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PASADENA, Calif. -- Just when it looked like the UCLA Bruins were going to pull away, Matt Barkley and the USC Trojans brushed off a horrific start and trail 24-14 at halftime.

The Bruins jumped out to a 24-0 lead, capitalizing on a Barkley interception on the first offensive play of the game and a Marqise Lee fumble.

A very efficient first half from quarterback Brett Hundley (16-of-19, 141 yards, one passing touchdown, one rushing) and the powerful running of Johnathan Franklin had the Bruins in the driver’s seat.

But after UCLA scored on its fourth straight possession, Barkley finally got USC on the board with 5:58 left in the half on a 33-yard touchdown to Nelson Agholor. The Trojans defense finally got a stop and Barkley hit Randall Telfer on a 2-yard touchdown pass.

Barkley is 9-of-15 for 135 yards with two touchdowns and an interception. UCLA gets the ball to start the second half.

The USC Trojans (No. 18 BCS, No. 21 AP) and UCLA Bruins (No. 17 BCS, No. 17 AP) haven't matched up in a game that meant this much in a long time.

The winner of Saturday's 12 p.m. PT game at the Rose Bowl will secure the Pac-12 South title and earn a trip to the conference championship to compete for a bid to another game at the Rose Bowl.

Here are 10 things to watch in the winner-take-all matchup:

1. Mora vs. Kiffin. Long-term, the most important takeaway from this game will be who takes the upper hand between the two coaches who seem destined for a nice rivalry. Jim Mora and Lane Kiffin have the perfect mix of similarities and differences to make things interesting -- coaching bloodlines, NFL failures and recruiting successes, plus their opposite personalities. Mora is engaging and exciting as a speaker; Kiffin is, at his best, mildly entertaining. But who's a better coach? Perhaps we'll find out on Saturday.

2. More Marqise Lee. Lee hasn't lost any of his luster over the past couple of weeks, as he continues to be probably the second-hottest player in the country, behind only Johnny Manziel of Texas A&M. The whole defense thing from last week didn't work out, and Lee said he won't be playing there this week, but even so, he should be able to exploit a weak UCLA secondary. Lee is just 14 catches, 86 yards and four touchdowns away from breaking the Pac-12 single-season marks in all three categories.

3. Strength vs. weakness. If this isn't a recipe for abject disaster, what is? UCLA's biggest weakness is its secondary, and specifically, at corner. USC's biggest strength is its receivers, the top pass-catching duo in the nation. If the Bruins single-cover Lee with Sheldon Price or Aaron Hester at any point, they'll essentially be inviting the Trojans to score a touchdown. If they double- or triple-cover him, they'll be inviting Kiffin to re-explore throwing the ball to Robert Woods, which has never worked out too poorly for USC.

4. Hundley and Franklin. USC has Lee and Matt Barkley. UCLA has Brett Hundley and Johnathan Franklin, and the Bruins' duo isn't far off in terms of overall excitement and ability to explode for dynamic plays. It'll be particularly interesting to see how the Trojans try to stop Franklin, who has reinvented himself this season as an outside runner after running mostly between the tackles in the old Bruins scheme. As for Hundley, he's a dual-threat quarterback who has been more effective as a passer than a runner, and he makes his living passing short to backs and tight ends. In fact, only one of the Bruins' top four receivers is an actual wide receiver, and only four of Hundley's 24 touchdown passes have gone to an actual receiver, not counting newly healthy running back/receiver Damien Thigpen.

5. The offensive lines. No, they won't be battling directly against one another, but the Trojans' and Bruins' lines will collectively determine a lot of what happens at the Rose Bowl. UCLA's offensive line is particularly young and hasn't kept Hundley off the ground, but the Trojans' linemen probably would've been on the hook for more sacks if Kiffin didn't call so many three-step drops because of them. Who will step up to the occasion? If there's an indicator, maybe it's that USC starts a fifth-year senior at center in Khaled Holmes, and UCLA starts a redshirt freshman, Jake Brendel.

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LOS ANGELES -- When USC's Robert Woods and Dion Bailey were youngsters in Carson, Calif., their Pop Warner team was among the best in the state.

Then, one Saturday morning, they suffered a crushing loss to a team from Carlsbad, quarterbacked by an older prodigy named Tate Forcier. Bailey, now a sophomore linebacker for the Trojans, says he still remembers everything about it vividly today: the first touchdown they allowed, when he knew it was over, when he knew how badly he wanted to forget it and how hard he found he would work to do so.

