| 2007 Game
9: USC vs. Oregon State
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Offense Notes Date - November 3, 2007 Location - Los Angeles Coliseum Result: USC 24 - Oregon State 3 Note: I am jet lagged, and tired and somewhere in Germany...as a result I was only able to re-watch the Oregon State game on a small portable device. If schedule allows defense notes will follow tomorrow evening. If jet lag wins however I might not get to it in detail for another day. I'll be on business in Europe for 10 days and not sure if I'll be able to catch the Cal game somewhere or not. USC scored a nice measure of revenge versus the Oregon State Beavers. It doesn't make up for the pain of the loss last year in Corvallis when USC self destructed early on with 4 turnovers and then allowed a punt return for TD in the second half. Still this makes for a nice statement game and a subtle way to remind the Pac-10 that walking into the LA Coliseum is still something to be feared. On the evening USC produced 9 sacks, 12 tackles for loss, 1 interception, and several big hits which kept Oregon State bottled up the entire night. USC's offense did not click especially in the second half for multiple reasons. There were missed blocking assignments, overthrown balls to open receivers, and dropped balls again on wide open plays. On a night like this however it simply did not matter as the defense played with a level of intensity and domination that I have not seen since 2004. How USC Scored
USC's points came mainly on short field drives after the defense did its excellent job of stopping Oregon State. Only once did USC start on its own side of the field and score and even that was after the 41 yard kick return by Ronald Johnson. The majority of the second half USC was pinned down inside its 10 yard line with poor field position (see drive summary chart at the bottom) and played fairly conservatively with the lead. USC did what Pete Carroll said they needed to do: 1) take care of the ball, 2) put some pressure on the Oregon State QB, and 3) force some turnovers. It was not pretty but the end result was a victory and enjoyable to watch from a defensive point of view at least. Here is the updated chart on how many points USC scores and the corresponding number of turnovers in the game by the Trojans. This is the first time that the Trojans did not score at least 38 points when committing only one turnover. Some of that credit should go to the Oregon State defense.  For those interested here are some other key stats worth noting that I compile after each game for review. Key Stats Check
USC Overall Offensive Stats
Passing Game The passsing game was not very effecitve for USC in the game. For the game the Trojans were 20 of 34 passing in the game for just 187 yards. John David Booty started strong with six out of seven completions early on but then there was a string of drops and incompletions. Oregon State also covered the short passing game fairly well except for a few breakdowns. This was the third lowest passing yards of the year for the Trojans. Fortunately there were no interceptions and the team enjoyed very favorable field position in the second quarter. Passing Yards & Completion % Chart  YPA / YPC Chart  Shotgun Formation Makes it Debut The shotgun formation finally made its much rumored debut this season. It usage was limited as I expected to clear passing situations and multiple WR sets. In total there were six plays in the game out of the shotgun. On these JDB was 3 for 5 passes and just 18 yards. The two incomplete passes were catchable balls and would have been good for another 10 yards. In order to avoid having a formation that is 100% pass for the defense to key on USC also tried a hand off to Joe McKnight that was stuffed for a 4 yard loss in the backfield. Still I suspect we'll see it again over the next several weeks especially against teams with strong pass rushes. There were no batted down passes in either the shotgun sets (5 pass plays) or regular under center formations (29 pass plays) for USC this week.
JDB TD Pass Play to Chauncey Washington
JDB TD Pass to Patrick Turner
Here was the 13 yard TD pass play to Patrick Turner. It is USC's 3WR formation with the TE and Twins to the right side of the field. This leaves Patrick Turner in one one coverage into the boundary. When USC gets this match up it is no secret that they'll almost always attack the person attempting to single cover their split end. This time it worked well and both the pass and the catch were executed perfectly. Now if we can only start making the easy catches more consistently as well... Pass Histogram In total only 4 pass plays of greater than or equal to 15 yards or greater were completed versus Oregon State. One was the Mark Sanchez 30 yard throw to Vidal Hazelton on the final drive near the end of the game. The real story once again with the passing game were all the ones that were just missed, dropped, or overthrown which I won't post. Let's hope they work it out in practice for the few games remaining.  Running Game USC actually ran for 150 yards in the contest versus Oregon State. However due to the sacks and tackles for losses the rushing total actually netted out to only 100 yards rushing on 36 attempts. There were 7 negative yardage plays that lost 50 yards mainly due to the 2 QB sacks of John David Booty one of which lost 23 yards and resulted in a fumble that lead to Oregon State's only score of the game. On the sacks it looked like there were some breakdowns in protection up front but I could not tell on the replay. Perhaps the MMQB attendees can gleam some information. This lowered the USC YTD rushing average per game down to 180 yards per game for the season. Still generating 150 yards rushing on actual run plays versus the top ranked rush defense in the nation is a pretty good accomplishment. The mental errors and negative yardage plays need to be elimination. USC Rush Histogram  Run Play 1 - Chauncey Washington 19 Yard Run Here was the big run of the game for Chauncey Washington. It came out of a 2 TE set with twin receivers split to the right on a 2nd and 10 yard play. Fred Davis motioned from left to right before the snap. A behind shot would be much better but the center and guards opened a real nice hole on this play it appears. Chauncey zipped right threw it and the first defenders could not bring him down. With help from the secondary he was finally bottled up after a 19 yard gain and his big run of the night. Two plays later he took a middle screen for touchdown (shown above).
Run Play 2 - JDB Sack of 23 Yards
Fans will boo the play call or clamor for a more mobile QB on cases like this but I'll bet anyone that the root cause was some sort of a breakdown in protection up front. USC has six men to block four rushers on the play and this should not have happened. Luckily the QB did not get injured and the mistake only cost the Trojans three points. This sort of thing will drive the coaching staff nuts until it is fixed and eliminated. Offensive by Downs & Run versus Pass
Overall it was a balanced game in terms of rushing and passing for USC. There was a nice mix of all types of runs (toss plays, power off tackle, zone, and isolation lead plays) and passes in the game. Unfortunately several of the deeper passes were incomplete either overthrown or plain dropped by the receiver. Drive Sequence Instead of looking at all the different situations and stats in the game let's just review the drives in the game especially at the ones in the second half
USC moved the ball well when the Trojans had field position. When backed up in the second half the offense went no where on several consecutive drives. Missed blocks, dropped passes, and overthrown receivers were in no short supply in the game. Still due to the excellent play of the defense the game was an easy homecoming win for the Trojans. Other Notes & Reflections: The defense certainly came around in this game and gave the offense the sort of help it was needing this year. Unfortunately the offense only sustained a couple of medium to long field drives in the game. Part of that is no doubt due to the defense of Oregon State. Part of the offensive struggle however is the continued trend of missing open receivers, and receivers dropping passes. No telling of John David Booty's finger is really 100% healthy or if he simply experienced some rust. Cal's defense while capable of playing well is not as strong as Oregon State's. Longshore is not the most mobile QB either so I am optimistic about the game in Berkeley. It all starts with taking care of the ball and then forcing turnovers on defense. I'll catch the radio broadcast of the game on the internet somehow. If not it'll have to wait until I return home. |
