The USC Trojans are going through a bit of upheaval now that Lane Kiffin is out as head coach and after sitting at home for two weeks thinking about the last loss to Arizona State, the team is ready to get back into action on Thursday when they take on the Arizona Wildcats at home at the Los Angeles Coliseum in a game that will be broadcast on Fox Sports 1.
The Trojans have had a disappointing start to the season after going 3-2 and following their latest embarrassing loss in a 62-41 defeat to Arizona State, the school decided to fire Kiffin and now Ed Orgeron will take over for the rest of the season. The team started off the season with a win over Hawaii before losing to Washington State 10-7 and after winning their next two games over Boston College and Utah State, the team fell apart mostly against Arizona State.
Click here for the Fox Sports 1 Coverage of the USC and Arizona college football game.
The team faces its second straight opponent from the state on Thursday when they host the Wildcats and the Trojans will be looking for their first win without Kiffin at the helm. The team has been trending downwards since being ranked as the preseason number one last year and after finishing 7-6 in 2012 and then getting off to this start, Pat Haden felt it was time to move on. Cody Kessler has continued to be the starting quarterback and he tossed for 295 yards last game while connecting on 20 of 29 passes and two touchdowns.
The Trojans have plenty of talent with players like Kessler and Marqise Lee and now they will get the chance to turn things around and while they might be out of the Pac-12 race after starting 0-2, they can get one in the win column on Thursday night. The team has a very anticipated game next week on the road against Notre Dame in South Bend and that will be the first of three road games in the next four weeks. After playing the Irish the Trojans will be home against Utah and then they will hit the road against Oregon State and California in back to back weeks.
The last stretch of the season has a number of tough Pac-12 games, as the Trojans will play against two ranked opponents in Stanford and UCLA and in between they will have to go on the road against Colorado. The final game against the Bruins will be a huge matchup for the Trojans and they still could put themselves in a nice bowl game with a solid finish to the season. The team is scoring just 26 points per game and the defense has not been as stout as recent years. The team is averaging less than 400 yards per game and that is a stark difference from years past.