"That," he says now, pausing for effect, "is the worst I've ever lost."

Bailey and Woods lost 28-6 to a team they never saw again. Take the margin of that loss and more than double it against your biggest rival, and that's about how badly UCLA lost to USC last Thanksgiving weekend: 50-0.

Bailey said he couldn't imagine facing his classmates after a loss of that magnitude.

"Here, at this school, with our tradition, if we lost 50-0, I probably wouldn't show up to school," Bailey said this week. "We didn't have any games after, we weren't bowl-eligible. That was our last game.

"I'd probably just show up for finals, keep my head down and avoid eye contact with everybody."

Of course, UCLA's players had to go to school the week after their devastating loss to USC last season. And they had to play in the conference championship game six days later, too -- against Oregon, the fifth-ranked team in the country.

Given all that, USC receiver Marqise Lee understands what has happened to the UCLA football team since that fateful night at the Coliseum.

"I'd change my mindset, too," Lee said. "Play harder. Play better. That's what they're doing."

UCLA safety Andrew Abbott, a Bruins captain and a former receiver of Matt Barkley's in high school at Mater Dei, said this week that the game was partially responsible for the drastic change he and his teammates made sometime in between December and September.

"It's something that kind of drove players individually," Abbott said. "The team remembers it, and we thought about it and it helped us in the offseason. But it wasn't something like we were like, 'We lost 50-0, let's go get extra work in.' We didn't do that."

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LOS ANGELES -- They're meeting somewhere in the middle, squaring up for a USC-UCLA rivalry that's given the word back its meaning.

USC has been just disappointing enough without quite collapsing.

UCLA has been just ascendant enough without quite proving it has ended the football monopoly in Los Angeles.

And so, this Saturday's game in Pasadena carries all the significance, all the potential for smack talk, all the old-fashioned, let's-take-it-out-back fun that it should. The stakes are pretty simple: Whoever wins Saturday's game at the Rose Bowl will play in the Pac-12 title game two weeks later with the hope of being back in the old building on New Year's Day.

What's not to like about that, especially as boring as these games have been lately? UCLA has beaten USC once in the past 14 years, that 2006 shocker that knocked Pete Carroll's team out of the BCS title game. Since then, the Trojans have outscored the Bruins 158-35 head-to-head. The closest UCLA loss has been by two touchdowns.

We live in an era of sanitized speech in sports. These days, the thing that passes for trash talking between these two teams is manufactured. Literally. One of the mini-dramas of last week involved UCLA cornerback Randall Goforth's fake Twitter account and coach Jim Mora's bizarre overreaction to it.

Things might get a little more chippy in the coming days -- and the hostility figures to amp up on game day -- but USC sounded oddly respectful of its cross-town rival following the Trojans' order-restoring 38-17 win over Arizona State Saturday at the Coliseum.

"They're a great team, I've been watching them all season," Trojans linebacker Hayes Pullard said. "They've matured and grown way better than the last couple years we've been playing them."

UCLA (8-2) is ranked higher, but USC (7-3) was installed as an early four-point favorite playing on the road, sort of. The guys in Las Vegas have followed this series.

"In years past, we've kind of gotten after UCLA, but they're a different team this year and, obviously, we're not going to take them lightly," defensive end Wes Horton said.

The take-lightly game for USC might have been this past one, with Arizona State sandwiched around a national-interest game against Oregon and the two upcoming rivalry games. Even though USC wraps up the Pac-12 South on Saturday, it might be even more satisfying to knock Notre Dame out of consideration for the national championship the following week.

Kiffin said he never mentioned either of those looming rivals in meetings and practice last week.

"Obviously, they know about it," Kiffin said.

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LOS ANGELES -- The Oregon Ducks' offense finally slowed to a jog. It was coming off the field after Kenjon Barner scored his fifth rushing touchdown Saturday night, when one of the offensive linemen, steam pouring off his head, yelled, "That's the way you finish, USC!"

Actually, that's not quite accurate. We're about to find out how USC finishes.

After Oregon's frisky herd of green-and-white ponies galloped up and down the Coliseum turf -- barely leaving a cleat mark (or having to break a tackle) -- we heard the usual array of motivations for the remainder of this USC season.

It's about pride. Trojans never quit, etc.

