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The last time USC had as few as three players selected in an NFL draft, as did they did last weekend, the Trojans were coming off a 6-6 season in Pete Carroll's first year on the job.

That was April 2002.

Cornerbacks Kris Richard and Chris Cash went in the third and sixth rounds, respectively. Thus, the common reaction would be to dismiss that year as having nothing to do with this one, when Matt Kalil and Nick Perry each went in the first round and then only tight end/fullback Rhett Ellison was taken among the remaining 231 selections.

But that would be incorrect.

The two years actually share a lot of similarities -- starting with the fact that the talent on both the 2001 and 2011 squads was overwhelmingly backloaded with underclassmen. The lack of draftable talent in 2002 -- along with the success the 2002 team would go on to have -- foreshadowed the five players who would be taken in 2003, including two in the first round.

And the lack of draftable talent in 2012 should foreshadow the many players likely to be selected in 2013, including three potential first-rounders.

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USC’s out on spring break this week and not practicing, but each weekday through Friday, we’ll bring you one thing we learned from the first three days of practice last week and what it might mean for the future.

Our first item covered Marqise Lee‘s continued progress and our second the new-look Aundrey Walker. Third is this: Cody Kessler and Max Wittek are both going to get a lot of time this spring.

It makes sense, but it's still interesting.

Lane Kiffin said last week, after the Trojans' first two practices, that he was going to significantly limit Matt Barkley's snaps this spring in order to give him fewer chances to get hurt and the other quarterbacks more chances to get better.

What is that going to mean for this spring? We're going to get a better look at both backups than last spring or fall. (Jesse Scroggins should see some snaps too, but he seems to be falling further and further down the Dillon Baxter-style spiral.) And we should have a pretty good idea of who to expect to win the job after Barkley departs next season.

Right now, it's still fairly even, as it has been since both players arrived on campus last January. Kessler continues to command the huddle like a player at least a year or two more experienced than him, and Wittek continues to show flashes of the make-every-throw ability coaches at all levels find inherently attractive.

Here's what is even more interesting about this situation going forward: How is Kiffin going to handle the process of naming the starter? He could name one at the end of next spring, like Pete Carroll did with Aaron Corp in 2009, allowing the choice to get comfortable with the new position. Or he could wait until midway through fall camp and keep the competition up all summer, which could push each player more.

The second option would also have the side-effect of making both guys stay put for the 2013 season. If, say, Kiffin named Wittek the starter next April, it wouldn't be at all surprising if Kessler announced the next month he was transferring. But if Kiffin gets both players to stick around, that gives him more options all season long, and more options are always good.

Of course, this is all speculative, and we should be able to speculate better in about a month, after we see what both players do with their increased snaps.

Check back Thursday for item No. 4.

USC coach Lane Kiffin announced the hiring of two assistant coaches at Sunday's Junior Day, according to multiple media reports.

Marvin Sanders will coach defensive backs and Scottie Hazelton will coach linebackers. A program source told ESPNLosAngeles.com the hirings were being finalized Sunday and would be formally announced at some point Monday.

Sanders was hired in December by Florida Atlantic after taking the 2011 season off, resigning from Nebraska last February for "personal and family reasons." In coming to USC, he fills an opening created by Willie Mack Garza's September resignation; grad assistant Sammy Knight had served as the interim position coach during the 2011 season but wasn't seriously considered for the full-time vacancy.

Hazelton has never played or coached at the FBS level but spent the last two seasons as the defensive coordinator at North Dakota State. At a previous stop at the school, he worked with Gus Bradley, who worked with Monte Kiffin in Tampa Bay and now works as the defensive coordinator under Pete Carroll for the NFL's Seattle Seahawks.

Hazelton replaces Joe Barry, who left for the NFL's San Diego Chargers earlier this month. Both Hazelton and Sanders have worked extensively with the Cover-2 defense.

USC now has only one opening to fill -- wide receivers coach -- before spring practice starts March 6. Ted Gilmore left for the NFL's Oakland Raiders last week.

Potential candidates for that job are believed to include former USC receiver and grad assistant Keary Colbert, former UCLA interim head coach Mike Johnson, Arizona State receivers coach DelVaughn Alexander and Clemson receivers coach Jeff Scott, among others.

Kiffin told ESPN.com's Ted Miller last week he hoped to fill all three openings by the end of the upcoming week.

