With the amount of caviar and vintage champagne I partake of in any given weekend, I found it hard to determine the proper way to celebrate the victory over UCLA on Saturday night. I mean, after the Oregon win, I opened something special, brought it to and Oregon fan’s place and proceeded to pour it in their toilet then flush. That was representative of their “national title” hopes. So if pouring a bottle of fine bubbly from the early 90s down a toilet was the Oregon celebration, what on earth could I do after we beat UCLA 50-0? I mean, how do you go big enough to encapsulate the public execution that went down at the Coliseum?

50 to 0. I want to extrapolate the number as much as possible. There are fifty states in America. USC scored one point for every state in the Union and UCLA didn’t bother to post one for Puerto Rico.

I am struggling for comparisons. I mean, since I got into USC in 2001, we’ve beaten down teams in a thousand different ways, but I don’t really recall us beating a team down exactly like this. This was about as hard as a beating could get. We’ve won 12 of 13 years now and none of those 12 was this thorough of an ass-kicking. I swear this was so embarrassing I was mostly just laughing during the game and at a certain point I had that Braveheart moment where I just hoped we would cut their heads off and end the torture.

Rick Neuhiesel’s “gap” comment, about how he felt in his 4 years UCLA had competitively grown closer to USC, kept getting more and more cryptic. I kept trying to figure out what gap he meant. I know he didn’t mean football because this was the worst UCLA bear slaughter since the second year of the “rivalry”, at which point movies were black and white, we hadn’t fought WWII, people were stoked alcohol was legal again and all the dead people in the baseball hall of fame were still playing.

So basically, no one you know or anyone they know ever saw UCLA get it’s ass handed to it as badly as it did the other night. Frankly, we kept trying to hand them their ass and they kept giving it back to us and seemingly begging us to hand it back to them, like some sort of golden retriever with a learning disability.

So what was this gap? Was it the gap between Coach Rick’s facial features and his hairline? Rick, wearing your headset like an 80s headband doesn’t fool anyone. Shave your head, be a man. The only thing that fooled us less was your “pistol” offense, which I am pretty sure was the culmination of a 3rd grader’s homemade dinosaur drawing and something you scribbled on a bar napkin when you were drinking to the point you came up with that whole “close the gap” quote.

Maybe the gap Rick meant was between him and the unemployment line? UCLA is so pathetic at this point their entire fan base is actually enjoying this part of the post because they want Rick gone more than anyone. And they got their wish. We beat down UCLA so damn hard that they fired their head coach before the Pac 12 Championship game. Holy shit, UCLA.

I mean, we knew Rick was gone, but you clowns made it out like you’d evaluate it after the championship, allowing Rick to say even MORE ridiculous “move the needle” and “passion bucket” quotes before ultimately succumbing to pressure from Bruins everywhere to fire him. Even better, we beat UCLA so hard they actually cared about football enough to outcry against their coach.

Damn. That’s an ass kicking.

The reality is, and I know this is pretty damn arrogant, but UCLA is dead. It’s over. Anything new that comes from Westwood would essentially be a new team. The rivalry is over. Maybe it is just on hold, and frankly that’s what I want to believe, but I am almost starting to feel bad for them.

It’s not about a new head coach or AD. It’s a general mindset thing. We’re Darth Vader, they are Luke Skywalker (both characters created by a Trojan, btw). This has always worked. Darth Vader killed way more dudes, sold way more lunchboxes and Luke kept it interesting because he had a puncher’s chance to win here and there. He also made out with his sister (total Bruin).

Except UCLA has given up. Dan Guerrero let Neuheisel writhe on the stake for a couple days, letting him continue to explain how in his balding head UCLA is still on the right path before firing him before a title game.

Pathetic. If you want to read the definition of everything you don’t want your team, your fanbase and student body to be, check out Bruins Nation and all the whining going on there. I admire that after 50-0 they have figured out they are a garbage sandwich, just not sure they even understand how bad it is.

That said, the comments section of every article about the game is a dream come true for Trojans. It’s a bunch of Bruin “fans” pretending we “cheated” (since they don’t actually know what our sanctions were for) and whining and calling for everyone at Morgan Hall’s head. It’s amazing. It’s the scene in a movie you never get to see. In the movies, you see the hero leave the exploding building. This is like getting to watch the clean up crew going through the dead bear meat and complaining about their 401Ks. It’s watching the “I’ll see you next time” villain when he gets home, sits on the couch for a microwave meal in his sweatpants watching porn and crying. That’s what these comment threads are like.