"We've still got a lot of football left," Matt Barkley mumbled afterward.

But it all rang a little hollow in the strange afterglow of a ridiculous assortment of records at the Coliseum -- and a 62-51 loss to the Ducks -- that left the Trojans with three losses nearly three weeks before Thanksgiving.

This would have been a disappointing season last year, when many people were still giving this team a pass as it dug its way out of the NCAA-created crater. In 2012, after everybody had built them up into an unstoppable machine, it's going to be viewed as a dull thud -- perhaps even the kind of thing that can get a team to lay down for the remainder of a season.

But here's what is stunning: Saturday's loss really didn't change the big picture. If these guys can regain their equilibrium after all the spinning, stumbling and chasing they did, they might realize they have exactly the same things to play for now as they did Saturday morning before the Oregon game.

If they beat UCLA and Arizona State in the next two weeks, they'll get a rematch with Oregon in the Pac-12 title game. If they somehow manage to win that game in Eugene -- and, granted, Marqise Lee might have to run backward to reverse the Earth's rotation to do it -- they could even play in the Rose Bowl on New Year's Day.

Together now: The what?!

Preposterous, isn't it? The Trojans' defense gave up 730 yards Saturday. I could have served as Oregon's punter and the Ducks still would have won.

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Is Oregon-USC about a passing of the guard?

The one absolute history teaches us is there will be change. Nothing lasts forever. Empires fall. In ancient times, no one could conceive a world without Roman domination. Look at Italy now.

USC has 11 national championships. Oregon has none. And it wasn't too long ago that USC under Pete Carroll made a dynastic run that terrorized college football. From 2002 to 2008, USC was college football's pre-eminent power, the lone program that made the SEC quake in fear.

But there is a distinct sense that Chip Kelly and the Oregon Ducks are headed to the Coliseum on Saturday to grab the Pac-12 sword from Tommy Trojan and take it back to Eugene.

It wasn't supposed to be like this. In the preseason, the overwhelming consensus was USC was ready to reclaim its place atop college football. The Trojans, emerging from a two-year postseason ban courtesy of the NCAA, welcomed back 19 starters from a team that went 10-2 and won at Oregon. They looked like a potentially all-time great team on offense, with a talented defense playing a strong supporting role.

Meanwhile, Oregon was replacing six offensive starters, including a two-year starter at quarterback in Darron Thomas and its all-time leading rusher, LaMichael James. The defense looked stout, but there were plenty of questions. It seemed premature, despite three consecutive Pac-12 titles, to call the Ducks a "reload, not rebuild" outfit.

Au contraire.

Oregon has been a well-oiled machine. It has rolled over everyone like an army of steamrollers and sat its starters for large portions of the second half. Sure, the schedule hasn't featured any A-list foes. But Arizona, Arizona State and Washington are a combined 14-10 with wins over Oklahoma State, Stanford, Oregon State and USC, and the Ducks beat them by a combined count of 144-42.

USC has flashed brilliance at times on both sides of the ball this season, but that only serves to provide a stark contrast for the moments of inexplicable mediocrity and sloppiness. The Trojans are 120th -- last! -- in the nation in penalties and penalty yards per game. And last by a fairly wide margin.

Quarterback Matt Barkley has thrown eight interceptions. He threw seven all of last year.

And to cut to the chase, USC already has two losses, to Stanford and Arizona, that have thrown a blanket of "Neh" over what was supposed to be not only the Pac-12 game of the year, but also perhaps the national game of the year.

So it's fair to ask what it might mean -- big picture -- if Oregon prevails and then goes on to win a fourth consecutive Pac-12 title: Are the Ducks poised to displace USC atop the conference for the long term?

USC fans would rightly counter, "Well, how about the Ducks win a national title first?" That's fair.

Oregon fans probably would admit there's a reasonable -- and nagging -- qualifier here also: "As long as coach Chip Kelly stays in Eugene."

While Oregon probably wouldn't tumble into mediocrity if Kelly bolted for the NFL -- the program is too rich and too Nike'd -- this run of dominance feels like its foundation is built on Kelly's cult of "Win the Day" personality.

But the Pac-12 blog, just like Kelly quashing an interesting question, won't deal in hypotheticals.

So then, if the Ducks roll over the Trojans on Saturday by multiple touchdowns -- an unthinkable idea in the preseason -- and go on to win a fourth consecutive Pac-12 title, that feels like it could be a resonating statement.