The chants of “One more year!” for USC quarterback Matt Barkley began in the first quarter in the USC student section. They grew louder and spread slowly in the second quarter. By the third, they took over the Coliseum. By the time USC put the finishing touches on a 50-0 rout of UCLA Saturday night, you could practically hear the Trojans' rallying cry across Los Angeles.

One more year.

It doesn’t seem like a lot to ask of a 21-year-old college student who has his entire life ahead of him, but it’s an almost impossible request to make at this point.

Barkley put an exclamation point on his Heisman Trophy campaign by completing 35 of 42 passes for 423 yards and six touchdowns against crosstown rival UCLA. It capped a season in which he passed for a school and conference record 39 touchdowns and seven interceptions.

As Barkley stood atop a ladder after the game, wielding a sword and leading the USC Trojan Marching Band in “Conquest,” USC senior linebacker Chris Galippo smiled at the scene and said, “He’s not coming back, trust me.”

Even USC coach Lane Kiffin was convinced Barkley had played his last game at USC when it was over.

“I’m probably not supposed to say this but unless he just wants to do it to be a special Trojan, he ain’t coming back,” Kiffin said. “Who’s playing better than Matt in the country? How do you not draft that kid? He’s going up there in the top five.”

It seemed everyone had an idea of what Barkley would do except for Barkley, who said, "I have no idea what I am doing next year. Tonight is too special to worry about that."

At some point, however, Barkley will have to worry about that. When he does, something tells me he will decide to come back.

I can’t explain it other than to say I’ve been wrong before. I was shocked when Andrew Luck decided to come back this season after Jim Harbaugh bolted for the NFL, stunned when Matt Leinart returned after winning the Heisman and back-to-back national championships, and surprised when Peyton Manning ended up playing his senior year at Tennessee.

When Leinart came back he said, “I think college football and this whole atmosphere here and being with my fans and my teammates ... is ultimately more satisfying and will make me happier than any amount of money could make someone happy.”

Leinart knew nothing in his life would ever be as good as his time at USC. Sure, he would have liked to have beaten Texas in the Rose Bowl and won another Heisman his senior year, but the “Bush Push” at Notre Dame and the memories of his time at USC will forever serve as high watermarks. He would probably trade his last five years in the NFL tomorrow if he could come back to USC for one more year and throw to the likes of Marqise Lee and Robert Woods.

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1. Uniforms? It's been the talk of the town this week, what kind of jerseys the two schools are going to wear for the annual crosstown rivalry game. For its part, USC has said it will be wearing its normal home cardinal-and-gold uniforms, but UCLA is hinting at an all-white alternate combination, which would certainly attract some eyes and get some attention. It's worth noting that teams wearing non-normal jerseys -- Colorado and Notre Dame -- have not fared well against the Trojans this season, and it's also worth noting that USC coach Lane Kiffin wasn't terribly pleased with UCLA coach Rick Neuheisel when he heard the news about the Bruins' uniforms. The schools have both worn their home uniforms each of the last three seasons after Neuheisel and Pete Carroll petitioned the NCAA to allow it.

2. Barkley4Heisman? With all the talk about USC quarterback Matt Barkley for the Heisman Trophy this week after USC's upset win over Oregon, one thing still remains before the all-out hype machine begins: The Trojans need to beat the Bruins. If they don't -- or even if they just sneak by -- Barkley's candidacy will be ruined. He needs to have a big game and USC needs to win in excessive fashion, otherwise voters are really going to forget about him by the time most vote in two weeks. Barkley has often talked about ending his Trojans' career with a bang, and beating UCLA handily would certainly qualify.

3. The pistol. Kiffin said it this week when asked about Rich Rodriguez' hiring over at Arizona: The Pac-12 is becoming the league of unusual offensive schemes. UCLA is no different, and the Trojans haven't necessarily had success defending the pistol in the past. (Remember the 2010 season opener against Hawaii?) The Bruins appear to have gotten it down really well in recent weeks, and quarterback Kevin Prince is the biggest threat to run USC has faced in a quarterback all season. The Trojans did face a team with multiple talented tailbacks a week ago in Oregon's LaMichael James, De'Anthony Thomas and Kenjon Barner, so UCLA's tandem of Johnathan Franklin and Derrick Coleman won't be an unheard-of threat.

