Carroll, Trojans insist they're happy to play in Rose Bowl
LOS ANGELES (AP) -- The USC Trojans were hoping for a bit of a BCS miracle that would vault them over a bunch of teams into the BCS championship game.
It didn't happen.
But they still get to play in the game that has been the goal of Pac-10 teams for many, many years -- the Rose Bowl.
No. 6 USC (10-2) will face No. 13 Illinois (9-3) on New Year's Day in Pasadena.
Coach Pete Carroll and the Trojans, who were No. 7 in the BCS rankings, insisted that they weren't disappointed to be playing in Pasadena and facing the Illini.
"For us seniors, it will be our last game in college football," nose tackle Sedrick Ellis said. "It will be great. We've got Illinois and we're going to make the best of it."
Carroll seemed bemused that at the end of a whacky football season across the country, the Rose Bowl will have a traditional matchup of teams from the Pac-10 and Big Ten.
"I think that's cool that that's the way it came off. I think that's kind of what we all know the Rose Bowl to be, so the fact that the (Rose Bowl) committee went that way, I can totally understand," he said.
"We're thrilled to be going to the Rose Bowl, and following last night, it's a great reward for our season to go there and we'll have a great time."
The Trojans beat crosstown rival UCLA 24-7 on Saturday.
Some of the USC players gathered in their campus cafeteria on Sunday to watch the BCS matchups announced on television.
When Illinois was named their opponent, several players said, "Yeah!" But the reaction overall was considerably more subdued than on the same occasion in several recent years, when the Trojans were fighting for the national championship.
Still, the matchup in Pasadena figures to make for an entertaining game. The Illini are explosive on offense and their campaign this year included victories over then-No. 5 Wisconsin and Ohio State when it was ranked No. 1.
"They have nothing but a highlight coach (Ron Zook), players on both sides of the ball, Juice Williams to Rashad Mendenhall, the top player in the conference, rookie of the year in the conference and maybe the best linebacker in the country in J Leman," Carroll said. "So they've got all kinds of guys and they've had a huge year and a big upswing in their momentum.
"I think it's the biggest turnaround we've heard of, the biggest turnaround from one year to the next. They've done a lot of great things and so they'll come in here rarin' to go."
Illinois went 2-10 last year, and hasn't played in a bowl since after the 2001 season.
The Trojans started the season ranked No. 1, and Stanford coach Jim Harbaugh called them one of the best teams ever. Then on Oct. 6, he coached the Cardinal to a stunning 24-23 upset over USC at the Coliseum.
The Trojans later lost to Oregon.
In a season of "ifs' for a lot of the country's better teams, the Trojans might be playing for the national title if quarterback John David Booty hadn't hurt his throwing hand.
Booty fractured the tip of his middle finger in the second quarter of the loss to Stanford, and wound up throwing four interceptions. He missed the next three games because of the injury, with backup Mark Sanchez filling in.
The Trojans beat Arizona and Notre Dame while Booty was sidelined, but lost 24-17 at Oregon. USC came back strong to finish the season with convincing wins over Oregon State, California, Arizona State and UCLA.
The loss to struggling Stanford, however, remained the big blot on USC's record.
"I don't think you can help but think about that. But that was in the past, and there's nothing we can do about it now," Ellis said. "Now we have to think about the Rose Bowl and Illinois."
As a footnote to the Rose Bowl game, USC recently put the Los Angeles Coliseum Commission on notice that it may consider moving from the Coliseum to the Rose Bowl for its home games. Negotiations will continue between the university and the commission, however, with the shift to Pasadena -- where the Trojans would share the stadium with UCLA -- a real long shot.