Further, USC has two more years of scholarship sanctions. It can sign no more than 15 players for the next two recruiting classes (though there's some backwards-looking wiggle room coach Lane Kiffin has skillfully exploited) and can't exceed more than 75 players on scholarship, instead of the standard 85. All along, the point has been repeatedly made that USC will be most taxed by sanctions over the next two to three years.

Meanwhile, a glance at Oregon's roster, led by redshirt freshman QB Marcus Mariota, and sophomore fancypants De'Anthony Thomas, suggests the Ducks aren't going anywhere. This is almost certainly a preseason top-five team in 2013.

It seems like a potential old-school to new-school transition is at hand. From a program with iconic uniforms and pageantry that is immediately recognizable to college football fans across the country, to a program that changes uniforms every week and isn't afraid to wear lime-green socks.

Of course, the reality is USC won't go easily into the night. It has too much tradition. And let's not forget this: Location, location, location. USC's presence in Southern California's recruiting hotbed means the potential for program greatness is built-in.

And maybe USC pulls the shocker on Saturday and gets to smirk back at all the doubters.

Yet if Oregon takes care of business as most now expect, something might very well change. When someone asks, "Tell me about the Pac-12?" The new response will be, "Well, of course, there's Oregon first. You know about them, right?"

A little bit of movement, as you'd expect, on the Pac-12 Heisman tracker after Week 3. Neither of your Pac-12 bloggers is ready to cast Matt Barkley aside. One bad game -- especially early in the year -- doesn't completely crush a Heisman campaign. Even David Shaw called Barkley the best quarterback in the country. But it certainly didn't help, which is why he drops to third this week.

De'Anthony Thomas, Oregon, WR/RB

• Week 3 numbers: Rushed three times for 62 yards and a touchdown and caught three balls for 73 yards and a touchdown. He also returned four punts for 87 yards.
• Season numbers: Thirteen rushes for 228 yards (17.5 yards per run) and four touchdowns. Eleven catches for 154 yards (14 yards per reception) and three touchdowns.
• What went well: Another blowout win for the Ducks provides us with our usual weekly dose of DAT highlights, including a season-high 59-yard run and a season-high 49-yard reception.
• Any questions? A couple of fumbles put a bit of a stain on the performance. That 49-yard reception, when he showed off some ridiculous moves, would have been a 50-yard touchdown, but he had the ball knocked out on the goal line. Heady play by Jake Fisher to not give up on the play and to fall on the ball for the score.

Johnathan Franklin, UCLA, RB

• Week 3 numbers: Rushed for 110 yards on 25 carries with no touchdowns. Caught four balls for 58 yards.
• Season numbers: Sixty-six rushes for 541 yards (8.2 yards per run) with three touchdowns. Eight receptions for 121 yards (15.1 yards per reception) with a touchdown.
• What went well: UCLA won against an overmatched Houston team. The Bruins are 3-0 with a chance to make a nice impression when they host Oregon State this weekend. If they keep winning and Franklin keeps putting out the yards, he'll stay in the picture.
• Any questions? The yards are there, and Franklin still leads the country in rushing with 180.3 yards per game. But the rushing touchdowns are on the lower end when you look at it from a national perspective. Even within the conference, Kenjon Barner has six and Ka'Deem Carey has five.

Matt Barkley, USC, QB

• Week 3 numbers: Completed just 20 of 41 passes for 254 yards with zero touchdowns and two interceptions.
• Season numbers: Completed 66 of 109 passes (60.6 percent) with 813 yards and 10 touchdowns and three interceptions.
• What went well: The hope is that his performance will light a fire under Barkley and the Trojans. If you have to lose, better to do it to a ranked team early in the season. Other than seeing how he handles the loss, which we won't know until he steps on the field against Cal, there isn't much about his performance that was redeeming.
• Any questions? How much time you got? He failed to throw a touchdown for the first time in 18 games -- and, given the weapons he has at his disposal, that seems almost unheard of. Heisman voters don't take backup centers into consideration. They look at the numbers. And the numbers weren't good.

The good news is there's no longer a need to regurgitate comparisons between USC in 2012 and USC in 2005. In 2005, the Trojans beat Stanford by 30. In 2012, the Cardinal forced a fourth-quarter tap out.

The 2005 team went undefeated in the regular season and lost an epic clash with Texas for the national title. The 2012 team got pushed around in Game 3.