4. Milestones. A number of USC players are on the cusp of some season- and career-long milestones, including receiver Marqise Lee and running back Curtis McNeal. Lee, a freshman, is just 81 receiving yards away from 1,000 on the season. McNeal, a junior, is just 119 rushing yards away from 1,000 on the season. And sophomore receiver Robert Woods needs only one catch to reach 100 on the year and four catches to break Keyshawn Johnson's single-season record. For what it's worth, Kiffin said that the Trojans will not be specifically trying to get those guys the ball early, but, if it's a blowout, they'll make sure as much as they can that the three of them get as many chances as possible to break the individual records.

5. Keeping it up defensively. As freshman linebacker Dion Bailey said this week, USC's defensive surge this season from disappointing to respectable would all be for naught if the Trojans relented against UCLA this week and gave up 30-plus points to the Bruins. A 9-3 record would essentially negate the progress Monte Kiffin's unit has made all season, and the Bruins do have the talent to make that possible. The goal, then, is to create multiple turnovers, something USC has not done with regularity this season. When the Trojans do that, though, they win. The problem is this: Prince hasn't thrown a pick in four of his last five starts.

News that UCLA is going to use alternate uniforms for Saturday's game against the Trojans does not please USC coach Lane Kiffin, who said he was a bit confused by the news out of Westwood this week that the Bruins would be unveiling a new jersey combination.

Why was he confused? Because USC and UCLA already have a unique uniform tradition that started when the two schools shared the L.A. Memorial Coliseum and was brought back in 2008: Both the Trojans and Bruins typically wear their home uniforms for the annual game.

Pete Carroll and Rick Neuheisel worked in tandem with the NCAA to repeal a rule that would penalize road teams a timeout for wearing their home uniforms, and the home-vs.-home tradition was expected to continue in the immediate future.

But a statement this week from UCLA athletic director Dan Guerrero indicated that that will not be the case.

"I don't understand it at all because everything I've been told is that Rick was behind this whole thing and I know that our players and fans really enjoy it," Kiffin said Wednesday. "But it's their choice."

Guerrero simply said that UCLA would be unveiling new uniforms that the school had been working on with adidas for several months; he didn't specify what they'd look like. But internet rumors have floated around all week that the jerseys and pants will be of the all-white variety, and Kiffin mentioned that after the Trojans' Wednesday practice.

He has also said all week that USC will be wearing its normal home uniforms no matter what UCLA does. There was talk before the 2011 season began that the Trojans would break out some type of black-based combination for the season finale against the Bruins, but that was quickly squashed by the school's administration.

Kiffin said using alternate uniforms would go against his strategy to not overly hype up each of the Trojans' games.

"We talked about it all year," he said. "The game is about the preparation, not about the hype around it.

Notes and quotes from Trojans head coach Lane Kiffin's conference call Sunday looking back at USC’s 38-35 win over Oregon in Eugene and looking forward to the season-ending matchup against UCLA:

• Kiffin had mostly positive things to say about his team's victory, as to be expected, but he did harp on one part of the game as an area for improvement in the coming years: the fourth quarter. He was displeased with how USC allowed the Ducks to score 21 straight points beginning with De'Anthony Thomas' kickoff return for a touchdown late in the third. "That was shades of last year, what we were doing offensively there," he said. But he ultimately concluded that it was sort of par for the course when dealing with coach Chip Kelly and Oregon. "Any time that you end the nation's longest home winning streak, it's tough to complain," Kiffin said.

• On the topic of Kelly, Kiffin said the Ducks' head coach was "very classy" to come into the USC locker room following the game and congratulate USC assistant coach Monte Kiffin. The two didn't meet on the field in the postgame aftermath because the Trojans' defensive playcaller operates in the upstairs coaches' box during the game.

• Kiffin was proud of his team for not getting caught up in the hype of having NBA stars LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Co. in attendance. Oregon hosted the players on their sideline during the game in what bore multiple similarities to USC and the Pete Carroll era -- as a couple of USC players pointed out after the game -- but the Trojans weren't negatively distracted in any way. "I think it was great for us, really,” Kiffin said.

• After subtly calling quarterback Matt Barkley a Heisman Trophy candidate in his postgame news conference Saturday, Kiffin expanded more on that topic Sunday, saying the third-year signal-caller should certainly finish in the top-5 of the voting come the end of the regular season. "If you look at the way he's played in big games and you don't vote based off sanctions and probations and dark clouds, I don't know how he's not in New York," Kiffin said. "If anything, it should help him, that he's had all this stuff around him, and he's still succeeded."

