In Reply to: Lynn posted by donutello on January 03, 2024 at 19:59:38
However, it should be noted that the defense was completely inept against Oregon
While the defense was poor against Oregon, it was as good or better than most teams against the Ducks. Nobody could stop them for most of the season. Here are their stats for their 2nd-9th games (score/yards/yards per play):
E Washington (70-14) 604 6.8
Brigham Young (41-20) 439 6.9
Washington St (44-41) 624 8.1
Stanford (45-27) 515 7.3
Arizona (49-22) 580 8.3
UCLA (45-30) 545 7.4
California (42-24) 586 7.8
Colorado (49-10) 479 7.3
Washington (34-37) 592 7.5
Against CCU the defense had four penalties, all offsides. In the next game vs SDS the defense had four penalties, all personal fouls. Against WSU the defense had five penalties. Against Colorado they had four including two for PI. In the ASU game the defense had seven penalties including three offside and two PI. So the penalties weren't exactly cleaned up. The Murphy's never stopped with the PF's.
The defense gave up over 300 yards in two of the first eight games and four of the last five. How is that improvement?
USC football isn't exactly known for intelligent coach hiring. They had to fire one on the tarmac, let two go who made the playoffs (and a NC) in future jobs and kept one who the fans wanted fired for years.
I never said Lynn wasn't a good coach, just not worth $2 million based on one good season. USC hired another coach based on one good season: Andy Enfield.