While USC's turnovers and penalties were notable at Stanford, they were only foot-notable. The primary narrative was how USC got whipped on both lines, most obviously in the fourth quarter when the screws tightened. Stanford asserted itself and the Trojans wilted.

There are many ways to lose, and some losses are easier to rationalize. Last year, Oregon opened with a loss to LSU. Sure, there was a false narrative -- LSU dominated those gimmicky Ducks! -- but the true narrative was Oregon played sloppily and LSU did not. You can rationalize a sloppy loss because you can envision corrected mistakes and better ball security.

It's more difficult to rationalize USC's loss to Stanford. Yes, the absence of center Khaled Holmes, maybe the best offensive lineman in the conference, was significant. Still, if you came to the game with no preconceptions, you'd be hard-pressed to imagine how the Trojans might reverse the scoreboard in a rematch.

But the purpose here is not to read the entrails of the Trojans' 21-14 defeat that knocked them from No. 2 to No. 13. It's to consider the present and to speculate on the future for USC in 2012.

The present is a test of the Trojans' heart and backbone. It starts with the leadership of Lane Kiffin and his coaching staff, then trickles down to quarterback Matt Barkley and safety T.J. McDonald, the guys who came back as seniors to take care of "unfinished business."

The point A after the loss, however, was a USC failure. The Trojans' postgame despondency, particularly Barkley's, was perfectly understandable. It was normal. But exceptional people, the sorts who are supposed to lead great teams, don't do despondency. They don't do feel sorry for yourself.

Don't hate me for going here, but this is what you do.

Yeah, I pulled out Tim Tebow's news conference speech after Florida's embarrassing 31-30 home loss to Ole Miss on Sept. 27, 2008. While I know Tebow is a Rorschach test in this country, what can't be denied is his ability to inspire those who compete beside him, who wear the same uniform.

My expectation is Barkley, after regaining his composure, will deliver a similar message to his teammates. The message is this: We will get back to work. We will rededicate. We will fight with everything we have to get everything we can from this season. And if we do this, good things will happen.

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Our position reviews move on to Pac-12 defensive ends.

Everyone wants a great edge rusher. Some teams are surely excited about their edge guys. Some teams, well, as you've heard us say before "we'll see."

By the way, if you want to review previous position reviews, go here.

Great shape

USC: Nick Perry is gone, but Wes Horton, who was second-team All-Pac-12 in 2011, and Devon Kennard are the best returning end combination in the Pac-12. While neither has been highly productive getting sacks during previous seasons, that could change this fall. Redshirt freshman Greg Townsend, Kevin Greene and JC transfer Morgan Breslin will provide depth.

Oregon: Dion Jordan is the best returning defensive end -- first-team All-Pac-12 in 2011 -- but his position has looked more line an outside linebacker of late. So he doesn't get a full chit here (the Ducks would have been an easy No. 1 here if he did). Taylor Hart, who mostly played tackle last year, Isaac Remington, Jared Ebert and touted freshman Arik Armstead give the Ducks a strong foursome.

California: The Bears lost both starting ends, so how are they this high? Well, let's put it this way: The Pac-12 blog believes it's highly possible -- perhaps even likely -- that by the end of the season we will judge Cal as having the best DEs in the conference. Deandre Coleman and Mustafa Jalil are 300 pounders with athleticism and tremendous upside. Todd Barr and Keni Kaufusi provide depth. And Aaron Tipoti could see some time at end.

Oregon State: The Beavers have a strong start with sophomores Scott Crichton and Dylan Wynn. They are undersized playmakers. Crichton, honorable mention All-Pac-12, had six sacks, 14.5 tackles for a loss and six forced fumbles last year. Wynn recovered five fumbles. So why are the Beavers not at the top? Both struggled against the run at times and the depth is questionable.

Good shape

Stanford: Second-team All-Pac-12 end Ben Gardner is back but the underrated Matt Masifilo is gone. Junior Josh Mauro (6-6, 275), sophomore Henry Anderson, redshirt freshmen Charlie Hopkins (6-6, 270) and J.B. Salem (6-4, 260) are competing for the vacancy and will provide depth.

Utah: 6-foot-7 Joe Kruger is back at one end. He had three sacks last year and moves to the right end spot where Derrick Shelby was productive last fall. Sophomore Nate Fakahafua takes over Kruger's spot on the opposite side. He only had four tackles last year. Depth is a bit of a question. Converted RB Thretton Palamo flashed promise and Niasi Leota is a JC transfer.

