A Pac-12 title race, the Big Ten move and the latest in the USC-UCLA rivalry
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Paolo UggettiESPN
SHANE LEE WAS CONFUSED. The USC linebacker walked out of Monday morning meetings this week and saw the Trojan statue near the center of campus covered in shimmering silver tape pulled taut. Lee, who transferred to USC this offseason from Alabama had to turn to backup quarterback Miller Moss for clarification.
“I thought UCLA did it or something,” Lee said. “They told me it’s just for protection.”
Lee knows about Auburn‘s Toomer’s Corner, the Iron Bowl and what SEC disdain for another team looks like. But the mild-mannered linebacker is new to the Pac-12’s marquee rivalry. He’s not the only one. With a brand new head coach in Lincoln Riley, a new coaching staff and more than 40 transfer players, the usual disdain between the two teams has felt tempered this week.
“We’re not doing anything honestly too specific with this rivalry and not to discount it in any way,” Riley said. “We’ve acknowledged that it is a rivalry game. There’s a lot of history behind it. It’s going to be a great game to play in. But past that, I think we’re really zeroed in on what we believe is going to help us play well, and that’s where our focus is going to be.”
USC’s approach to the game has been largely matter of fact. To hear players — mainstays who have been there for five seasons to those who are brand new — talk about it, there is excitement, but nothing close to determined disdain for UCLA.
West of downtown Los Angeles, there was at least one player who wasn’t shying away from providing any bulletin board material. Over five years in Westwood, Dorian Thompson-Robinson‘s filter has only dissipated as his confidence has risen. When it comes to USC, he’s long past the point of holding back.
“Obviously we hate those guys across town,” Thompson-Robinson said on Monday. “There’s definitely a bitter feeling toward those guys.”
Institutional antagonism has found its way deep into Thompson-Robinson’s vocabulary because, unlike most USC players, he’s revved up for this game five times and, after Saturday, played in it four times. But if getting into a war of words was the goal, USC players did not engage.
“Even all the guys that’ve been here and the new guys that came in, we are all treating it pretty much the same,” Lee said. “It’s just another game, a game that’s on our list that we have to go out there and take care of business.”
That perspective underlines what a unique year this is for the rivalry. For the first time since Pete Carroll left for the NFL, USC is being led by a coach with no roots to the program and a roster full of players who have come to spend one season, maybe two, at the school. It’s not just the Trojans.
“I don’t think anybody — the fan bases might have something to say about this — but I don’t think anyone on the team really hates anybody on the other team,” said UCLA wide receiver Jake Bobo, who transferred from Duke. “So at the end of the day, it’s just a big game, we need a win right now, they obviously need a win as well, so I’m excited.”
Stakes — not animosity — might be what give this sold-out game at the Rose Bowl the biggest boost. Even after Arizona beat UCLA last week, preventing the game from likely being the first top-10 matchup between the teams since 1988, there’s plenty to play for. Both programs need a win to keep their seasons alive. In the case of the Bruins, a win still gives them a shot at making the Pac-12 title game and their first Rose Bowl since 1999. A loss eliminates them. For the Trojans, a win would punch their ticket to that title game and keep their playoff hopes alive as a one-loss team.
This season, the rivalry and the regional bragging rights seem second to the fact that there are bigger things to look to, in the present and the near future, especially as both teams get closer to their eventual, controversial departure to the Big Ten in 2024.
“When both teams are good and there are a lot of opportunities ahead for both teams,” Riley said this week of rivalry games, “it makes it way, way better.”
JUST A FEW years ago, in the days of Steve Sarkisian and Clay Helton, there was a USC player or two who would keep an eye on the sidelines of the Trojans’ practices at Howard Jones Field in search of any shade of blue during UCLA week. Media, staffers and any others who were in attendance were called out for wearing the color of the team across town, even if sometimes, it wasn’t quite the shade of the team across town. It didn’t matter. The blue was not to be seen.
The Riley regime has been different in many ways, and this week featured none of that. While the sidelines of that same practice field featured USC players being asked plenty of questions about their feelings toward the game, and the Bruins at large, the message they voiced rang like that of a choir who had all perfectly hit the same note.