I give it two arrogant thumbs up.

I guess I ask this question. If UCLA was “sanctioned” like we were (although I doubt they’ve had a player in years that a shady agent would even attempt to pay), do you think they’d have been on the sidelines dancing like they didn’t give a shit kicking our ass?

No. But we were and we did. 10 wins capped with the worst ass kicking of UCLA we may ever see. Oh, man. UCLA…

They come prancing out in white uniforms and get absolutely dismantled on television. USC scored whenever it wanted to, however it wanted to. Wearing white to that game was like wearing white to an Italian restaurant without silverware. They were just easels for blood, grass stains and Cardinal that came off our helmets.

My pregame prediction was wildly arrogant, even by my standards, but it was the most accurate ever. We scored as much as we wanted to and we let them score as much as we wanted to.

There was actually nothing positive to be said about UCLA’s performance other than that eventually it stopped and they got to go home.

Robert Woods went for 100+ and he has needed surgery for over two months. Marqise Lee got more tired from scoring touchdowns than from evading defenders. Matt Barkley threw six touchdowns. Curtis McNeal ran wherever he wanted to. Hell, Kyle Negrete (the best thing to happen to our punting game since Tom the Bomb Malone) even punted the ball like a monster.

Let’s just say it. UCLA played like a high school team. They are a high school team. They spent the week talking about closing the gap, about feeling good and playing good in new uniforms and about the “chance to compete for a Pac 12 title”. Then they come on the field, take a bottle of pills and let a sellout crowd watch them choke to death on their own vomit.

Could anything be more self-deprecating and pride-swallowing than applying for a 6-7 record bowl exemption prior to playing USC or Oregon? Loser mentality. Just brutally embarrassing. Make it stop!

I was embarrassed to be a Trojan on Saturday for a few minutes because we are apparently “rivals” with UCLA. I want to think about our rivalry like this:

Except it always seems to look like this:

Before I continue, I want to extend an olive branch to UCLA fans. I am rooting for Dan Guerrero to fire himself. I am rooting for the madness to end. It’s not about you. WE deserve better than this.

That said, you fucked with tradition and wore white, a shade Coach Lane Fucking Kiffin has claimed his own, and the football gods punished you. Honestly, I think the Pac 12 Championship is must-see TV. What on EARTH will that be like?

Let’s now get to that.

Are you happy, Larry Scott? Ticket prices for your CHAMPIONSHIP are the lowest of any conference, averaging around 22 dollars, which costs less than the drink I just ordered. You have two teams playing that never held a lead against USC this season. But seriously, we’re dying to see who the champ is…

You could have stood up for your money maker and let USC play if they had won, but you didn’t. And that’s fine, you are the asshole left standing with a conference championship that will be about as watched as a rerun of Next Iron Chef. Honestly though, that is your problem. You won’t put an asterisk on that game. You won’t do anything because you aren’t good at your job.

The problem is that you and your cronies felt the need to put out a statement that USC could “claim in finished first, but not call itself Pac 12 South Champions”. For a guy who apparently thought USC was treated unfairly by the NCAA, you sure learned how to act just like them.

The only bylaw in the Pac 12 rules that covers this (not that you couldn’t change it) is this:

“Eligibility for Conference Championships. An institution prohibited from competing in post-season competition by the NCAA or the Conference shall not be eligible for the Conference Championship in the cited sport(s), but its games against Conference opponents shall count in the Conference standings. Such an institution also may not compete in a Conference event that determines the Conference’s automatic qualifier for the NCAA Championship in that sport. (12/81, 6/03)”

It doesn’t say anything about claiming the title of Champion, something I am pretty sure no one else in the south would try doing, and certainly not the 50-0 spanked, 6-6 Bruin cheerleading squad you prefer in the “title game”.

Honestly, Larry. You did the impossible. Pat Haden has been dignified and quiet through the sanctions that now seem like bullshit, through your flip-flopping from thinking they are unfair to treating us just as badly as the NCAA, to fining our coach and providing no answers to penalties even ESPN couldn’t figure out. He’s been the picture of compliance.

But when you and your idiot staff issued the edict that USC could claim it finished “first” but not claim it was “champion”, Pat Haden went out and had t-shirts made:

Pat Haden told you to fuck off, Larry and now I am DYING to see your next move. Guess what? We did claim we were the South Champs. You don’t need to worry about us hanging a banner (it’s not an achievement we’d brag about) because we’ve had to take down more Heisman banners than most schools in the Pac 12 have ever won, but you should realize that we just told you to eat a fat one. What are you going to do? You can’t be half pregnant, Larry. We just called you out on your BS. Actually, Pat Haden, a man so compliant he reported a player taking a golf cart ride across campus from another student called you out.