UCLA: The Bruins are hard to figure: Plenty of big names, but they ranked 11th in the conference in run defense in 2011 and their measly 14 sacks also ranked 11th. Perhaps a switch to a 3-4 scheme will help? Datone Jones and Owamagbe Odighizuwa are on the left side, while Cassius Marsh and Odighizuwa are Nos. 1 and 2 on the right side, meaning the coaching staff feels good about three guys.

Washington: The critical element for the Huskies is getting back a healthy Hau'oli Jamora. He was highly productive in 2010 but blew his knee out last year and missed spring practices. Josh Shirley led the Huskies with 8.5 sacks, and he's slated to play a hybrid outside linebacker-rush end spot in the Huskies new, and apparently mostly 3-4 scheme. Senior Talia Crichton and Andrew Hudson are also in the starting mix, while redshirt freshmen Jarett Finau, Connor Cree and Corey Waller are battling for reps.

Arizona State: The Sun Devils new defensive scheme is a hybrid 3-4/4-3. It features one true end -- Davon Coleman was No. 1 on the post-spring depth chart -- and a "devil-backer," who's a hybrid end/OLB. Carl Bradford was No. 1 there on the post-spring depth chart, but he'll likely have to fight off a challenge from Junior Onyeali, who was suspended after he followed a promising freshman season with an lackluster, injury-riddled 2011 campaign. Gannon Conway could provide depth.

Washington State: Travis Long has moved to outside linebacker in the Cougars new 3-4 look, but he at least gets acknowledged here. Senior end Lenard Williams (6-2, 250) is a returning starter and redshirt freshman end Xavier Cooper flashed promise this spring. Jordan Pu'u Robinson and Ioane Gauta look like good bets to provide depth.

We'll see

Colorado: The good news is junior end Chidera Uzo-Diribe, who had 5.5 sacks last year. Sophomore Juda Parker is the likely starter at the other end. He had six tackles last year as a freshman. After that, it's mostly crickets. Defensive coordinator Greg Brown has made no secret about his believe that incoming freshmen will provide depth. And potentially win starting jobs.

Arizona: The bottom line is Arizona is replacing both starting DEs from a unit that tied for 116th in the nation last year with just 10 sacks. But things aren't completely hopeless here. There is experience, though it's all about tackles transforming into ends as the Wildcats switch to a 3-3-5 scheme. That means Justin Washington will move outside from tackle to end. After a miserable sophomore season, the once promising Washington is trying to regain his form. Sophomore Kirifi Taula, also a former tackle, is the likely starter at the other end, though sophomore Dan Pettinato also is in the mix.

Every season, players transfer from one school to another. Some are never heard from again. Some flourish. Here are a few incoming Pac-12 transfers who could have an impact this year.

Quarterbacks Jordan Webb (Kansas to Colorado) and Connor Wood (Texas to Colorado): It's a good bet that the Buffaloes starting quarterback will be one of these two in 2012. Webb, a former starter, bolted for Boulder when he was no longer wanted by new Jayhawks coach Charlie Weis. Wood, a once touted recruit, left Texas after losing a competition for the starting job.

Offensive lineman Stan Hasiak, UCLA to Oregon State: It's not often a player flames out at one Pac-12 school and re-emerges at another. Hasiak's tumultuous tenure ended badly in Westwood -- he was dismissed from the team after having academic and behavior problems -- but he's got a good chance to start or see plenty of action on the Beavers' questionable offensive line. And he does have a redshirt year available.

Defensive tackle Brandon Willis, North Carolina to UCLA x2: Willis, a redshirt freshman, has twice transferred from North Carolina to UCLA in the past year and a half, but this time his move West appears to be sticking. He also was No. 1 at nose guard after spring practices.

Safety Josh Shaw, Florida to USC: The 6-foot-1, 200-pound third-year sophomore was granted a hardship waiver by the NCAA after playing in 10 games for the Gators last year. The Trojans are deep at safety but Shaw has a chance to see action.

ESPN.com's series on FBS coaches continues today with this question: Which coach in the Pac-12 provides the biggest bang for the buck?

That's tough to answer for a number of reasons.