“I haven’t learned much about the rivalry to be honest,” said quarterback Caleb Williams. “It’s just another game to me.”
“It’s just any other game really,” said running back Austin Jones. “At the end of the day we got to go out there and play our brand of ball.”
“We’re just taking it week by week, trying to be the most successful team we can be,” senior offensive lineman Andrew Vorhees said when asked if, having had experience with the rivalry, he has tried to amp up the energy in practice this week. “I mean, we heard the Rose Bowl is sold out so, we’ll see what that’s like.”
“You gotta make sure that winning football is winning football regardless of what the logos on our helmets are,” defensive coordinator Alex Grinch said.
Grinch had to even catch himself when complimenting Chip Kelly, with whom he worked at New Hampshire as a cornerbacks coach when Kelly was the head coach.
“I got a lot of respect for Chip,” Grinch said. “I call him a friend and I’ve been a fan for — I can’t be a fan anymore, it’s the way it goes — but I am, I have been for a long time.”
In recent years, the game has been less about two great teams facing off and more about the built-in hostility between the programs. Last year, Thompson-Robinson ran roughshod over a USC team that was in shambles and went 4-8. This week, he said he wanted to score 60 points on the Trojans, who he recalled “cussing us out and flipping us off” in the 2020 version of the game at the Rose Bowl.
“As disrespectful as you can get,” Thompson-Robinson said. “So we’ve got to go out there on Saturday and do the best we can to win this game, so we know what’s at stake and we know what it means to our fans and this community, we’ve got to go out there and win this game.”
In some ways, Thompson-Robinson is a dying breed. Not only is his case unique — usually, players face their rivals for only four seasons and he was awarded an extra year of eligibility because of the COVID-19 pandemic — but with the advent of the transfer portal and USC and UCLA’s looming exodus to the Big Ten, this rivalry is about to, at the very least, evolve, if not have fewer and fewer players and figures who feel the need to lean into the matchup. As long as talent enters the portal, transfers will keep making their way to Southern California, and in a new conference, bigger games against the Ohio States and Michigans of the world might become more important in the race to what is likely an expanded playoff.
The irony of an outgoing Thompson-Robinson expressing his hatred for USC is that the two programs find themselves closer than ever thanks to not just the rankings, but that contentious, impending defection from the conference they sit at the top of this season. Just as Riley seems to have USC heading back to the top of the sport and Kelly is finding his stride in Westwood, the two teams not only seem to be playing their best ball in some time, they’re also finding themselves united in an ongoing evolution to upend the sport.
FROM PARKING LOT tailgates in Eugene where fans curse the USC and UCLA names when discussing the move to the Big Ten (only to wonder in the next breath if they’re next), to new commissioner George Kliavkoff understandably maligning the departure at every turn as he tries to secure a new media rights deal and replace the two outgoing schools, the spectrum of emotions that have been born out of the L.A. schools’ move East has made this season in the Pac-12 a fascinating one. The fuel to that fire is that, from a football standpoint, it has been a stellar year for the conference and a stellar season for its two departing members. Case in point: Six Pac-12 teams are ranked in the latest version of the College Football Playoff poll, the most of any conference.
In many ways, this season from USC and UCLA is exactly what the conference has been missing the past few years and part of the reason it has failed to compete with the SEC, Big Ten and even the Big 12. In other ways, this season from the Bruins and Trojans could be seen as proof that their transition to the Big Ten is forward thinking and necessary (see: the 10:30 p.m. ET kickoffs and the three required appearances on Pac-12 Network). Or in the case of the Bruins, financially essential. Pac-12 After Dark is fun and all, but so is playing in prime time and a $7 billion media deal.
The kicker is that this move is not quite a done deal. While both USC and UCLA have routinely refused to talk about an exodus that’s still two years away, the University of California Board of Regents has been put in a position to decide the fate of UCLA, which, unlike USC, is a public institution that’s part of the UC system. At first, UCLA appeared to have made the move without any issues and unspoken approval from the regents. But as more discussion was brought forth about how the move could damage UCLA’s sister school, Cal, the board of regents has reaffirmed its power to hold UCLA back if it so chooses.