• After shying away from commenting on ranking-related questions all season long, Kiffin has started to perk up about the Associated Press poll of late. Last week he called out a voter from Tennessee for leaving the Trojans out of the top 25 when they were ranked 18th nationally; Sunday he said he didn't understand why USC was one spot behind Oregon (10th to 9th) despite beating them the night before the latest ranking was released. "The polls are confusing to me," Kiffin said. "You would think if you beat someone 24 hours ago at their place, you'd be ahead of them."

• Asked about a questionable first-half intentional grounding call on Barkley, Kiffin first said he didn't want to be fined "$10,000 more," then carefully commented while trying to avoid directly criticizing the Pac-12 officiating. "I'm not [being] negative," he said. "I'm just saying I've never seen that at any level of football...Have you?"

• Injury updates: Several players got hurt during Saturday's game, but Kiffin said he didn't think anyone would be held out of Saturday's UCLA game based on weekend injuries. Among those who came out for a time were linebackers Dion Bailey (ankle) and Lamar Dawson (ankle), fullback/tight end Rhett Ellison and fullback Ross Cumming, defensive tackle Christian Tupou and safety Drew McAllister.

• Amid reports and rumors that UCLA will break out alternate all-white jerseys for Saturday's game, Kiffin said the Trojans would be sporting their traditional home uniforms at the Coliseum. "I don't really care what they wear," he said.

Every Tuesday morning, all of the Pac-12 coaches talk to reporters across the region for a designated 10-minute period on a conference call open to all conference media members.

Certain coaches -- Lane Kiffin, Chip Kelly, Steve Sarkisian -- use the full 10 minutes each week. Certain other coaches -- Jon Embree, Paul Wulff, Kyle Whittingham -- almost never do.

Tuesday, Kiffin learned how it felt to be a member of the latter group. Always the last one to go each week, he was asked just one question during his segment, leading the whole call to end before he was even due to start.

"That’s what happens when you’re 18-point underdogs," Kiffin said in response to the lack of interest. "Nobody cares about you."

He was joking, obviously. But there is something to be said about USC's underdog status heading into this weekend's game against Oregon. For quite some time under former coach Pete Carroll, the Trojans were never underdogs, no matter the opponent, no matter whether they were playing at home or on the road.

Now, they've been projected to lose a number of times in Kiffin's 23 games as the head coach. But they haven't been 14 or 15 point underdogs -- like they are this weekend, according to most sports books -- in a long, long while. Las Vegas Sports Consultants said it's been 14 years since a USC opponent was favored to beat the Trojans by that much in any given game.

Does that matter? Kiffin says no -- despite the fact that he brought it up, unprompted, during the conference call.

"Oh I don't know," Kiffin said earlier Tuesday to that very question, speaking to the media after the Trojans' practice. "Those things are wrong, right, whatever. I can see why it would be like that. Look at what they've done at home to almost everybody.

"It is what it is."

In fact, Kiffin spinned it off as a positive -- as in, the Trojans will have less pressure on them because of their underdog status. And there's some truth to that: It's typically easier to play under zero pressure than under a ton.

And USC has beaten the spread in each of its last five games, dating back to the October road win over Cal. Notre Dame was favored by more than a touchdown against the Trojans last month in South Bend, but USC won that game pretty handily, 31-17.

Kiffin brought that game up as an example of what being an underdog can do for a team.

"We've been pretty heavy underdogs a few weeks ago when we went to the Midwest so sometimes you can take it as motivation," Kiffin said. "Also, the pressure is off in those types of games. Like I told our team today, when we were here before with the great runs and the 34-straight, the pressure was always on us. We were the No. 1 team and we were the ones that had to play well to stay up there.

"So, a lot of times in these games, the pressure goes the other way with the team that's got a chance to go to the national championship still. We just go up there and have some fun and see what happens."

There are a couple different ways you can look at USC's upcoming game against Oregon on Saturday.

One way is as a perfect example of a team playing with little to lose (USC) against a team with plenty to lose (Oregon). But the second is as two teams matching up with plenty to prove to observers, one in much better position (Oregon) than the other (USC).

Either way, this much is clear: Both teams have things on the line. They're just different things, as the Ducks will risk an almost-sure BCS bowl berth and potential national championship game contention, while the Trojans will risk potential double-digit wins and the chance to finish the season in the top 10 nationally.