1. There are four new coaches in the Pac-12 this season.
2. There were two new coaches last year.
3. USC and Stanford, as private schools, don't provide salary information for their coaches, though USA Today reported that Lane Kiffin made $2.4 million in 2010, way less than had been widely reported.

Two years ago, it would have been easy to say that Oregon State's Mike Riley provided the most bang for buck. Riley won 36 games from 2006-2009 before the Beavers tumbled to consecutive losing seasons. And he did that with a fairly modest salary.

Here are the latest numbers.

Chip Kelly, Oregon, $2,800,000

Lane Kiffin, USC, $2,400,000*

Jim Mora, UCLA, $2,400,00 million**

Jeff Tedford, California, $2,300,000

Steve Sarkisian, Washington, $2,250,000

Mike Leach, Washington State, $2,250,000

Todd Graham, Arizona State, $2,000,000

Kyle Whittingham, Utah, $2,000,000

Rich Rodriguez, Arizona, $1,910,000

Mike Riley, Oregon State, $1,313,471

Jon Embree, Colorado, $725,000

*It's perfectly reasonable to posit that Kiffin made more than this in 2011 and also will in 2012.

**Mora's number is an average of his five-year, $12 million contract. He'll likely make less than this figure this season.

By the way, David Shaw's salary at Stanford has been estimated at $1.75 million. It seems, in any event, that it's too early to rate Shaw or Colorado's Jon Embree as second-year coaches. And it makes no sense to look at the track record of the four new coaches because the past doesn't mean anything for the new schools, though you could say that Arizona got Rodriguez at below market value.

So who provides the most bang for the buck? I've got two answers: Utah's Kyle Whittingham and Oregon's Chip Kelly.

Why? Well, name the two coaches on the above list who have won BCS bowl game at their present job.

Whittingham is 66-25 (.725) at Utah, including double-digit wins in three of the past four seasons. His worst season in seven years is 7-5 in 2005. After an 0-4 start in Pac-12 play last fall, he rallied his team behind a backup QB who'd transferred from Nebraska-Omaha, and the Utes nearly won the South Division. Oh, and he's 7-1 in bowl games.

Further, Whittingham has been loyal to Utah. He's had opportunities to leave but he's stuck around.

Kelly is the Pac-12's highest paid coach by a fairly wide margin. He was guaranteed $2.8 million in 2011 and will make $3.5 million this season, according to USA Today. So why does he rate highly in terms of bang for the buck? Well, there's a 34-6 (.850) record, including a 25-2 mark in Pac-12 games (.926). And there's three consecutive conference titles. And an undefeated regular season in 2010 when the Ducks fell just short of beating Auburn for the national title. And there's the Rose Bowl victory over Wisconsin last January.

Kelly has delivered a super-elite level of performance in his three seasons. If you were to name the nation's best coaches, you wouldn't have to wait long after Nick Saban and Urban Meyer to get to Kelly.

He gets big bucks, yes, but he's delivered unprecedented bang to the Ducks program.

Any Oregon fans think he's overpaid?

LOS ANGELES -- The Pac-12 should have rolled out a big podium and presented UCLA with its South division trophy on the floor of the Coliseum after USC’s 50-0 win Saturday night. Commissioner Larry Scott could have handed Rick Neuheisel a microphone for his acceptance speech.

Wouldn’t that have been fun? The perfect snapshot of the farce this conference foisted on us all this year.

Then again, UCLA still gets to “represent” the South next week in Eugene, Ore., another chance to make the conference look ridiculous.

USC players and coaches might watch that game Friday night, have a chuckle or two along with the rest of the country. They won’t be playing in it, of course, even though it could have been an electric rematch. The Pac-12 lined up behind the NCAA and stripped the Trojans of any opportunity to play postseason football two Junes ago.

So, Saturday was the final statement the Trojans get to make this year when it looks like they have so much more left to say. At least their final phrase was definitive.

“Neuheisel said it best. They closed the gap,” USC defensive tackle DaJohn Harris said. “I don’t see it, but that’s what they said.”

USC isn’t just the best team in this division right now. It looks like it will sit on top of the thing for a decade or two.

But who cares about that? By the end of the season it was probably the best team west of the Rockies. Let this thing play out a little longer and the Trojans might have given any team in the country a battle. It’s rare you see a team improve in such a straight line, week by week, from mediocre in early fall to a machine by Thanksgiving.