On Thursday, the regents could have voted on the move, but instead they announced a Dec. 14 session would be held to either approve or rescind the decision on UCLA’s Big Ten membership. In other words, there is still a world in which the regents decide to outright block the Bruins’ move and the USC-UCLA rivalry is, at the very least, paused, if not permanently put on hold after next season.
Even if the UCLA-USC rivalry does not go away, it is certainly evolving. And that, at least, serves to make Saturday’s game feel more like the one Thompson-Robinson is hyping up than the one USC players are trying to downplay as just another game.
Yet for all the rather tepid energy surrounding this game from a rivalry standpoint, coaches and players acknowledged that once Saturday comes, the emotions will be high and USC will care about beating UCLA in the same way UCLA will care about beating USC.
“A lot of emotion and intensity and excitement in these games and that’s what makes them fun, right?,” Riley said. “Sometimes in the heat of the battle you have to really balance it, but you also have to have the intensity, too. You can’t do it without that.”
As part of the regents’ agenda update this week, a report and survey of athletes commissioned by UCLA and the UC Office of the President was included that shed some light on one thing. Athletes at UCLA were asked what they thought the benefits were to making the move to the Big Ten. Of the 20% of athletes who participated, only 28% mentioned maintaining rivalry with USC as one of the benefits. And yet, as the report points out, prompted by a separate question 93% of respondents said it was important or very important to have USC and UCLA in the same conference, while only 24% said it was important for Cal and UCLA in the same conference.
Even if this year’s game carries high stakes but low hostility, it seems at least some athletes still care about being in the same conference as their main rival. And if the past two years of realignment in college football have taught us anything, it’s that keeping your friends close but your enemies closer seems to pay off.
The 2024 NFL draft brought record-breaking trends, including six quarterbacks picked in Round 1 for the first time since 1983 and eight offensive tackles taken in Round 1, which ties 2008 for the most ever. Now that more than a week has passed since the draft concluded, our NFL experts have had time to assess the class.
We asked our analysts and insiders to answer some of the draft’s biggest questions. We’ll begin with their favorite picks and the biggest head-scratching selections — some of which don’t involve quarterback Michael Penix Jr. going to the Atlanta Falcons in the top 10. We’ll continue to update this story with a new topic every day this week, including rookie classes our analysts believe will make the biggest impacts, Rookie of the Year picks, fantasy sleepers and bold predictions.
Who were the best picks in this class? Which were the most puzzling? Our experts dive in on the top takeaways:
Jump to a question:
Favorite picks | Biggest head-scratchers
Who was your favorite pick in the entire draft?
Stephania Bell, fantasy football analyst: Cornerback Quinyon Mitchell to the Philadelphia Eagles at No. 22. When a team fills a need with a standout prospect without breaking the bank to do it, it’s a winner. Mitchell is fast and agile and allowed no touchdowns in over 400 coverage snaps last season. He rose on many draft boards in recent months … and yet, the Eagles were able to surprise the competition by snagging him here.
Matt Bowen, NFL analyst: Cornerback Mike Sainristil to the Washington Commanders at No. 50. A nickel corner with a playmaking mentality, Sainristil was one of my favorite defensive backs to study. He led Michigan’s defense last season with six interceptions and seven pass breakups. Look for him to play a disruptive role as a rookie in Dan Quinn’s defensive system.
Mike Clay, fantasy football analyst: Wide receiver Ladd McConkey to the Los Angeles Chargers at No. 34. The Chargers moved on from Keenan Allen, Mike Williams, Austin Ekeler and Gerald Everett during the offseason, a foursome responsible for 55% of the team’s targets over the past two seasons. Enter McConkey, who is an excellent fit as a potential Allen replacement in the short-to-intermediate area for quarterback Justin Herbert. Even in a run-heavy offense, McConkey, who came out of Georgia, has a path to massive volume right out of the gate.
