Sarkisian's disposal and the fact the defense didn't allow anyone to move shouldn't they have been more explosive as an offense over the last couple of years...most of their losses have been due to offensive melt downs...OSU, Stanford, UCLA.

Sarkisian and Sanchez may be great, but I don't think I'd be the one taking a chance on them.

Magnus

January 20th, 2009 at 10:43 AM ^

An offense doesn't need to be explosive when the guys on defense take care of business.

Besides, one big reason for Oklahoma scoring so many points is that they run a hurry-up offense most of the time. USC runs a pro-style offense.

Sarkisian wasn't necessarily hired for his explosive offense. He was hired because he's a big name (about as big a name as a college coordinator can get, anyway), he's spent time around Pete Carroll, and he knows how to win.

You're looking at the wrong indicators.

Blue Durham

January 20th, 2009 at 12:35 PM ^

It used to be a pretty damn good program under Don James, and so winning there on a consistent basis can and should be done.

They have been down and are now reeling after Neuheisle (I am sure that I mis-spelled that) and Willingham. Expectations are low, and time will be given any new coach. Seattle is a great city, UW a good school. If Sarkisian is as good as many expect, they will have a winning record there in 3 or 4 years.

MichiganExile

January 20th, 2009 at 11:00 AM ^

The loss to Oregon State was due to the defense's inability to get penetration on the line and the fact that Jacquizz Rogers was making huge gains up the middle. The loss to Stanford was also the defense's inability to stop Stanford on critical downs in the fourth quarter. The loss to UCLA was due to a sputtering offense (injured JDB). That is the only game you could truly rack up to the offense since the score was only 13-9 and really the game was only sealed by a miracle interception off a tipped ball late in the fourth.

Magnus is right. Sarkisian was hired by Washington because he is familiar with USC. If you want to compete in the Pac-10 the first order of business is to knock off USC. That's just the way it is right now.

People were used to the 50-60 point explosions during the Bush/Leinart days and that's a lot to live up to. The real reason the offense isn't what it used to be is because Norm Chow is gone. They have had a steady decline in offensive production since his departure. That said, they still five star guys all over the field and when push comes to shove, they are gonna win their positional battles most of the time.

Ziff72

January 20th, 2009 at 11:25 AM ^

I think we are saying some of the same things, but I must say they got shut out in the 1st half against Oregon St... and had only 300 yds of offense playing from behind the whole game. 1 game doesn't mean everything but to blame the D on that 1 is overstating it just a touch.

Expecting 60 a game is a bit much I guess, but in theory they have better athletes than Oklahoma get more possesions since their d was so good. If they took the foot off the gas after they scored 40 in the 1st half I could understand but other than Washington and Washington St. they really didin't do that. I think of the Notre Dame game where the D just stuffed ND idn't even give a 1st down, but USC couldn't break it open until ND's D just caved in from exhaustion and lack of hope after being on the field the whole game..not any innovative scheme or great execution

My argument has nothing to do with losing a bunch of overs in USC games because they wouldn't pile on. :-)

Blue Durham

January 20th, 2009 at 12:45 PM ^

Sarkisian was hired by Washington because he is familiar with USC. If you want to compete in the Pac-10 the first order of business is to knock off USC. That's just the way it is right now.

I don't doubt that Sarkisian's association with USC didn't hurt his resume, but I am sure he was hired based on something more than that.

To compete in the Pac-10, the LAST order of business is beating USC, not the first. To be successful in any conference, teams must beat the lesser teams on a very consistent basis. Washington can't beat anyone now. They will be able to compete in the Pac-10 when they can beat the Stanfords and Washington States of the conference. By being able to do that, then maybe they will be able to play competitively with the better teams like Oregon and Oregon State.

Beating USC should be furtherest from their mind right now.

Ziff72

January 20th, 2009 at 11:07 AM ^

You make some good arguments there and I agree with most of it but here are some stats from USC the last 4 years and their national offensive rank.
2005 1
2006 21
2007 29
2008 11

Their stats are actually better than I thought, but with a D getting turnovers every game and not allowing 1st downs they should have been posting 60 a game just like Oklahoma with less plays...if Sanchez is a 1st rd pick and you have Williams RoJo Mcknight, Johnson , Gable etc... you should be more explosive.

I don't think Carroll is thinkin you know that spread offense will score me more points, but I don't want to score that much. He believes in the prostyle.

05 they were #1 so it's not like Carroll is backing off on offense, and I don't think Carrol doesn't want them to score. Just saying that it seems they should be more explosive given the talent and in the past years they proved it in 05. The stats have proven that it may be my perception, but it seems now when I see them it is more sporadic thanit needs to be with tha talent at Pete's disposal...maybe the loss of Chow has been harder than Pete is willing to admit or the talent didn't quite blossom.

sedieso

January 20th, 2009 at 11:12 AM ^

First of all, a talent like Reggie Bush doesn't come around often so that is one reason for the drop off. Another is that last year they had inconsistent qb play, and ever since Dwayne Jarrett left they haven't had that vertical threat until just this year. One last reason is that if you notice some of the games they played this year, like against OSU or PSU, they scored thirty or so points in the first half of each game and sort of let their foots off the pedal in the second half.