Heading into next season, if a few juniors (or one in particular) come back, USC (10-2, 7-2 in Pac-12) will be a national title contender. Even if all four of them bolt, they should be Top 15 with a shot at something magical.

Wouldn’t you have loved to see USC wrap up this sensational 2011 season with a bowl game against Arkansas or Georgia or one of those other SEC teams that everyone is always telling us is so tough? Instead, we had to hold our hands over our eyes and peek at Saturday’s sad spectacle of a once-vibrant rivalry.

I don’t feel sorry for USC’s players any longer. You got the sense all year they were having a blast showing everybody USC is still USC, that no matter what the NCAA does, it can’t make them play slower or dumber or with less pride. And, what’s more, they liked each other, which helped them enjoy it that much more.

“This is the closest team I’ve ever been on,” said left tackle Matt Kalil.

The Senior Night ceremony Saturday was nice, but short. It was mostly walk-ons and special-teams players who got to come out of the tunnel and hug coach Lane Kiffin. The core of this team isn’t going anywhere. In fact, many of this team’s best players will be juniors and sophomores next year, their learning curves just beginning to climb.

By early in the third quarter, USC fans were chanting “One more year!” and Matt Barkley had to hear it. He was backed up near his own end zone, just a few dozen yards for the student section. In the fourth quarter, after the defense stuffed UCLA on fourth down to preserve the shutout, Barkley sprinted 40 yards onto the field, leapt and chest-bumped safety T.J. McDonald.

Barkley came to USC because he wanted to play in the NFL and after Saturday’s performance -- 35-for-42 for 432 yards and six touchdowns -- he looks like he could have left the Coliseum and driven to a hotel near the closest NFL stadium and started Sunday. He doesn’t have much left to prove at this level. Even Kiffin expects him to go.

But, if he does leave, he will feel it somewhere deep, the opportunity he’s leaving behind. The love from the fans in these past few games reminded him. The crackling chemistry he’s found with Marqise Lee and Robert Woods will tease him if he goes. It looks like they’re playing a video game out there.

It takes a certain kind of person to perform at the highest level without the hint of a reward at the end. This team had every excuse imaginable at hand -- transfers, the lack of a bowl game, negative publicity -- and didn’t seem to care.

So, yeah, one team of champions did walk off the field Saturday night.

USC TROJANS

Record: 4-1, 2-1

We still don't really know what we have with USC in 2011. They were good enough to beat a couple of bad-to-mediocre AQ teams in Minnesota and Syracuse, but not impressively. They beat Utah -- with Jordan Wynn -- at home. And they lost to Arizona State on the road in fairly decisive fashion.

The good? QB Matt Barkley and WR Robert Woods are one of the nation's best pass-catch combinations. The offense, though inconsistent running the football, has been pretty good over all, in fact, other than turnovers -- see four interceptions and six fumbles.

The bad? The defense has been mediocre-to-bad, particularly against the pass. The Trojans have yielded 10 TD passes and grabbed just three interceptions. They rank ninth in the conference in pass-efficiency defense, with opponents completing 66 percent of their throws.

In the preseason, the offensive line was the chief concern. It hasn't been great but it's been decent, surrendering just four sacks -- which ranks 13th in the nation -- on 189 attempts. But the thinness as linebacker has been an issue, as much with coverage issues as with defending the running game.

So far, even while suffering through the second year of a NCAA-mandated two-year postseason ban, the Trojans have shown up and played hard. They haven't duplicated the listless performance at Oregon State last year.

Still, the tough part of the schedule is ahead: road games at California, Notre Dame and Oregon as well as a home game with Stanford. We don't know who these Trojans are yet, but we will shortly.

Offensive MVP: Receiver Robert Woods. Woods gets the nod here over quarterback Matt Barkley. Woods ranks second in the nation with 149 yards receiving per game. He's caught six TD passes and averages 13.6 yards per reception.

Defensive MVP: Linebacker Dion Bailey. The redshirt freshman leads the Trojans with 40 tackles -- 11 more than anyone else -- including two sacks, which ranks second on the team. He also has two pass breakups and a forced fumble.

Drop by on Friday and visit with the ESPNLA.com staff covering Saturday's Rivalry Game at the Rose Bowl. Questions welcomed, and answers in real time. From noon to 1:30 p.m. PT

Don't miss Mark Saxon's examination of Lane Kiffin,
and Peter Yoon's close look at Rick Neuheisel on ESPNLA.com.