Jeremy Fowler, national NFL writer: Wide receiver Malik Nabers to the New York Giants at No. 6. For all the hand-wringing about the Giants’ quarterback outlook, the truth is New York quarterbacks haven’t had a true top-10 receiver since Odell Beckham Jr. Nabers might have the highest ceiling of any offensive player in the draft. Several teams in the top 15 coveted him. Give quarterback Daniel Jones a chance with a guy of this caliber, and see what happens.
Matt Miller, NFL draft analyst: Wide receiver Rome Odunze to the Chicago Bears at No. 9. Let’s give the Bears credit for not overthinking and simply drafting great players. With a rookie quarterback added in Caleb Williams, selecting a go-to receiver for him to learn and grow with was brilliant. It also helps that the two trained together, building chemistry in the pre-draft process. Odunze was my No. 3 overall prospect, which means Chicago drafted two of my top three players in this class.
Eric Moody, fantasy and sports betting analyst: Offensive lineman Graham Barton to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at No. 26. As an ex-offensive lineman, it was a pleasure breaking down Barton’s film. He’s consistent and showcases maximum effort on every play without mental errors. Barton can play center, guard or tackle as a rookie, and I believe he’ll have a superior career to some of the names drafted ahead of him.
Jason Reid, senior Andscape writer: Quarterback Michael Penix Jr. to the Atlanta Falcons at No. 8. I understand everything about the Falcons’ commitment to quarterback Kirk Cousins, the salary cap implications and the potential for strife within the locker room. But if the Falcons are right about Penix, none of that will matter in the long run. If a team believes it has identified a potential transformational player at the most important position in sports, well, it has to go get him. It’s that simple.
Jordan Reid, NFL draft analyst: Edge rusher Dallas Turner to the Minnesota Vikings at No. 17. Minnesota hasn’t drafted an edge rusher in the first two rounds since 2005 (Erasmus James). The team needed to replenish its talent off of the edge after losing Danielle Hunter in free agency. While the team signed Jonathan Greenard and Andrew Van Ginkel during free agency, Turner provides a high upside as a pass-rusher in Brian Flores’ defense. Turner led Alabama with 10 sacks and 45 pressures last season.
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Fantasy projections for the 2024 rookie NFL pass catchers
Check out Mike Clay’s fantasy projections for Marvin Harrison Jr., Malik Nabers, Rome Odunze, Brock Bowers and Brian Thomas Jr.
Aaron Schatz, NFL writer: Wide receiver Adonai Mitchell to the Indianapolis Colts at No. 52. Analytics suggest there is no such thing as a “draft steal” because prospects drop from consensus for good reasons. That being said, Mitchell might have dropped due to off-field concerns, and Colts GM Chris Ballard spoke out against that. This was the No. 5 wide receiver in Playmaker Score but the No. 11 receiver off the board.
Mike Tannenbaum, NFL front office insider: Odunze. He has a legitimate chance to be the best receiver from this draft. Under the motto of “win for today and develop for tomorrow,” the Bears have Allen on a one-year deal, and Odunze has Terrell Owens‘ type of ability. Odunze had 1,640 receiving yards and 13 scores in 2023. This is ideal for Chicago.
Seth Walder, sports analytics writer: Defensive end Laiatu Latu to the Colts at No. 15. Because of medical concerns and the run on offense, the Colts managed to take the edge rusher who led FBS football in pressure rate in each of the past two seasons — yes, ahead of Will Anderson Jr. and Tyree Wilson in 2022 — at No. 15. The Colts might have landed a great one at a premium position in the middle of the first round.
Field Yates, NFL analyst: Odunze. The wideout falling to No. 9 was not a complete surprise, given the anticipated run on quarterbacks early, but it was also not a sure thing. The sixth-highest-rated player on my board could have been the first receiver taken in so many prior drafts, but the presence of Marvin Harrison Jr. and Nabers (the third- and fourth-rated players on my board) made him the third off the board in this class. But don’t be mistaken — Odunze will be an instant impact contributor as one the most polished prospects in the class.
Who was the biggest head-scratching pick of the draft?
