You can't do the same thing over and over again against an offense as potent as USC's. If Texas constantly blitzes, USC will use screens, dump offs to the fullback, quick slants to their ultra talented receivers, etc... They will find a way to beat an aggressive defense. They just have too many weapons.

The key is going to be how well Chizik varries things up. He needs to force Leinart to think before every play. Texas has to be unpredictable and confuse Leinart. It's the best way to beat a great quarterback and a great offense. Need proof? Look at how the Patriots handled Manning the last few years. They threw him off his game by throwing a million different looks at him.

The Horns only chance is to keep Leinart and USC guessing. If they don't, it's going to be a long day.

From what I saw, games where we had trouble offensively were games where they shut down the run.  Leinart is solid, but he hasn't been on fire this season like he was last season.  Look at ASU or Oregon, and you'll see that when SC had to rely solely on the pass, we weren't doing well.  Once the run game broke loose however, all bets were off.

The danger with blitzing leinart is that, despite popular belief, those ballroom dancing classes have REALLY helped.  Many near sacks he's spun out of, and he's been scrambling for the first down really effectively.  Dodging that first tackle gives him an extra 2 seconds to throw, and even if its just a screen pass to Bush or White, thats dangerous, and unless your secondary has them WELL covered, they're gone for at least a first down.

If I were to gameplan against our offense, I'd probably run a zone pass coverage while showing blitz.  Occasionally run one to keep the O off guard, but you can't do it the entire time.  Lane Kiffin isn't Norm Chow, but you've seen the games, he can game plan when what is currently going on isn't working.

UT's best shot is to run a blitz heavy offense early in the game to try and get Leinart off his rhythm, and then to relax into a more pass coverage focused D if/when Leinart starts making mistakes.

One major issue is that Leinart tends to need to get into rhythm.  Bush is ALWAYS dangerous, whether its his first touch or his tenth.  USC hasn't seen a defense like UT, but UT sure as hell hasn't seen an offense like USC.  I think that USC has the edge in this category, although it depends largely upon how well our O-line holds.

My 2 cents.

Well, here we go, gentlemen.  USC vs. Texas.  In the Grandaddy of them All.  We couldn't ask for much more, right?  The question is, how will this game go?  First, let's start with some perceptions and truths:

Perception: USC plays in a soft conference and hasn't seen a physical Midwestern team before.  
Truth: Actually, they've seen them the last 3 years.  Before each of the following games, we were all told that USC would be manhandled at the line of scrimmage:
*    USC vs. Iowa, 2003 - USC controls the line of scrimmage, overcoming an early kickoff return for a TD to win, 38-17.
*    USC vs. Michigan, 2004 - Iowa was an aberration, they were saying.  Michigan has a huge offensive line and had only allowed 12 sacks during the regular season.  The Trojans sacked John Navarre 9 times, controlling the line of scrimmage in a 28-14 win that wasn't as close as the score indicated.
*    USC vs. Oklahoma, 2005 - OK, this was REALLY supposed to be different.  This was the "greatest college football team of all time" and the "best offensive line in the game", anchored by All America (and dirty player) Jamaal Brown.  The Trojans stuffed Adrian Peterson all game, controlling the line of scrimmage in a 55-19 beat-down.  

See a pattern here?  The point is, teams continue to be overconfident in their misperception that USC is soft, and they continue to be punched in the mouth by the Trojans.  Will this year be different?  We'll see.  USC lost four All-Americas in the front seven on defense from last year, so they're definitely not as good up front.  It depends on...

Perception: USC will succumb to a physical running team that can eat up the clock.  
Truth: USC has a pretty solid defensive line and can play the run (top 5 in the nation the last few years).  It's BALANCE that works against USC.  Vince can pass, but is he going to be able to pass better than the other high-powered attacks USC has seen?  We'll see.  Texas might make the same mistake that USC bowl opponents always make: they may get too cocky and think they can run their basic power game plan against the Trojans, and rely on personnel to do the job.  Mack was smart this season to just give the ball the VY and get out of the way.  That probably won't work anymore.  Now, he must coach.  

Perception: This year is different.  We are the team that REALLY has the athletes to stay with USC on defense.  
Truth: Uh-huh.  USC is just HOPING that Texas will think that their corners are good enough to play straight up man coverage and not mix up their looks.  You've heard it before: these Midwest teams have never seen speed like USC's.  And that is the truth.  But they THINK they have, so they play tight man coverage and get torched.  Will that be the case with Texas?  I don't think so.  I think Gene Chizik will be smarter than that.  He'll know that the way to play USC is not man coverage. By the way, to respond to an earlier post about blitzing Leinart - you better have the right coverage on that blitz, because you're not going to rattle a Heisman Tropy-winning, 5th year senior with plain blitzes).  You want to make USC work for their points, which is better than getting 70 dropped on you.  