And on top of that, you are bald! Rough week, Larry. We look forward to the overnight ratings on your Oregon/UCLA debut of the “championship”. I’ll tune in before I go out and do something else.

The thing is, this isn’t just about us. I mean that. We’re all pretty stoked on our 10-2 season that no one thought we could do. We’re all pretty stoked about the fact Barkley or not, we’re going to be good next season and for years to come. We’re stoked that we’ve been redshirting players like crazy to counteract the 3 years of schollie reductions. This isn’t just about us…

Larry, you failed the fans, you failed Oregon (who doesn’t get a redemption shot at a team that they never held a lead against) and you failed the most basic test a commissioner needs to pass 9 of 10 times. You need to do what is right for the players, your student-athletes. No one wants this game. Not Oregon. Not UCLA. Not us.

You think the country would like to see Oregon and USC suit up again?

Just tell me, Larry. What does UCLA learn from the beating they will take on Friday (great day to schedule a game, asshole)? What will Oregon learn from playing a 6-6 team who after they lose won’t be bowl eligible. It’s insane.

It’s all about your hope of getting 2 teams on the BCS payroll, and I get that, but why don’t you just say it instead of being a bald, coward and sweeping it under the rug. The way you earn national respect isn’t by scheduling games at weird times, adding crappy teams to the conference, signing TV deals that prove nothing but your ability to hit a 6 inch putt or ignoring requests for explanations on calls the whole media universe knew deserved explanations.

You do it by letting the players compete. You’ve become the NCAA. No need to explain how being “first” is different than “champion” (look up the definition of champion, Larry). No need to explain mistakes. No need to do what’s best for the conference and the players. Just a need to do whatever makes it seem like you are in control.

You aren’t. I call for USC secession. What is the point of being in a conference where your commissioner doesn’t have your back? Why let us play at all if you are going to make us pretend we didn’t win our division? The answer is that you don’t know and that’s why you can’t explain it.

The only things more pathetic than how the Pac 12 has handled USC are UCLA’s performance on Saturday and the Championship Game on Friday that will be so lopsided, so uninteresting and so inexplicable that it will only further the negative perceptions that the Pac 12 can’t compete nationally. I am sure SEC fans will truly be impressed with Oregon defecating all over UCLA after losing to LSU without some of the Tigers key starters.

Building that brand, Larry!

You are disgracing USC, but perhaps in this situation more importantly, you are disgracing UCLA and Oregon, who are playing for a fake title and they know it. It was not the NCAA who said we couldn’t play in this game. It was you, Larry. You made the rules for a title game last year when we decided to have a title. You hoped it would work out differently, but it didn’t.

In the end, you reap what you sow. Just hoping you teach your kids what you won’t teach your student athletes. I’m hoping you teach them about competition and mercy and humility. I feel sorry for UCLA being lead to the abattoir. I feel sorry for Oregon not getting the chance to compete against USC. I feel sorry for USC for having do deal with pedantic explanations from a conference that clearly is becoming the NCAA’s lap dog.

Mostly, I feel sorry for the fans who have to watch this game.

Enough of that. I need a pick-me-up. Hey, remember that time we beat UCLA 50 to 0? That was crazy. Remember how we went for two and then on fourth down we ran the same play for a TD? That was hilarious.

Anyway.

A little love from the Bearfighter. Thank you to everyone who tuned in this season. I have one more post for sure, my note to Matt Barkley and my reasons he should stay. That said, he knows I support him either way (I texted him that the other day). He’s our guy whether it’s in the pros or winning it all next year (all I care about are Rose Bowls).

I met a lot more of you that I had the year before. I will be back for another year.

At 10-2, winning the South and Matt in the Heisman conversation, we pretty much achieved most of what we set out to do.

USC is on the upswing. We’re hot sauce again and we pretty much were the whole time. We never lost the lead against both teams in the “championship” and for those of you worried about Matt leaving, remember this.

After Palmer left, we got Leinart. The greatest gift Matt and Kiff and Woods and Lee and Bailey and Robey and McDonald and Co gave USC is that they made us a program again, not a probation.

It’s going to be sunny skies. The bearfighter told you it would be from day one.

FTFO. We’re almost done.