Bell: Quarterback Michael Penix Jr. to the Atlanta Falcons at No. 8. It is hard to justify spending this first-round draft capital when the Falcons had declared their nine-figure love for Kirk Cousins weeks earlier. The team did fulfill defensive needs — its most glaring hole entering the draft — in later rounds, but will the strategy of having two QBs capable of starting create less tension in the locker room … or more?
Bowen: Penix. The Falcons built depth behind Cousins with this selection and set up their QB room for the future. However, I saw this as an opportunity for the Falcons to add an impactful defensive player to new coach Raheem Morris’ system, with outside linebacker Dallas Turner and defensive tackle Byron Murphy II still on the board at the time of Atlanta’s pick.
Fowler: Wide receiver Ricky Pearsall to the San Francisco 49ers at No. 31. I’m not about to doubt coach Kyle Shanahan’s eye for offensive skill players, and I love Pearsall as a player. But his place as WR6 in this draft was unexpected. Most teams I spoke to pegged him as a Day 2 pick. Considering the 49ers still have Deebo Samuel and Brandon Aiyuk on the roster, bolstering the offensive or defensive line seemed like a sensible play.
Liz Loza, fantasy and sports betting analyst: Tight end Brock Bowers to the Las Vegas Raiders at No. 13. I was stupefied by the Raiders’ selection of Bowers, and it’s not because of his talent level. He’s a potential generational talent with a do-it-all skill set who was expected to come off the board before the first half of the first round. However, Las Vegas spent an early second-round pick on Michael Mayer just a year ago and entered the draft with holes all along the offensive line. In the end, I suppose, the value Bowers presented was too great to pass on.
Moody: Quarterback Bo Nix to the Denver Broncos at No. 12. While he posted prolific numbers at Oregon during his final collegiate season, it’s worth noting that nearly 67% of his passes came within 9 yards of the line of scrimmage. Nix’s selection appears to reflect desperation on the part of a Sean Payton-led Broncos team in need of a quarterback upgrade. I felt like Denver could have traded down and still landed Nix.
Jason Reid: Offensive tackle Tyler Guyton to the Dallas Cowboys at No. 29. Look, I get that the Cowboys had a major need along their offensive line. And the fact that they moved to rebuild it in this draft makes sense. That established, Guyton, while possessing impressive physical tools, is a developmental player. There’s no sugarcoating that.
Jordan Reid: Defensive tackle Ruke Orhorhoro to the Falcons at No. 35. With Jer’Zhan Newton still on the board, it made more sense to take him there. Newton possesses more upside as a rusher and is an ideal interior defender who pairs perfectly with Grady Jarrett. Orhorhoro is unquestionably the better run-defender, but Newton’s combination of explosiveness and disruption would’ve made him the better pick.
Schatz: Penix. Look, I understand the importance of the quarterback position, leading to six quarterbacks chosen in this year’s top 12. You can talk me into the idea that Penix is a better prospect than J.J. McCarthy despite McCarthy doing better in my QBASE projections. But if all goes well, Penix is not going to take a snap in the NFL regular season until he’s 26 years old. The Penix pick isn’t that head-scratching; it’s the Penix pick in conjunction with the Cousins contract.
Walder: Defensive tackle Braden Fiske to the Los Angeles Rams at No. 39. This has little to do with the player and more to do with the circumstances of the pick. The Rams paid an obscene price to move up from No. 52, sacrificing a fifth-round pick and future second-rounder in the process — the most expensive Day 2 overpay in at least the past six drafts and a larger investment than their first-round pick (Jared Verse at No. 19), according to our draft pick valuations. And all this for a player who was at the beginning of his selection range, according to the Draft Day Predictor (in other words, this was a borderline reach).
Yates: Penix. I had a top-of-the-second-round grade on Penix, but quarterbacks always fly off the board earlier than the overall ranks indicate. This is about Atlanta investing in a player who will turn 24 on Wednesday at a position in which only one player will play after paying Cousins $100 million guaranteed in March. One of the great advantages of a quarterback on a rookie contract is the modest cost of his contract, which affords you the ability to spend elsewhere across the roster. The Falcons are not realizing that advantage with Cousins under contract and making $90 million over the first two seasons of Penix’s deal.
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