Perception: Big Midwest teams will eventually wear down the USC defense in the second half.  
Truth: USC is a second half team.  They get BETTER as the game goes on, due to excellent halftime adjustments and the superb conditioning to execute them.  If you want to beat USC, you'd better get out to an early lead because the second half adjustments are coming, and they've worked about 98% of the time (this year's Notre Dame game is a notable exception).  If the Trojans take the lead into halftime, you're done.  

Believe it or not, this post is not claiming a USC victory (my prediction will come later).  I'm just bringing up some common misperceptions that have killed USC bowl opponents the last three years.  They may not come to fruition this year, but they're interesting to note.

If Chizik game plans to ultimately shut down Bush, Leinart will have a field day. Look for the emergence of Dominique Byrd, one of the best tight ends in the country (overshadowed this year) to find the open slots and keep the chains moving for USC. I still think Texas needs to execute many stunts and delayed blitzes to confuse leinart and get past that O-line. USc's O-line is big and physical, and have created the gaps for both Bush and White to each rush for 1000 yards this season. Texas secondary will probably be playing alot of cover 2 to prevent the big play and help in run support. I am interested to see if Texas can stop USC's ridiculous 3rd down conversion percentage....I wonder if Chizik will press the receivers. More importantly for TExas, if they turn the ball over, thats bad news. All it took was one turnover last year against OU and the floodgates were opened. I know last year means nothing compared to this year, but USC is not Oklahoma State and as evident by everyone's opinion on USC kicking onside kicks and going for it on 4th down when they were 40 up on UCLA
, look for Carrol to show no mercy.

The 'Horns have been on cruise control since that "big" win at Ohio State.  The so-called "great" Texas hasn't faced a balanced, well-rounded offense all season. The Buckeyes have a conservative offense and were going through a QB controversy at the time.  Oklahoma was pretty much without Adrian Peterson, and have a non-existant QB. Texas Tech is the most unbalanced offense in the country, with their 5 running plays per game average. Texas A&M was sans Reggie McNeal, and still moved the ball effectively behind a Freshman QB making his first ever start. All of the other opponents on the schedule Louisiana Lafayette, Rice, Baylor, Kansas, these guys aren't exactly the Indianapolis Colts.  So with that being said, I realize USC's defense also has some question marks, but Texas does not have the dominating defense that people think they do.

It's funny that the only teams you listed above that aren't the Colts have losing records and 1/2 of them are conference games.  What about Stanford, Arizona, Hawii, and Arkansas?  Did they put up a fight?  The tables can be turned both ways.  And since we ruined your little Rose Bowl party last year, you're just hating cause your not going back and we are.  And by the way, to your post earlier about Leinart beating us, Most NFL people would pick Vince over Matt.  Not a homer bias.  Leinart's stock is falling fast.  Partly because he's just not playing as good as he did earlier in the season.  Partly because Vince has been getting better with every game.

First let me just say that Mike and Mike this morning picked Vince to go #2 behind Bush if he comes out. both agreed that Matt is losing steam.

I also agree with Wells, alot of text. I have a couple of points that I think were overlooked.

1. We do not have the typical ball control offense. How many 1 play drives did we have. I can't remember them all because I, unlike Wells, am not good at counting that high. We are as much of a pick your poison offensive unit as USC. Obviously when you look at the season as a whole our Offenses pretty much tie. I know "Big XII is weak, blah blah blah" Guess what so is the Pac 10. Face it it's true on both sides.
2. Our defense has not blitzed all that much and I think it would be a huge mistake to start. I say we "TRY" to shut the scariest person on the field down and make Baryshnikov beat us. I concede that their recievers are big and fast. Guess what so are Sweed, Pittman, and Cosby. Huff and company are studs. They can hang.

I know it's a cliche but I honestly believe that this will come down to who wants it more.

BON suggests the key to win the defensive matchup is to pressure Leinart and ignore Bush. Hawaii (and DC Glanville) did that in game 1 and it turned ugly. In no way am I suggesting that UT and UH are comparable, but Glanville's no slouch with an entire off-season to prepare; he was stunned with the MLs instincts and execution.

The flip side of course is to take away Bush. SC's offense has been most limited in games where the opponent focused on Bush (i.e. Cal). That being said that was Oklahoma's strategy last year, and to a certain extent, it worked: they did stop Bush. But it wasn't the outcome they wanted.

It will take a mixture of the two strategies, a couple prayers and maybe sneaking a 12th guy on the field to shutdown this offense.