But look at it this way: Since the NCAA sanctions were laid down at USC in June 2010, the school's goal has essentially been to get through the next two college football seasons without much collateral damage, and maybe -- hopefully -- develop its talent in the process. If the Trojans could emerge from December 2011 without a serious loss of talent or national respect, the next few years of the scholarship-limited sanctions wouldn't be so bad.

That was the thought.

Now, USC has the opportunity to turn that common, much-espoused thought entirely on its head. By beating Oregon, the Trojans would essentially have proven that the final year of the Pete Carroll era and the first year of Lane Kiffin's tenure were flukes, and will also have injected the third and fourth and fifth years of Kiffin's time to come with a ton of promise.

By beating Oregon, USC would have sent a clear message to the NCAA, to the Pac-12 and to a number of outside observers that it is here to stay -- and, as Kiffin loves to say, will have moved all the dark clouds covering the program away for good.

"At the end of the year, we want people to wonder, 'What if USC could have been in a bowl game? What would happen?' " USC defensive end Devon Kennard said after the Trojans' 40-17 win over Washington on Saturday. "That's where we want to leave everybody."

Kennard is a junior. He was coming off his freshman season when the sanctions were announced and thus didn't have the opportunity to transfer away without penalty like many others could and some did.

But he has always maintained, like quarterback Matt Barkley and many more young players also did at that time, that USC would still be able to keep up a similar level of dominance without going to a bowl game. They all said it, in one way or another.

But now it sounds a bit more real.

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LOS ANGELES – This was the kind of game USC would have found a way to lose the last two seasons.

Admit it, even though you probably picked USC to win the game, in the back of your mind you knew this team was entirely capable of mailing it in Saturday afternoon.

Forget for a moment the Trojans were playing former USC offensive and defensive coordinators Steve Sarkisian and Nick Holt, who had led Washington to back-to-back last-second wins over USC the last two seasons.

This was the kind of game even when USC was playing for BCS bowl games would have overlooked with games against Oregon and UCLA coming up to finish the season.

Not only did USC not overlook this game, they looked it straight in the eyes and slapped it upside the head.

USC’s 40-17 thrashing of Washington on Saturday was further proof the Trojans have turned the corner under Lane Kiffin. The rest of the country will not fully realize this as long as USC is on probation and unable to play in the postseason but they will be well aware of it soon enough.

This USC team is more than just a feel-good story after a triple overtime loss to Stanford. They are slowing looking like the team Pete Carroll coached to seven straight BCS bowl games and 11-win seasons.

It’s hard to say exactly when they turned the corner. From most accounts it was after their embarrassing 43-22 loss to Arizona State in Tempe, which was more than just wakeup call for a young team that desperately needed one. It was a game they trailed 21-6 in the first half before storming back to take a 22-21 lead with 4:15 left in the third quarter and then came completely undone.

Since then the Trojans’ offense has scored at least 30 points in every game, their defense has given up 17 or fewer points in four of their last five games, and they have yet to lose a game in regulation (or double overtime for that matter). And, yes, Kiffin is still upset referees didn’t let Andre Heidari, who is 13-for-15 on the season, kick a game-winning field goal in regulation against Stanford.

Almost as amazing as USC’s resurgence after being left for dead after the Arizona State blowout, has been the players who have powered this unlikely rebirth.

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1. Back-to-back-to-back. Until this year, it had been a full decade since USC had lost three straight games to a single opponent. Stanford reset the clock on that last month at the Coliseum with its triple-overtime victory over the Trojans, but USC runs the risk of doing that once again this weekend against Washington. The last two times the Trojans and Huskies have met, Washington has pulled out last-minute victories on the foot of kicker Erik Folk. USC's favored by nearly two touchdowns this time around, but this isn't the typical game with that margin. The Huskies were just as easily supposed to lose each of the last two games, but Jake Locker buoyed them into victories each time.

2. Price and Polk. On the topic of Locker, Keith Price is no Locker, but Washington's Price and Chris Polk are up there this year among all the QB-RB tandems the Trojans have faced, probably behind only Stanford's Andrew Luck and Stepfan Taylor. Polk, a junior who once committed to USC in high school, has gotten at least 100 yards from scrimmage in every game this season and has already surpassed 1,000 yards. Price started the season, his first as the starter, really hot but has since cooled down. He's thrown a combined five picks in his last two games, so the Trojans clearly have an opportunity to force turnovers against him.

