University Southern California Trojans
2018 Bye Week Tuesday: Notes
October 02, 2018 | Football, USC Ripsit Blog, Features
The Trojans have two weeks to prepare for Colorado and fix the mistakes from Arizona.
The bye week has arrived at the right time with several key players banged up.
- Here is the injury report, per head coach Clay Helton: OLB Porter Gustin (out - ankle), RT Chuma Edoga (out - hip), DL Malik Dorton (out - ankle), LB John Houston (out - neck), CB Isaac Taylor-Stuart (out - ankle) and WR Amon-Ra St. Brown (out - AC sprain).
- In addition, QB JT Daniels was held out yesterday and today, so he focused on footwork and conditioning. "As a freshman quarterback, you don't want him to hit that wall at the wrong time," OC Tee Martin explained. "When you have opportunities to rest him and keep him fresh, you do it. This is great timing for our bye week."
- Daniels will throw routes on air with his receivers tomorrow to continue to build chemistry, but Helton explained that USC quarterback is a "daylight to darkness job," and just like Sam Darnold the last two years, the coaches will find small breaks for him in the season.
- Helton told the team that he expects them to play eight straight weeks coming out of this bye, which would include the Pac-12 Championship Game. To do so, the Trojans likely need to beat Colorado next week. "It's a big game for us," the head coach said. "This next game kind of decides who is going to be in first place in the South."
- USC picked up a Pac-12 South win at Arizona, but the many mistakes left a bad aftertaste. "Although you win the game, it didn't feel great after the game with the finish of it," Martin said. "I like the way we started. I like the way we competed throughout, but I don't like the finish of it."
- The primary issue was penalties. Helton met with the entire team and went over in detail every single penalty from the game. "We addressed it as a team," said Martin. "We addressed it as a unit. We're going to try to move on and not have those."
- Snaps have been another consistent issue for the USC offense. Helton spent extra time after practice working with C Toa Lobendahn on his shotgun snaps. "We're trying to get rid of those three or four snaps that end up low," Helton said. "He's working hard at it. He's worked it every day."
- The offense did get a boost from the running game, including a career-high effort from senior RB Aca'Cedric Ware. "Just knowing that we needed the win," Ware explained his inspiration. "Just me being unselfish and trying to do everything I can for my team. Running backs always come to play so I knew I had to play my game and the O-line did their thing, the whole offense did their thing, and we just outplayed those guys."
- Ware sees great things ahead for this USC offense if they continue to improve. "I know, us as an offense, we're still continuing to build, still trying to find our mojo. Just continuing to work, trying to get better and better at each practice, each day. Continue to come together. Once we come together we're gonna be a great offense."
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