Clay Helton: Sam Darnold, USC not satisfied after Rose Bowl victory

Andrew L. John | Palm Springs Desert Sun

Clay Helton has coached quarterbacks at USC since 2010. Two of his former pupils, Matt Barkley and Cody Kessler, were Heisman Trophy candidates who are now playing on Sundays in the NFL.

Helton believes his quarterback this season, Sam Darnold, could be as good, or better, than both of them.

“I think as a young person right now, he has a tremendous amount of game maturity, that it reminds me of having a Matt or having a Cody Kessler. I can see Sam – he’s not a finished product – but every game he seems to get better and better, and we saw that last year.

“I think he knows his ceiling is still so high, and [he has] so much room to grow.”

Helton spoke of Darnold, who came off the bench to lead the Trojans to nine consecutive wins and a Rose Bowl victory, and what he is looking forward to in his second full season while at Indian Wells Country Club on Friday for the annual Coaches Tour.

Darnold, who’ll be a redshirt sophomore this fall, is considered by several Las Vegas sportsbooks as the Heisman favorite for 2017. As a 19-year-old freshman last season, he passed for 3,086 yards and 31 touchdowns while leading the Trojans to nine consecutive wins, including a Rose Bowl victory over Penn State on Jan. 2 to elevate USC to the No. 3 ranking in the final college football poll for the 2016 season.

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Still a teenager until June 5, Darnold is the primary reason the Trojans were ranking inside the top 5 by every major pollster in the post-spring polls. USC is expected to be one of the top-ranked teams in the college football when the pre-season polls are released later this summer.

That should help Darnold’s candidacy, and aid the Trojans in a national title quest this season.

For Darnold to become a serious contender for college football’s most prestigious individual honor, Helton says it will have to be won, in part, as a team. The Trojans will have to be title contenders for Darnold to win it, and Darnold will have to play well enough individually to put USC in a position to make its first appearance in the college football playoff, where one of the semifinal games will be played at the nearby Rose Bowl.

“There’s a lot of expectations when you’re at USC, especially when you’re a USC quarterback or head coach,” Helton said. “We came here for that. We know the bar is set high, and we know our performance has to be high.”

Helton acknowledges that the bar has been raised to some degree based on last season’s strong 10-3 finish after a 1-3 start.

“What we learned is that we’ve been a really good October-November team the past two years,” Helton said, “but we’ve learned that September and starting fast is hugely important when we have the aspirations that we do to win Pac-12 championships and national championships.”

Last season, USC had wins against Colorado, at Washington, and against Penn State, while defeating rivals UCLA and Notre Dame. Yet, due to three early losses (against Alabama, and at Stanford and Utah) the Trojans were unable to use their late surge to creep into the playoff.

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With what should be a high ranking early on, a seemingly manageable schedule, some carryover momentum from last season and what could be the best quarterback in America, Helton is not shying away from talking about what could be a national championship-caliber season.

After the Rose Bowl victory in January, Helton, not wanting his players to rest on their laurels, asked them if they were satisfied. Were they content to win 10 games and the Rose Bowl, a feat of which most other college football programs can only dream?

“I said, ‘Are any of you satisfied?’” Helton said. “Not one hand rose.”

That’ll be Helton’s message this season. He’ll ride Darnold’s arm on offense, and a pesky defense that returns seven starters, but he said it will be the drive to return USC to its past glories that will drive what the head coach hopes is not only a Heisman Trophy-winning season, but one that allows the Trojans to again be in contention for a national title.

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“We understand that to finish No. 3 in the country last year, that’s nice,” Helton said, “but to go from three to one is a giant step; it’s a hard step, and it’s going to take an even more special effort than we had last year to get that done.”