3. A healthy defense. Those turnovers depend on the playmakers of this defense, and a couple of those playmakers were absent against Colorado last week. Strongside linebacker Dion Bailey, the biggest pleasant surprise of the unit this year, wasn't cleared to play because of a concussion but is now slated to move back into the starting lineup for Washington. And safety T.J. McDonald missed the first half of that game because of a Pac-12 suspension -- he'll be playing right away against the Huskies, and he'll be motivated after USC coach Lane Kiffin told reporters that McDonald played tentatively in the second half last week.

4. The USC RBs. Curtis McNeal has been handling himself just fine as USC's primary running back the last two weeks, except for the injuries that seem to come up every time he picks up more than 10 or so carries in a game. The good thing for the Trojans is that Marc Tyler is healthy again and will be available against Washington. Against Notre Dame, McNeal and Tyler made for a combination the Irish had no consistent answer for, so it'll be interesting to see if the Huskies have anything ND didn't. George Farmer is also expected to play for the first time since the Notre Dame game, so the Trojans could use him for a trick play or a mix-'em-up call.

5. Sarkisian-Kiffin. The two coaches, USC's Kiffin and Washington's Steve Sarkisian, managed to create some entertainment for Saturday's game with their back-and-forth barbs this week. There's something fun about their interactions, almost as if you can see the Pete Carroll influence in the both of them. Both have the opportunity to get one step closer to making their 2011 seasons unabated successes with wins Saturday. In Sarkisian's case, a win against the Trojans means his team is probably going to finish with nine wins, considering the Huskies' last two opponents. In Kiffin's case, a win against Washington means his team is going to enter into next week's matchup with Oregon a top-15 team, probably right around the same rank as the Ducks if they lose to Stanford on Saturday. A lot's on the line for both men, and there will surely be attention paid to their postgame interactions at the Coliseum.

It's an unusual relationship Steve Sarkisian and Lane Kiffin have.

Not too many opposing head coaches around the country were as closely connected as the two of them were under former USC coach Pete Carroll, and even fewer have continued to stay that way as their coaching trees broadened over the years. Sarkisian served for seven seasons under Carroll, Kiffin six, and they often worked together on the prolific offenses of those days.

But, with the two friends matching up Saturday for the second time as rival head coaches, both men insisted Monday that their shared histories don't play any role in the importance of the upcoming battle between USC and Washington, where Sarkisian is in his third year as the head coach.

"This isn’t about Sarkisian or Kiffin," Kiffin said after the Trojans practiced Monday in preparation for Sarkisian's Huskies. "We want to beat Washington because they beat us. We want to win every game that we play, especially when you feel like you had a game that we could have won.

"You do have a sense from your players that you’d like to get those back because you felt you could have won them with so many opportunities and you have to wait a whole year to have a chance again."

They've had to wait more than a whole year. Kiffin, of course, is referencing the Trojans' 32-31 last-second loss to Washington at the Coliseum last October, when Huskies kicker Erik Folk made a 32-yard field goal as time expired to upset USC for the second straight year.

Thirteen months before that, on the same day that Kiffin's Tennessee Volunteers lost to then-No.1 Florida, Folk made a 22-yarder with seconds left to provide the margin of victory on a 16-13 Washington upset under the Trojans.

So, really, many of the Trojans have been waiting two whole years. But, back to the rivalry -- Kiffin memorably said a year ago that Sarkisian joke-texted him in the week leading up to the game that quarterback Jake Locker had gotten hurt in a freak accident and would miss the contest.

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USC dropped just one spot in the Associated Press poll following Saturday's 56-48 loss to No. 4 Stanford in triple overtime, from No. 20 to 21, a sign of just how much national viewers respected the Trojans' performance in a losing effort.

We wrote pre-game that the game would be a crossroads for Lane Kiffin and USC. Win, and the Trojans would go one way, skying up to inarguable success this season. Lose, and they'd trend significantly downward and be in danger of losing some fan support once again.

Well, we were wrong. They took the in-between route.

Kiffin's Trojans put up such a fight against Andrew Luck and the Cardinal that the outcome doesn't necessarily take them in a given direction from here. They'll face Colorado in five days, and they obviously need to win that comfortably to keep up the momentum, but they'll likely be ranked higher after beating the Buffaloes than they were entering the Stanford game, which is saying something.

What did USC prove in Saturday's four-hour tour de force on the Coliseum field?

