Show notes
On this episode of the Peristyle Podcasts hosts Ryan Abraham and Coach Harvey Hyde are back breaking down what they saw and heard at the USC spring game Saturday in the Coliseum. Both Ryan and Coach Hyde were there taking it all in and they give their biggest takeaways from the game and how this Trojan football team improved during the last six week of spring ball.
Starting out with the environment in the Coliseum, Hyde was impressed by the 25,000+ fans that showed up. Everyone was seated on the press box side of the Coliseum and they turned the Pac-12 Network cameras to the far side of the stadium to shoot the side where the crowd was. In order to do that, they also turned around the USC logo at midfield so it was upside down for everyone in the stands.
Hyde liked how the halftime Caleb Williams Heisman Trophy presentation went, but he would have loved to have seen something about Reggie Bush getting his Heisman back with the chairman of the Heisman Trust there on the field.
Speaking of Williams, he had nothing to prove and only played three plays in the game (going 2 for 2 for 55 yards and a touchdown), but Hyde would have liked to see a little more of him just so the fans in attendance could see the star of the show.
He likes how the offensive line looked, saying they are improved and more in place than they were a year ago. The starters from left to right Michael Tarquin, Gino Quinones, Justin Dedich, Jarrett Kingston and Jonah Monheim and Hyde likes the improved depth behind those guys.
The running backs were all very impressive, but it gave the coach concern that the defense may still be bad, especially considering the offense averaged over 9 yards per carry. He thinks the offense overall will be even better than last year and he thinks the most impressive newcomer he saw on either side of the ball was former five-star receiver Zachariah Branch.
One thing missing was the spark on defense, some head hunters who just go out and make plays and hit people. It still felt to Hyde like the offense was the hammer and the defense was the nail. He feels the defense has a long way to go but overall the talent does look better.
At the end of the day, Coach Hyde wants to know if this team is better than last year and better to the point that they can stop some of the top offenses on their schedule like Oregon, Washington, UCLA, Notre Dame and Utah. That is the bar he has set for this team and specifically the defense, can you stop those great offenses you just couldn’t stop last year.
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