You can say what you want but statistically UT has one of the best defenses in the nation and as I just posted the Big 12 is the winningest football conference in the country and they beat all comers and except for Ohio stomped every one of them.
The question is whether that UT defense is good enough to hold USC's fantastic Offense. Then you have to compare the UT offense to USC's Defense which. UT's offense shredded CU when it was highly ranked and considered a much better run defense that USC's. USC has a good Defensive line and overall lots of defensive team speed which will give up yards in the middle of the fields but with a short field ib the red zone can perform much better.
You have to give a lot of credit to Coach Carroll for devising defensive schemes that uses his defensive talent and  protects the team weaknesses.
One of the things going against UT is Coach Brown tends to become conservative in his game calling in big games and against USC you have to attack and keep them off balance.
One very interesting point about this game is how well both of these QB's read the defense. That is a skill that is not common on the college level. USC has been much stronger on defense than expected by using defense alignments to confuse the offence which will be less effective against UT. matt Leinart is only a great passer if he can set his feet, so you want to keep him moving. UT needs to blitz but they need to do it from various coverage's to hide their intent or Leinart will read it and dump the ball off to a short man.
BY the same token VY can read defenses just as well and since he throws well on the run should be able to get the ball down field.
How well USC can run will come down to how well the LBs and DBs can tackle. Reggie Bush is fast but so is the UT defense and they will get they hands on Bush the question will be if they can tackle him when they do.
The big difference between these two teams is Special Teams and UT is much better than USC. If UT can make USC punt more than 2 or 3 times they can win the game.

This game will hinge on poise and confidence. The team that can impose it's will on the other and make it lose focus will control the game

 

ACC    W-76 L-58 W%.567
SEC    W-76 L-58 W%.567
PAC 10 W-64 L-48 W%.567
Big 10 W-72 L-40 W%.610
Big 12 W-80 L-54 W%.645

As far as this goes the inter-conference games should be a wash and the W-L% should reflect extra conference play. Now either the Big 12 is a better conference or it's better at picking extra-conference cream puffs.

Not exactly a cream puff. Can't talk for the others.

Your right and that's to UT's credit, but almost every big named program does schedule less than competitive teams for the early season games which since most programs do this it evens out the W-L%. So when you take that into account UT has played a higher level of competition than USC and stomped every team of a group of more competitve teams except Ohio which they beat but in a less dominating way.

I've been looking at the full season rankings and trying to get a feel for how the units match up.  USC's offense is superb and no one can realistically contest that.  However, their numbers this year have been put up against a truly abysmal bunch of defenses.  I don't think that the "PAC-10 defenses look bad because PAC-10 offenses are so good" argument works either, because while the PAC-10 has some highly rated offenses, these occur in neither the number nor the quality to offset the shoddy defensive rankings.  By quartile rankings, USC played no one in the top quartile defensively, three in the second, two in the third (with one of them 2 spots from being in the fourth), and seven in the fourth. Of the seven in the bottom, four were ranked 102 or lower out of 117 teams.

The opponents that met the Texas defense have a somewhat better distribution.  Two were in the top quartile, three in the second, three in the third (playing one of them twice), and two in the fourth.  The best opponent was Texas Tech who ended up #2 in total offense and #3 in scoring offense.  Texas held them to a total 25 points below their season average.

Say what you want about Carroll's ability to come up with a defensive game plan over a month, but it's safe to say that USC hasn't seen a defense the likes of Texas' in a very long time, and certainly not this year.  I also wouldn't discount the fact the Texas has an excellent defensive coordinator who hasn't had a defense of his lose in 27 games.  Coach Carroll may be busy during December, but it's a safe bet Coach Chizik isn't just diagramming plays on a etch-a-sketch while waiting to go to Pasadena.

On the flip side, Texas' offense v. USC's defense, there's not a whole lot to say.  USC's defense is #40 in the nation in total defense and will have a challenge in stopping an offensive comparible to their own.  And unlike USC's offense, Vince Young  & Co. have faced some top defenses this year, most notably tOSU and A.J. Hawk.  A fun little fact I saw - Colorado finished #9 in rushing defense this year, giving up 1,143 yards total.  The Longhorns, in two games, amassed 413 of those, and accounted for 36% of the rushing yards the Buffs allowed.  Kansas was #3 in rushing defense (#1 when they played Texas), giving up 969 yards.  In one game, Texas rushed for 336 yards against them, or 34% of their season total.  In one game.

Texas is the better balanced team, I think.  They may lack a little on the flash meter, but I'd much rather have the substance.  Here's to a second Longhorn Rose Bowl win!

Hook 'em!

Scott "Fu*#in" Ware is one of the sickets hitters in college football. Just wanted to throw my friend's name out there...the guy is one dangerous mother---- !!