For one, the Trojans' defense has improved from last season and the start of last year. Luck's numbers were nice and Stanford ended up with 186 yards rushing, but the Cardinal did not dominate the game on the offensive side like they've dominated every other game they played this season. Stepfan Taylor and the other backs only finished with a lot of yards because they ran the ball so many times -- Stanford got less than four yards per rush on average.

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USC's struggles over the last few years of Pac-12 play don't really apply to the California Bears.

Jeff Tedford's squads, while consistently solid nationally and often a force in the conference, have just not been an issue for the Trojans of late. In 2008, USC shut down Cal's offense entirely and won 17-3. In 2009, the Trojans blew the Bears out, 30-3, in a game dedicated to Stafon Johnson, who had dropped a bench-press bar on his throat in the week leading up to it. And, last year, at the Coliseum, USC led 42-0 at halftime before pulling away with a comfortable 48-14 win.

Going back further, the Trojans haven't lost to Cal since a triple-overtime game in Berkeley in 2003, a game in which future Super Bowl-winner Aaron Rodgers was replaced in the second half becaise of poor play. The 2011 Bears starting signal-caller, Zach Maynard, has been replaced by a backup, Allan Bridgford, twice this season. But those appearances came later in the game, in one case because of an injury and in the other because of a blowout.

Maynard, a Buffalo transfer, has proven to have well-developed chemistry with his top two receivers in Keenan Allen and Marvin Jones. Running back Isi Sofele stepped right in for Shane Vereen, who left to the NFL, but the Bears defense has been the primary issue at fault for the team's 3-2 start.

Cal was 3-0 at first, after a trio of non-conference games. But Keith Price and Washington found a way to beat the Bears last month in Seattle, and then the Bears again struggled to keep up with Oregon last week in Eugene. The latest problem is the pass defense, especially now, with top corner Marc Anthony out for the foreseeable future and a true freshman, Stefan McClure, in for him.

With how much trouble USC's quarterback-receiver tandem of Matt Barkley and Robert Woods has caused some better defenses so far this year, it's not hard to imagine a situation where Woods surpasses 200 receiving yards on Thursday at AT&T Park.

Cal's run defense allowed a ton of yards (239) to Oregon's LaMichael James on Thursday, but that's not indicative of its normal play. Washington running back Chris Polk gained three yards a carry against the Bears in that Huskies win, and Fresno State's Robbie Rouse and Colorado's Rodney Stewart both ran the ball poorly earlier this year, too.

A Marc Tyler-dominated day is not likely for USC in what promises to be an unusual environment at AT&T Park, where only a handful of Trojans have played a football game previously.

A Barkley-to-Woods one is.

With 35 seconds left in the first half of USC's 48-41 win over Arizona on Saturday, the Trojans approached the line at the Arizona 38 holding a 24-12 lead but facing a key fourth-and-two situation.

A conversion would put them into position to extend their lead to 15 with a field goal or even 19 with a touchdown. A turnover on downs would give the Wildcats the ball with enough time to cull together a few plays to get into field-goal range.

Coach Lane Kiffin called a short pass play, but quarterback Matt Barkley's first three reads were covered tightly by Arizona defenders. So he delivered the ball to the right side of the field, to a little-known backup fullback named Ross Cumming.

Cumming corralled the pass, notched the first down and got out of bounds, allowing the Trojans to get a field goal four plays later and go into halftime with a more comfortable lead.

"Really good job by him staying alive on the sideline and Matt’s progression to be able to get to the fourth guy was big," Kiffin said before joking that Cumming wasn't "way up on the ladder" of Barkley's options at the line of scrimmage

A converted linebacker who switched positions midseason and has long excelled at special teams as a Trojan, Cumming's first week at fullback was a success. Having him there allows USC to keep Rhett Ellison at his more comfortable tight end position, and still maintain a veteran presence in the backfield.

“I wish we had done it earlier," Kiffin said of Cumming's move. "It’s just an example of a guy staying around here, understanding the systems, understanding techniques.

"What we teach on special teams can really carry over to offense and defense, sometimes regardless of position, and Ross is a great example of that to be able to step in and contribute.”

Cumming, a senior and former walk-on, is a special-teamer for this team, first and foremost. He starts on all four of those units. But he also played a few snaps against Syracuse and Arizona State at tight end, and, when it was revealed that Christian Thomas was going to miss the rest of the year, it was thought that Cumming would remain there for the rest of the year.

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